Usually it's just coachspeak: The Atlantic Coast Conference women's basketball tournament is a wide-open an affair that anybody can win.
Not this year. Not with five of the 12 teams ranked in the latest Top 25 poll and a sixth on the cusp of the national rankings.
That adds up to an unpredictable four-day tournament run beginning Thursday.
''If you can make it through each day and get to Sunday, it's a pretty spectacular affair,'' Duke coach Joanne P. McCallie said. ''I can't think of a better way to grow our team. ... Especially competition that we're familiar with. That makes it more exciting and more difficult, because we know each other so well. If you're part of balloons coming down on Sunday, you're pretty special.''
McCallie's eighth-ranked Blue Devils (26-3) are the defending champions and hold the No. 1 seed, so there's little question they're the team to beat. But there's no shortage of capable challengers.
No. 10 Miami (26-3) - the regular-season co-champion with Duke - is seeded second, giving the league two top-10 teams in the tournament for the 15th time. No. 14 Florida State (23-6) and No. 13 Maryland (23-6) are seeded third and fourth, and No. 19 North Carolina (22-7) is the No. 6 seed. Additionally, fifth-seeded Georgia Tech (21-9) is receiving votes in the poll.
Having so many ranked teams in the field ''makes it exciting to see how this is going to play out,'' Georgia Tech coach Machelle Joseph said.
The prime challenger to Duke's bid for a repeat tournament title might be a Miami team coached by a former Blue Devil great and led by the league's top two scorers.
Katie Meier led the Hurricanes to their highest finish in the ACC since joining the league for the 2004-05 season. Riquna Williams leads the conference with an average of 21.7 points while teammate Shenise Johnson is right behind her at 19.6 points per game.
Now Miami is looking to take the next step by finding success in the postseason. The Hurricanes' 1-6 record in the ACC tournament is the worst of any team, and they've gone one-and-done five straight years.
''I'm thrilled with the progress that we've made this year, and we just had an absolute blast in the regular season,'' said Meier, who starred at Duke in the 1980s. ''It's been kind of a magical little run for us, and we are very excited and will play excited ... excited to get to Greensboro and really continue with the momentum that we built throughout the conference season.''
Another team from Florida - Florida State - also has run into struggles in the conference tournament. Sue Semrau's Seminoles claimed a first-round bye for the third straight year but continue to chase their first trip to the championship game.
''We've been a team, the last two years, that's won a share of the ACC regular-season championship, and nobody has a ring on their finger for that,'' Semrau said. ''The ACC tournament is the one where the ACC recognizes the champion. You can look at the season that you had and you can look at the goals - what did you achieve? ... That's what makes it fun. I think it's extremely difficult to play three games in three days in this caliber of basketball.''
Indeed, the event has long been dominated by Duke, Maryland and North Carolina - which have combined to win the last 11 championships. While the Terrapins are streaking, having won 20 games for the seventh straight year, the Tar Heels appear headed in the opposite direction.
North Carolina enters on a four-game losing streak and for the second consecutive year failed to claim a first-round bye - an almost unthinkable plight for a program that won the tournament four straight years from 2006-09.
''I think we've just got to refocus a little bit - maybe a couple players putting too much pressure on themselves,'' coach Sylvia Hatchell said. ''I don't know if we're the worst team in the country that's 22-7 ... but they've got another chance to prove something.''
