Sunday, September 6, 2009

Bad Start For the ACC; Is This a BCS League?


The ACC isn't a football power ... even if they'd like to be. It's a basketball conference who likes to dabble in football to make that bank. They've screwed up the hoops side of things chasing the money.

I don't know how the ACC keeps its BCS slot. Virginia Tech's win over Cincinnati in the Orange Bowl last year was the league's first BCS win in forever. They never put two teams in the BCS bowls in the same season.

Meanwhile, Utah and Boise State are winning those BCS games and BYU is beating Oklahoma.

The BYU win is relevant since the ACC showed its lack of muscle on the opening day of the college football season.

Duke lost at home to Richmond. Sure, the Spiders are defending FCS champions ... but this is a BCS school losing to a FCS school ... again!

Duke wasn't the lone ACC team losing to a Championship Subdivision school: Virginia lost to William & Mary, 26-14. Unlike Richmond, William & Mary isn't a FCS power. This is their first opening game win since 2001 and first win over a FBS school since 1998 (and that was against lowly Temple).

Baylor went into Wake Forest and beat the Deacs. Not a surprise, but this was a game that Wake could've won.

In the two big games that involved ACC teams this week saw the league lose both contests. Virginia Tech fought hard but were beaten by Alabama, 34-24. On Thursday, NC State lost to South Carolina in Raleigh, 7-3.

As I'm typing this, Maryland is down to California 45-13 (note: it ended up finishing 52-13).

On Monday, the league's two football "powers" go at it as Miami faces off against Florida State. Wonder if the announcers will talk about the possibility of Bobby Bowden getting penalized several wins? Or how the Miami head coach is on the hot seat?

Yeah, North Carolina, Clemson, Georgia Tech and Boston College cruised to wins over FCS schools. And in that Clemson game, star back C.J. Spiller left the game with an injury. But none of that makes you believe in the league.

I hope the ACC can get it together and show that this was just a bad week and nothing more. Next week sees Virginia host ranked TCU, North Carolina visiting UConn, Duke traveling to Army and Wake Forest hosting Stanford -- all loseable games. Also, we have Clemson facing off against Georgia Tech ... meaning one of the best teams in the conference will get their first loss.

I'm an ACC guy and I know that it's tough for ACC fans to admit they aren't the best at everything. We believe it in basketball, starting to believe it in baseball, believe it in men's and women's soccer. We've always dismissed football as "not our thing" but that argument flew out the window when we added four schools with a football background (Florida State, Miami, Virginia Tech, Boston College). The conference also places a lot of guys in the NFL draft.

So what's going on?

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