So there's rumors of the ACC looking at adding both Cal and Stanford as expansion candidates, as well as SMU. There's also rumors of Notre Dame, who is an ACC member in all sports but football, is pushing for this expansion. Here is my opinion on it all.
ACC BLEW ITS CHANCE AT THE PAC-12
I said two years ago that the ACC should aggressively go after the Pac-12. My master plan went out the window a year later when USC and UCLA ditched the Pac-12 for the Big Ten. Still, grabbing Oregon, Washington, Stanford and California would've been a nice move but the ACC couldn't pull the trigger and when the great Pac-12 war of last week happened, the ACC was left helpless.
ADDING CAL AND STANFORD ISN'T A HORRIBLE IDEA
Well, it is if that's your only play. I'm not big on adding those two schools for the sake of adding those two schools. As I said, this made sense if you were also pulling USC, UCLA, Oregon and/or Washington. But that ship has sailed. There is no reason that have two west coast schools in the ACC just for the sake of having them. They don't help financially much and they aren't what I'd call must see college football TV.
However, if adding Cal and Stanford is the first domino that leads to a bigger westward expansion (and something else) then it isn't a bad idea to strongly look into it. The ACC could sell to ESPN having a late night game that the Pac-12 used to provide and with it an east coast viewership that wasn't there. East coast fans may not stay up for a Arizona State-Stanford game but may for a Miami-Stanford game. Again, what I am about to say looked better when I said it two years ago, but I must bring it back up in this climate.
UNDERSTAND THAT THIS IS ABOUT NETWORKS AND NOT CONFERENCES
The "climate" I just referred to is the television climate. It has changed. FOX went out and got into the Big Ten business in full, pulling that conference out of ESPN, with CBS and NBC in on the fun. The Big 12 also is a FOX property of sorts, though a bigger part of its inventory belongs to ESPN. ESPN has a cherry deal with the ACC and pulled in the SEC away from CBS.
The Pac-12's demise was due, in major part, to the networks. When USC and UCLA went to the Big Ten ahead of their deal with FOX, NBC and CBS, it became evident that the Pac-12 would have a difficult time trying to find a TV deal worth anything. ESPN is laying off folks and becoming more picky in what rights they bid on. FOX put a huge investment into the Big Ten and wants to take advantage of ESPN's weakening. NBC is gearing up to pay Notre Dame and CBS doesn't think the Pac-12 really replaces losing the SEC.
So instead of bidding on the Pac-12, ESPN and FOX just took parts they wanted from each league. Now ESPN and FOX shares Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah in the Big 12 while FOX, CBS and NBC got Oregon and Washington to join USC and UCLA. No one needs Cal or Stanford. Not even the ACC.
You also have to consider that this new expanded College Football Playoff comes next year and the bidding rights for it and the future will be quite a battle.
STOP WITH THE "ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE" NAME JOKES
Have we not understood that college athletics jumped the shark with conference names already? I keep seeing on Twitter comments like "you can't have west coast teams in the Atlantic Coast Conference" or that the ACC needs to be renamed the "All Coast Conference" or something of that nature. The Big Ten will have 18 teams next year. The Big 12 will have 16. The Big East has a team in Nebraska. The Dallas Cowboys play in the NFC East. The Oklahoma City Thunder play in the NBA's Northwest Division. The name doesn't matter anymore and the acronym "ACC" is more important. Stop it.
ACC CAN TRY TO LURE NOTRE DAME
This is the Hail Mary. Understand that Notre Dame is a full voting member in the ACC despite not being a football member. Also understand that Notre Dame's contract with NBC is about to expire and a new one is all but a formality. Notre Dame is pushing for Cal and Stanford and said that those two high academic institutions and well-rounded athletic programs deserve to be in a power conference.
The ACC knows that Notre Dame can save them.
Notre Dame is bound to the ACC, even in football. The ACC provides five games each season for Notre Dame to play and they are contractually obligated to join the ACC if it decides to give up its football independence. The Irish are also bound to the same Grant of Rights agreement that the other 14 ACC members are.
My proposal two years ago was to add both USC and Stanford into the ACC in a large attempt to lure Notre Dame into the conference. If Notre Dame already plays five ACC games and also plays USC and Stanford every season, then why not agree to play in the ACC and work out the TV money? They would already be playing 7 ACC games so why not get the perks of full membership and a chance at the ACC championship and College Football Playoff seeding? It worked the one year they were in the ACC.
USC going to the Big Ten really hurt that, but Stanford would help. So would adding ... say ... Navy. The ACC values academics and adding Stanford, Cal and Navy would keep that theme going. It would also replace USC with Navy as a Notre Dame rival that would already be in the ACC. Again, 7 games against ACC foes.
Hail Mary.
That's where this lives right now. If Notre Dame said, "we will join the ACC if you do X, Y and Z" then the ACC and all members would do just that. But the Irish isn't saying that, which is making any movement difficult.
THE ACC IS AS FRACTURED AS IT HAS EVER BEEN
The ACC is the latest example of what college athletics was to where it is now. The ACC was made up of a tightly connected schools who were close in geography and in culture. There were four North Carolina schools (Duke, NC State, North Carolina, Wake Forest) with nearby Virginia and Maryland north and Clemson and South Carolina south. In the early 1990s, the ACC added Florida State so it could be a football player, and then kept adding to keep pumping its football profile. Now it is a conference is disarray.
Florida State wants out. Clemson believes it deserves to be paid like the national championship contender it has been. North Carolina and Virginia knows that no matter what happens, they are highly desirable programs. Miami knows that, too, and wants to be treated like the football power it once was. Schools like Pitt and Louisville know they should be alright, but have no guarantees. Wake Forest, Syracuse and Boston College are holding on to dear life so they aren't the next Cal and Stanford.
So any proposal to add Cal and Stanford will cause Florida State's and Clemson's eyes to roll. Why do anything to help a league they are trying to leave? Florida State's play is to either find a sugar daddy to bank roll their program or to piss off enough other ACC schools so the league blows up and the Grant of Rights deal is torn up.
So while the ACC powers discuss adding Cal, Stanford and SMU, all of them have completely different agendas, which isn't healthy for a conference that's reeling and its future.
PLAY THE LONG GAME
The ACC's Grant of Rights is keeping the conference together. For now. It keeps schools from jumping ship and it keeps conferences from poaching. It also keeps ESPN from forcing anything because they have the ACC at cost control.
So as dysfunctional as things may seem, the ACC is sort of locked in to what it is. Maybe ... just maybe ... that is the stability needed if college football transforms into something else that keeps the ACC from suffering the Pac-12's fate.
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