Duke's Mason Plumlee and N.C. State's Richard Howell were first-team all-ACC selections. Credit: CHUCK LIDDY

The Triangle schools were well represented on the media’s all-ACC teams released Monday. Duke, North Carolina and N.C. State combined for 13 representatives on the first, second, third and freshman teams as selected by the 77 voters of Atlantic Coast Sports Media Association.

Duke’s Mason Plumlee was led all players with 226 points and 73 out of a possible 77 first-place votes. Plumlee finished the regular season ranked second in the league in scoring (17.3 points per game), rebounding (10.3 boards per game) and field goal percentage (58.9 percent). He led the ACC with 17 double-doubles. Duke has had a first-team All-ACC selection in six straight seasons.

N.C. State’s Richard Howell was also a first-team selection with 192 points and 46 1st-place votes. Howell and Plumlee were the only two players to average a double-double in league play, and the N.C. State senior led the league in rebounding with an average of 10.6 rebounds per game.

My all-ACC ballot, annotated.

Player of the year: Erick Green, Virginia Tech. In the end, I couldn’t ignore the fact that Green is leading the entire country in scoring, not just the conference. That includes the small-conference machine-gun scorers like Nate Wolters, Lamont “Momo” Jones and Doug McDermott, guys who aren't playing against ACC defenders on a nightly basis.

Duke and North Carolina will have Thursday off in the ACC Tournament, N.C. State will not.

Virginia's 61-58 overtime win over Maryland on Sunday night clinched the No. 4 seed, and the final opening-round bye, for the Cavaliers.

N.C. State, which finished 11-7 in the ACC and in fifth place, will play on Thursday against 12th-seeded Virginia Tech. The other three games on Thursday in Greensboro will be: Boston College-Georgia Tech, Maryland-Wake Forest and Florida State-Clemson.

Three Points from N.C. State's 71-67 loss at Florida State:

1) Desperate times

N.C. State played 31 regular-season games, how many times during the season did the Wolfpack play with true desperation? How many times did the Wolfpack play with conspicuous urgency?

The answer matters because talent alone doesn't define greatness. It's the combination of talent with desire and the ability of a group to play with a purpose and above the level of the sum of their parts.

Florida State handed N.C. State a ticket for a bye in the ACC tournament and then the Seminoles took it away.

Freshman guard Devon Bookert scored eight of his 18 points in the final 3 minutes to carry Florida State to a 71-67 home win over the Wolfpack on Saturday afternoon in Tallahassee, Fla.

N.C. State (22-9, 11-7 ACC) only needed a win to clinch a spot in the quarterfinals of the ACC tournament and avoid having to play on Thursday. The Wolfpack beat FSU by 18 points in Raleigh two and half weeks ago and led by as many as eight points in the second half on Saturday.

N.C. State outlasted Duke and North Carolina in the pursuit of top recruit Julius Randle but the Wolfpack didn't make it to the finish line.

Randle, a 6-9 forward from Dallas and the No. 3 prospect in the class of 2013, has eliminated N.C. State from his final list, according to ESPN's Dave Telep.

Kentucky, Florida, Kansas and Texas made Randle's final four, according to Telep. Randle will announce his decision on ESPNU on March 20.

With a win over Virginia on Thursday night, Florida State opened the door for N.C. State to earn a bye in the ACC tournament.

N.C. State, 11-6 in the ACC, would clinch an opening-round bye with a win over FSU on Saturday. The Wolfpack would be the No. 3 seed if Duke (13-4) beats UNC (12-5) on Saturday in Chapel Hill. State would be the No. 4 seed with a win and a UNC home win on Saturday.

Three Points from N.C. State's 81-66 win over Wake Forest:

1) A new approach

Basically, N.C. State spent the first 25 games of the season trying to out-score its opponents. Given the Wolfpack's scoring firepower, that wasn't a bad strategy (the Pack went 18-7 in those games) but it also wasn't the best.

N.C. State has been a different team on defense over the past five games. The Pack has been more active with more steals, which leads to easy points in transition, and has allowed fewer points.

RALEIGH N.C. State let a 16-point lead slip away at Wake Forest in January. C.J. Leslie wouldn't let that happen on Wednesday night, not in the Wolfpack's final home game of the season, not with the real season about to begin.

Leslie's 19 points and 10 rebounds helped N.C. State throttle Wake Forest 81-66 for the Pack's sixth win in seven games and third straight at home by double-digits. N.C. State (22-8, 11-6 ACC) closed out its home schedule with a 16-1 record, including an 8-1 mark in the ACC.

It was the final home game together for State's veteran quartet of Leslie, Richard Howell, Scott Wood and Lorenzo Brown. Howell and Wood were honored on Senior Night and then Leslie proceeded to do the heavy lifting.

ATLANTA — Nothing is ever easy for N.C. State team and it wasn't on Sunday but the Wolfpack found a way to pick up a needed road win.

With 18 points from Richard Howell in the first half, and 11 from C.J. Leslie in the second half, the Wolfpack beat Georgia Tech 70-57 in another physical, deliberate, ACC basketball game best suited for Tums stockholders and amnesiacs.

The Wolfpack, as it has all season, put together a stretch brilliance, which was enough to carry it to a 14-point lead in the first half, but the Yellow Jackets jammed the tempo of the game into a grinder, like sausage into casing.