johnnyroadtrip.com - ACC Basketball Tournament Information

The ACC Tournament - The Granddaddy of College Hoops Tourneys

The inaugural ACC Tournament was held in 1954, in Raleigh, NC. The tournament drew 39,200 over the course of the weekend, with only Saturday's games drawing a sellout. Since that weekend, the ACC Tournament has become the most popular and hotly contested tournaments in all of college basketball. When the tourney was held at the Georgia Dome in 2001, attendance was 182,525, an average of 36,505 per session.

The ACC is composed of 12 schools (Boston College, Clemson, Duke, Florida State, Georgia Tech, Maryland, Miami, North Carolina, North Carolina State, Virginia, Virginia Tech, and Wake Forest) in the south Atlantic region. The conference is known for its great basketball tradition, a tradition that dates back to the conference's founding in 1953. The annual tournament is the showpiece of that tradition.

The tournament is held at various sites (usually in North Carolina) over a four-day period. Thursday's sessions match the 5th through 12th-place teams in the league in two doubleheaders beginning at noon and 7 pm. Friday also features two doubleheaders beginning at noon and 7 pm. Saturday's semifinals match the Friday winners beginning at 1:30. Sunday's championship game begins at 1:00.

ACC Tournament Tickets

There has not been a public sale of ACC Tournament tickets since 1966. All tickets to the tourney are divided equally among the league's schools; if you're not a high-paying booster of one of those schools, you can forget about buying tickets in advance.

Therefore, unless you're a student or a friend or family member of a player, you'll be buying your tickets on the street or through a broker. While buying through a broker will guarantee your seats, without the hassles of looking for tickets at the arena, it also guarantees a high price. If you're the adventurous type, you're probably better off buying on the street.

Tourney tickets are sold in booklets, with each booklet containing a separate ticket for each session. Face value is determined by the number of games in that session (one on Thursday and Sunday, two on Friday and Saturday). There are five sessions total. Booklets can be broken up so that the tickets can be used individually, by different people.

Demand for tickets is very dependent on the matchups, or potential matchups, that the tournament will provide. First round sessions are always very easy to get, and while you're buying these you should be checking out prices on the semifinals and finals. The prices you'll find on Thursday or Friday for these games will vary tremendously, and will change as teams are eliminated. If two great teams are headed for the final, the prices will soar. If there's an upset, tickets to the final become cheap. We recommend buying weekend tickets as soon as you find a price you are comfortable with, because there is no way to predict whether prices will go up or down as the weekend progresses.

Take 2002 as an example: Duke and Maryland, ranked 1 and 2 in the national polls, were headed for a Sunday showdown. Tickets for Sunday's title game (face value $30) were going for about $80 on Friday, and at least $150 on Saturday morning. When Maryland lost to NC State Saturday, prices began dropping immediately, from about $100 per ticket immediately after the game, to $20 each 30 minutes after the game, to approximately $0 per ticket on Sunday; that's right, people were literally giving their tickets away the morning of the game. It is our guess that had Maryland and Duke played, tickets would have been upwards of $250 each on Sunday morning.

The costliest tickets to obtain are usually Saturday's, because the ACC semifinals traditionally are tightly contested battles, and four teams (and their fans) are involved instead of only two. Sunday's game typically interests only fans of the competing teams, barring a powerhouse matchup.

So, the lesson here is, be smart about the matchups; buy early for Saturday and Sunday games; and if you're holding a ticket for Sunday and you're skipping town because your team lost on Saturday, sell that ticket immediately after the game (inside the arena) or you might be holding worthless paper.

To buy ACC Tournament tickets now, click here.

ACC Travel Information

Fans from all ACC schools travel to the tournament. The ACC is a fairly compact conference geographically, and many fans are within driving distance of the tournament site. Therefore, you should book your hotels early, especially if the tourney is held in a smaller city such as Greensboro. Click here for a list of Greensboro hotels.

Future ACC Tournament Sites and Dates

The ACC Tournament is always held in early March, and runs from Thursday night (opening game) through Sunday (championship).

2009 - March 12-15, Georgia Dome, Atlanta, GA

2010 - March 11-14, Greensboro Coliseum, Greensboro, NC

2011 - March 10-13, Greensboro Coliseum, Greensboro, NC

2012 - March 8-11, Georgia Dome, Atlanta, GA

2013 - Greensboro Coliseum, Greensboro, NC

2014 - Greensboro Coliseum, Greensboro, NC

2015 - Greensboro Coliseum, Greensboro, NC