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WINSTON-SALEM -- Wake Forest will head back to the Sunshine State this weekend and try to avoid being sucked into the ACC's black hole. Coming off its worst game since Jim Grobe pulled the Deacons out of the dark ages, Wake must deal with Miami and hope it can break away from the league's center of gravity, a force that seems to be pulling the entire conference in on itself.

The national spotlight has become a glare as BCS analysts take shots at the league's inability to produce a clear leader. Though grouping Wake in that criticism sounds harsh, it's still something of a compliment to a school that redefined losing during the 20th century. At 4-2, the Deacs are in good shape historically. But at 2-1 in the Atlantic Division, they are in danger of becoming just another ACC team. And they have a lot of company.

Virginia Tech and Clemson looked strong early, and as recently as two weeks ago Wake Forest and North Carolina appeared to be lining up for would have been an ACC championship game of historic proportions. The teams are not scheduled to play this year.

Maryland looked to be cooked after two weeks, and Virginia looked to be headed for ignominy after about two quarters against Southern Cal. But a pecking order has been impossible to maintain, and when Wake went up to Maryland last weekend and lost 26-0, the picture became hopelessly muddled.

N.C. State and Clemson look to be out of it, but it might be folly to say that even now. Georgia Tech is the only ACC team with three conference wins. Beyond that, every team in the league, including Duke, is for all intents and purposes tied.

Grobe seemed genuinely concerned about his team Tuesday as he assessed the loss to Maryland. He was concerned his team took a step back just when it needed to be moving forward. He was concerned his offense has become stagnant. He was concerned injuries will have an effect on this week's game at Miami and maybe even games down the road.

But he's not concerned about the league standings. This is about the way he thought it would be back when everyone was talking about Clemson playing for a national title.

"Early in the year I tried to tell people that's how I thought the league would be," Grobe said. "I really didn't see anybody, even Clemson, that I thought could breeze through this league. It's proven to be a little more true than I even thought."

Of course, take a look at any conference in America at any time in history and you'll see roughly the same thing. The difference with the ACC this season is there are no dominant teams. Not even one.

Three teams went into the weekend ranked last week, and all three lost. Almost all the favored teams lost, and Clemson lost at home to a team that's now leading the league against all reason -- Georgia Tech.

"I suspected there wasn't a dominant team in the league," Grobe said. "But now it seems every team in the league has a chance to beat everybody. The way Maryland played us Saturday, they impressed me. Boston College got a great win against Virginia Tech. I know they're on a roll. Virginia's probably playing as good as anybody right now. It's crazy. It's just crazy."

Nationally, with no team playing for the title and any number of ACC teams slipping into and out of the rankings, the league has come up for some ridicule. But that's the nature of things. Even in the polls, the top teams have almost all been beaten, then scrutinized and torn down, only to see every one of them climb back into the national picture.

There's a reason for that. Other than the SEC, they all play in leagues with no center of gravity. The power conferences traditionally produce a couple of strong teams and eight or nine weak sisters. The Big 12 has bucked the tradition and has become the first league in a generation to challenge the SEC for national superiority.

When the expansion of the ACC was completed and Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College were added, it was thought the ACC would go the way of the other leagues around the country. It was thought that Virginia Tech and the Florida schools would dominate and schools such as Wake and Duke would fall to the bottom and every other team would struggle to keep the leaders in sight.

What happened, of course, was that the ACC kept its identity and pulled Virginia Tech and the Florida schools to the middle. Wake's ascendancy has been a much bigger surprise than Miami, FSU and Virginia Tech's descent.

And now Duke has arrived, in its fashion.

Longtime observes saw this coming, but no one believed them. Grobe saw it coming, too, but no one listened.

The noise you hear now is Wake kicking and screaming trying to not be dragged into the darkness of the ACC, where the 5-5 teams used to dwell, where bowl teams went to die.

Contact Ed Hardin at 373-7069 or ed.hardin@news-record.com