By FRANK DASCENZO
Herald-Sun
The stars of ACC basketball are fairly obvious.
Wake Forest's Tim Duncan is a leading candidate for national player of the year.
North Carolina's Antawn Jamison is a force inside.
Maryland's Keith Booth is respected throughout the league.
Duke's Trajan Langdon is the ACC's leading 3-point shooter and the Blue Devils' best player.
Georgia Tech's Matt Harpring has put up impressive numbers despite playing on the league's worst team.
Argue if you must whether this should be All-ACC first team, but the point is theirs are household names.
But two who have - or by now should have - caught the attention of lots of folks are Duke junior Steve Wojciechowski and North Carolina rookie Ed Cota.
Wojciechowski has been invaluable for the 23-6 Blue Devils.
There was a play in Duke's 81-69 victory Thrusday night over Maryland that typified the season Wojciechowski is having.
Seemingly trapped by two Terps, Wojciechowski fell to his knees, kept dribbling, turned in front of the Duke bench and went down the floor for a score.
Duke (12-3 in the ACC) is a good team - one of the best in the nation - for a lot of reasons. But Wojciechowski is one big reason, and could very well be the teams most valuable player.
Check this out: Wojciechowski's assist-to-turnover ratio in ACC games is an amazing 2.3-to-1. In all games, it's 3-to-1. To go along with the obvious is his improved outside shooting. Teams make a big mistake leaving him alone on the perimeter. He has made 19 3-pointers against ACC teams, same as teammates Jeff Capel and Roshown McLeod.
The Wojciechowski work ethic also has typified the way the Blue Devils have played, especially in the ACC. He ahs shown an impressive balance on offense and defense and, because of that, has been just what the Devils badly needed - a quality point guard.
On the defensive end, Wojciechowski leads Duke with 37 steals vs. ACC teams (75 overall).
Wojciechowski has set the table often this winter for the Duke scorers - Langdon, moving on the perimeter and hunting the 3-pointer. McLeod, inside or outside. And Capel, whose experience is going to be a badly needed commodity in postseason games.
Common sense says Wojciechowski should be a lock for second-team All-ACC. No player in the league has improved as much from one year tot he next as the Duke guard.
At North Carolina, Cota has had some stunning games. And one could easily build a case that the reason the Heels have turned their season around is because of this freshman.
Comparing UNC's first half of the ACC season with the second half might be amazing in itself, but check out what Cota has done in the first half/second half sequences:
In UNC's first eight ACC games, Cota averaged 5.5 assists, has 4.4 turnovers and averages 4.4 points.
In UNC's last seven ACC games (all wins, by the way), he is averaging 7.7 assists, 2.9 turnovers and 9.3 points.
He leads the ACC in assists with 165, and has 91 turnovers. No freshman in the country has more assists than Cota.
Cota had 10 assists, one turnover and scored 14 points Feb. 6 against Florida State. Two days later he had eight assists - seven in the first half - against Virginia.
Cota is bidding to become the first freshman since Georgia Tech's Kenny Anderson in 1990 to lead the ACC in assists. The last UNC player to do it was Jimmy Black in 1982.
It's not just Cota's numbers that have been instrumental in helping the Tar Heels to go 8-0 in February after a 3-5 January record.
Cota, remember, made the game-winning basket with four seconds remaining Feb. 12 at N.C. State. That was UNC's first road win in the ACC. And the passes he has thrown to Vince Carter, going to the basket. Don't forget that.
Cota should be a strong candidate for ACC rookie of the year.
Just two reasons why Duke and North Carolina should be excited about the month of March.