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ATLANTA — The rain poured on Atlanta’s parade Saturday, stranding motorists in traffic, soaking long lines of tourists and washing away North Carolina from the ACC men’s basketball tournament.

Duke’s win over Maryland in Saturday’s second semifinal sent the Blue Devils into today’s championship game against Florida State, the 55th time in the 56-year history of the tournament that a North Carolina team will play for the title. As the Carolina fans streamed from the giant Georgia Dome, the Duke fans across the massive arena chanted “Drive home safely!”

It was the end of a long day for Tar Heel fans who wanted more than anything to play in the championship game against Duke. Carolina lost 73-70, then many in the large contingent of UNC fans stayed around hoping Duke, too, would lose. Mike Krzyzewski, the Blue Devils’ coach, said he listened to taunts and other “cool things” from the Carolina fans seated directly behind the Duke bench.

Even 350 miles away, the Carolina-Duke rivalry dominates everything. But in a city the size of Atlanta, it’s not always as noticeable. Saturday was the day of the annual St. Patrick’s Day parade through downtown here, an event that snarled traffic all the way out to the eight-lane highways winding through the city and created waits of up to an hour for people trying to drive to the arena.

Heavy rain made matters worse.

The game today will cap a long and trying week for the men’s ACC tournament, which will return to Greensboro in 2010. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution referred to Greensboro as the “hometown of the ACC” in a recent story, and after a three-year run of tournaments away from home, most agreed it will be good to get back.

Many people from Greensboro are in Atlanta for the games, some of them for the parties afterward and some to observe the efforts it takes to hold such an event. Matt Brown, the managing director of the Greensboro Coliseum, has been here all week and said he understands why the ACC wants to be in Atlanta occasionally.

“It’s attractive for them because of Georgia Tech, and it’s a major city in the South,” Brown said. “It’s a natural for them to come to this venue from time to time. It’s a natural for the ACC to want to capture this market down here. It certainly doesn’t feel like Tobacco Road by any stretch of the imagination, but it is what it is.”

Ticket sales this year were off due to the economic downturn and the abundance of seats in the big dome, an indoor football stadium large enough to hold Martinsville Speedway. The conference sold out the lower bowl of 26,000 seats and held the first public sale of tickets for the event since 1966. Only about 500 fans sat in the upper deck of the arena Saturday, but going into the final day, attendance per session is the second-largest in tournament history.

The largest crowds the ACC ever attracted for its annual tournament came in 2001 when an average of more than 36,000 saw each session in Atlanta.

Duke won that year, defeating Maryland in the final, and the Blue Devils have not won an ACC championship since.

“Just playing in the championship game is an honor,” Krzyzewski said.

A win by Florida State today would make the Seminoles one of three schools to have won only one tournament championship. North Carolina teams have won 47 of the 55 tournaments since it began in 1954.

This has been a North Carolina event since then. The first 13 ACC tournaments were played in Raleigh, 12 have been played in Charlotte and 21 have been held in Greensboro.

A long line of fans dressed in various shades of blue stood outside in the rain Saturday as the parade went past. Car horns honked and taxi drivers darted in and out of traffic and a city went about its business. Nothing suggested the ACC tournament was even in town.

Atlanta swallows up almost anything that comes in, and that’s not a bad thing. The energy here this weekend has been different from it is in any of the other six cities that have played host to the event. Long waits in shuttles going back and forth from downtown hotels and even longer waits in traffic flowing from the highways made it less than a collegial feel.

A man wearing a Duke rain poncho glared as he waited for a taxi in front of a downtown hotel Saturday morning.

“I’ve been standing here for 30 minutes,” he said. “Why can’t we just keep this in Greensboro and be done with it?”

Duke will play Florida State today for the ACC championship, then we’ll all meet again next year in Greensboro.

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