ACC Basketball in North Carolina: Thursday’s ACC Tournament Seeds, Odds, Spreads, and Totals

The 2026 ACC Tournament is going more or less as expected, except that no one knows quite what to expect from North Carolina with blue-chip forward Caleb Wilson out for the rest of the campaign. The Tar Heels had to wait until late Wednesday night to find out that they'll play Clemson in a respective No. 4 versus No. 5 seed quarterfinal this Thursday. The event's No. 1 seed, Duke, knew sooner that No. 8-seeded Florida State would be the Blue Devils' antagonist in another of Thursday's quarterfinals.

How many surprises can there be when the tourney's top seed also ranks first in Division 1? There could be upsets afoot in any case, especially given the tough field of rivals Duke must contend with. The ACC Tournament's final eight includes lower seeds who not only have the talent to reach the championship round, but who are hungrier to improve their potential March Madness resume.

Look no further than No. 2-seeded Virginia and No. 7-seeded North Carolina State, set to clash inside Spectrum Center in the conference tourney's first quarterfinal matchup of the afternoon.

NC State will try to defend better from the outset when the Wolfpack takes on the Virginia Cavaliers in the ACC Tournament quarterfinals Thursday at noon EST. North Carolina State just survived a crazy second-round tilt with Pittsburgh in which 101 combined first-half points were scored. 

UVA arrives having won 12 of its last 13 games to get to 27-4 on the season. Senior guard Jacan White is the trey-shooting specialist on a squad led by the 23-year-old forward Thijs De Ridder. Virginia ranks atop the Atlantic Coast Conference in scoring offense and third in the ACC in scoring defense, a lethal combination that helped UVA crush NCSU 90-61 when the teams last met on Feb. 24.

Sophomore guard Paul McNeil and the 20-12 Wolfpack went 0-2 against the Cavs this regular season. If they can reverse the trend and upset Virginia to advance to Friday's semifinals, it would go a long way to ensure the Wolfpack a conventional March Madness seed instead of a First Four berth or an NIT invite. Virginia is a consensus money line favorite, though not by a mile, in a game with a healthy O/U total.

It doesn't matter how many points Cameron Boozer has scored this season, or at least it won't matter to gamblers who follow head-to-head trends above all. Duke is about to take on a Florida State squad that the Blue Devils had a devil of a time defeating 91-87 in the regular season. The Blue Devils and the underdog Seminoles are set to tip off in the ACC's quarterfinal round on Thursday at 7 p.m. EST. 

FSU forward Chauncey Wiggins and the Seminoles were able to frustrate the No. 1-ranked Blue Devils like few other teams on Saturday, Jan 3, outpacing Boozer's club 14 treys to 12 and losing mostly due to Duke's 23-of-25 foul-stripe effort. Wiggins leads the 18-14 'Noles with a 37.6% mark from downtown.

FSU will try to take advantage of Duke missing its key guard, Caleb Foster, along with multiple big men in the paint. The 29-2 Blue Devils have won eight in a row, boasting a record of 3-1 on neutral hardwood. The less said to Florida State fans about FSU's betting odds for Thursday's quarterfinals, the better. 

The 23-9 Clemson Tigers, now preparing for Thursday's 9:30 p.m. EST elimination game with the 24-7 UNC Tar Heels, made easy work of Wake Forest on Wednesday night. Too easy, as far as speculators are concerned. Clemson's skeptical odds to win Thursday's quarterfinal are influenced by the notion that Wake wasn't the best competition, compared to the second-seeded and 24-7 overall UNC squad.

Clemson outrebounded Wake 38-30 in the Tigers' 71-62 victory to begin their postseason. The 6-foot-10 senior Nick Davidson's seven rebounds off the bench were impressive, but Wake Forest has been bad on the glass for most of the 2025-26 season. The Tigers' best trait on Wednesday was grabbing turnovers and turning them into points, showing North Carolina that the ACC's sharper teams have weeded out ragtag squads already. UNC has a small margin of error with Wilson sidelined for the rest of spring.

The phenomenal junior Henri Veesaar is under pressure to carry North Carolina in March. The chameleon of a scoring threat went 5-of-7 from the field against Duke in UNC's 76-61 loss to end the regular season, though he was held to just one three-pointer on two attempts. Justin Backer of Sports Illustrated writes of UNC's scenario, "heading into the ACC Tournament without their best (Wilson), the Tar Heels will look to prove that they can win games without him." We'll see if Veesaar is motivated by being so overlooked.