Wednesday, November 28, 2012

What Should New ACC Look Like?

Now that the ACC has added Louisville to the mix, what should the league look like?

I hate the "Atlantic" and "Coastal" divisions.  They make no sense and it has been nearly a decade and I barely know who is in what football division.  To me, it seems like there are two simple solutions.

GEOGRAPHY

Just do the geography and move on.  For the most part, Virginia-North Carolina border serves as a perfect dividing line for the divisions.  However, one of the North Carolina schools had to move to the North.  I put Wake Forest there due to ... well, they are the smallest fanbase and would be least affected.  Plus, the Triangle dynamic of North Carolina-Duke-NC State should stick together.  Have some sort of stipulation that Wake gets to play at least one and try to get two games against the fellow NC schools.

NORTH:  Boston College, Louisville, Pittsburgh, Syracuse, Virginia, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest

SOUTH:  Clemson, Duke, Florida State, Georgia Tech, Miami, NC State, North Carolina

THE OLD BIG EAST

In a somewhat similar setup, just split the division into the pre-expansion fellowships.  Meaning, the seven schools that were together before the league decided to become relevant in football (remember, that started with bringing in Florida State in the early 1990s) and have FSU and the former Big East republics together.

ORIGINAL:  Clemson, Duke, Georgia Tech, NC State, North Carolina, Virginia, Wake Forest

NEW GUYS:  Boston College, Florida State, Louisville, Miami, Pittsburgh, Syracuse, Virginia Tech

The good is that the old school ACC fans will like that they are back together again.  The bad is that the football dominance is obviously in the "New Guys" division (name 'em what you want).  Clemson would be the best school in one division while there is a brawl in the other.

SPLIT THE POT

Even though I mentioned I hated the current setup, maybe do what the Pac-12 was toying with and split the conference.  The Pac-12 has six easy geographical rivalry sets and toyed with having each member in each set in separate divisions.  That would mean that each school still had the ability to make trips to each area in the conference. 

In the ACC, that's tough since there are only a few of these types of sets.  Still, let's give it a try.

SET #1:  Boston College, Clemson, Florida State, NC State, Pittsburgh, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest

SET #2:  Duke, Georgia Tech, Louisville, Miami, North Carolina, Syracuse, Virginia 

Looks a little similar to what the ACC is now, but still has the split.


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