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The Atlantic Coast Conference is probably the most storied NCAA basketball conference in the country, and arguably the most successful. Four teams from the ACC have won the NCAA tournament – Duke, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina State University and The University of Maryland at College Park – and several others, such as the University of Virginia, Wake Forest University and Georgia Institute of Technology have all made the Final Four. It’s a murderer’s row of schools with tradition and passion for the game, and they’ve produced some of the most outstanding professionals in addition to their success in college.

ACC basketball was where Michael Jordan, for one, cut his teeth as an undergrad. He played for the University of North Carolina for three seasons, winning the national championship as a freshman and being in consideration for NCAA player of the year as a junior. He didn’t win the award – fellow ACC basketball player Ralph Sampson of the University of Virginia did. Sampson obviously didn’t have the impact in the National Basketball Association that Jordan did, but he was arguably a better college player, leading the Cavaliers to three straight Final Four appearances and dominating in a way no big man had since Bill Walton of the University of California at Los Angeles.

In recent years the ACC basketball landscape has been much the same as it was thirty years ago. The “Haves” are the likes of University of North Carolina, Duke and Wake Forest. Other programs such as the University of Maryland and Georgia Institute of Technology have had two to five year spurts where they compete with the big boys, but they haven’t put together dominant programs that compete year-in, year-out for decades. Maryland may eventually get there – they have one of the most progressive athletic departments in the country and a rabid fanbase – but you can only say “might,” not “definitely will.” ACC basketball is so competitive that there’s no such thing as a sure thing.

So while the landscape hasn’t changed much at the top, it’s been rearranged and expanded a bit in the middle and bottom. ACC basketball added three programs this decade: Boston College, the Virginia Institute of Technology and the University of Miami. The decision was made in order to expand the conference’s regional footprint, and all three programs joined the ACC at the expense of the ACC’s biggest rival – the Big East Conference. As a result there is significant bad blood between the two.

Of course, that bad blood makes for exciting games. Whenever and ACC basketball team meets a Big East team, you can rest assured both sides will be giving their all for the full 40 minutes.
Are you aware of the adult diabetes symptoms? You should. Diabetes is a disease that affects close to 8% of the US population. However, there are a growing number of people who dont even know that they have diabetes. Going unchecked, diabetes can lead to some serious health complication. Thanks to advances in treatment and prevention, diabetes has become a manageable disease. There are several adult diabetes symptoms that should serve as a red flag.

One of the most common adult diabetes symptoms is fatigue. This isnt your normal end of the day run down. Diabetes causes a break down in your metabolism. You can no longer properly process glucose as an energy source. Therefore the body turns to your fat cells for fuel. Although that might sound like a great diet, it is actually harmful when diabetes is the cause and you become constantly weaken as the result.

Unexplained weight loss is another one of the adult diabetes symptoms to be on the look out for. Unexplained means you havent changed your diet but are still losing weight. This is because you are unable to process the amount of calories you take in.

The unexplained weight loss ties into excessive thirst and excessive urination as two more adult diabetes symptoms. With diabetes youll have high blood sugar levels that will kick your kidneys into overdrive as they try to reabsorb the excessive sugar in your bloodstream. The kidneys send an S.O.S. to the brain to help dilute the blood which means drinking more. Obviously when you drink more you have to expel that. The body tries to get rid of the build up of sugar through excessive urinating.

Although you might not always be able to see this in action, another one of the adult diabetes symptoms is poor wound healing. If you have a cut that takes a very long time to heal this could mean that high blood sugar levels are blocking white blood cells from doing their healing duty. This suppression of your immune system can also lead to an increase in infections.

You can also add blurred vision and alter mental status to this list of adult diabetes symptoms. Becoming easily irritated, losing focus or having blurred vision could mean that diabetes is causing your body to malfunction. If you feel that you persistently have one or more of these adult diabetes symptoms, check in with your doctor.
Abuse of drugs has been a near constant since the down of civilization. Alcohol, of course, has been around for nearly six thousand years, and alcoholism has been around for just as long. Other drugs like tobacco, marijuana, cocaine and heroin are nearly as old.

The poppy, which grows best and originates from central asia (Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Krgyzistan and Uzbekistan are all massive poppy producers, as is Iran – which has the highest percentage of heroin addicts of any country in the industrialized world), is the basic component of heroin and opium and is in many ways the most dangerous starting point in the abuse of drugs. This isn’t because poppy based narcotics are inherently any more dangerous than drugs like tobacco, alcohol and marijuana, but because along with heroin comes the added risk of transmitting HIV/AIDS through the use of hypodermic needles. Even in spite of this risk, heroin has such addictive properties that addicts will ignore the potential consequences and “pop skin”, as the kids say, to get their fix.

Of course heroin abuse is well down the list in the race for most deaths caused by the abuse of drugs. Here in the Americas, far and away the greatest killers are alcohol and tobacco. The number one cause of death in the United States of America, Canada and Mexico is heart disease, which is caused and inflamed by smoking more than any other risk factor. Smoking tobacco causes fatty deposits to build up in your arteries and veins. These fatty deposits can then break off and travel down your arteries to your heart, causing a cardiac incident. Tobacco also, of course, increases your risk of suffering from stroke, diabets, arthritis and a whole host of other inflammatory diseases. Quite simply, smoking is the worst thing you can do to yourself if you want to live a long, healthy life.

Alcohol is nearly as bad. Prolonged alcohol abuse can lead to problems like high triglycerides, which itself can cause heart disease to become more acute and disabling. Then there are more direct consequences like scirossis of the liver, kidney failure, ulcers, colon cancer, acid reflux disease and a nearly endless list of other health complications. Unlike tobacco, though, alcohol can actually have beneficial effects when used in moderation. A glass of wine a day has been shown by many studies to improve blood circulation, meaning many folks with heart disease or diabetes are encouraged to indulge every now and again. The problem is when that glass of wine turns into three or four – this negates the positives and actually causes the negatives.

And this is without even mentioning deaths caused by drunk driving, one of the most obvious abuse of drugs out there. If you’ve had more than you should, please find a designated driver.