CHARLOTTE, N.C. — College football is out of control, the economics involved becoming so extraordinary that football’s gravitational force is warping the very boundaries of college sports in which it exists. As the ACC reckons with where it fits in this new landscape, at least one coach has come to regret his role in how things got this way.
Mack Brown, at Texas, pushed the envelope as far as it could be pushed, and … it worked! Brown indeed delivered the Longhorns their long-sought national title, earning the ring he wore Thursday at ACC Kickoff, the one day a year he brings out that bling since returning to Chapel Hill.
But as North Carolina and the ACC may soon face a choice between chasing the Big Ten and SEC into a world of semi-professionalism or sticking to the principles on which the ACC was founded almost 70 years ago and being left behind, Brown now finds himself losing the same football power struggle he once won.
