Following 48 hours of conference realignment that left the Pac-12 sitting with just four teams (Washington State, Oregon State, Cal and Stanford), the ACC presidents met on Friday night to discuss the next steps of conference realignment, according to a report from Ross Dellenger of Yahoo!.
Per Dellenger, the ACC “seriously explored” adding 5-7 Pac-12 schools as the conference’s uncertain future loomed. Now with Colorado, Arizona, Arizona State and Utah bolting to the Big 12, while Washington and Oregon departed to the Big 10, the most attractive football schools from the west coast have now found new homes elsewhere.
What’s next for the ACC is anybody’s guess. The conference’s current Grant of Rights runs through 2036, but the financial implications of the television deal signed by former commissioner John Swafford and ESPN prior to his retirement puts member schools in a precarious situation. The ACC’s deal was signed prior to the massive television contracts put together by the SEC with ESPN and the Big Ten with Fox, CBS and NBC, and puts the conference well behind its counterparts on an out-year basis.
With the future uncertain, Florida State very publicly began laying the groundwork for a potential departure. However, it won’t be easy for the Seminoles to leave the ACC. With 13 years remaining on the “ironclad” Grant of Rights, it remains to be seen how Florida State leaves the conference without paying an unprecedented exit fee.
The Seminoles want an updated revenue sharing model that pays the bona fide football stalwarts of the conference more than other member schools to get a bigger piece of the pie in the ACC. But making such a change for the most lucrative ACC brands like Florida State, Clemson, Miami and North Carolina would surely cause issues with other schools across the conference.
Since the ACC sat on its hands as other conferences negotiated with the exiting Pac-12 schools, the conference is left with scraps. Cal and Stanford are academic brands that would fit the ACC’s profile, but both have struggled on the football field and in men’s basketball in recent years, making the fit imperfect. Washington State and Oregon State could be adds out of necessity, but neither make too much sense for the ACC either.
Could the conference look to poach some up-and-coming football brands from the Group of Five? Perhaps an addition like James Madison, a school that had a long track record of success at the FCS level until its recent elevation to the FBS could make some sense. Appalachian State has been one of the best college football brands in the Group of Five over the better part of the last decade. Geographically it would be in the conference’s footprint, and could add football value as well.
There are no easy answers for the ACC, but it’s clear that this latest round of conference realignment - one which has shaken the sport to its core - is far from finished.
