I posted this on an FSU site, but wanted to bring it here also.

With realignment done for now, I've spent a lot of time thinking about and discussing with people what is the most intractable problem the ACC faces...divisional alignment. As of now, there is plenty of dissatisfaction with the divisions, from a lot of fans, and for a lot of different, sometimes conflicting, reasons.

To summarize, here are the primary reasons the ACC's divisions fail:

1) Going 10 years between opponents is not acceptable
2) Many of the teams that are separated by divisions and that decade gap are geographical, historical, or logical rivals, and/or premier national interest games.

I've always been a proponent of a straight north-south divide, with no crossover game. The elimination of the crossover would allow the ACC to cycle through cross-division games twice as quickly, but there's no way to eliminate the crossover and maintain important games without a straight North-South split. However, I understand why other schools in the conference would have a major problem with that. It essentially splits the league into the Big East and the ACC, and I can see why that's probably not good for the future health of the conference. I also understand, and agree, that it puts a substantial wall between the northern ACC schools and the fertile recruiting grounds in the Southern ACC.

The fact is, there are some unique aspects about the ACC that make ANY 14-team divisional split unacceptable. Yes, the SEC uses the same model, but what is merely sub-optimal in the SEC is dreadful for the ACC. The ACC is MUCH further spread out than the SEC, leaving ACC schools with many fewer driving opportunities. A geographic split would be far more competitively unbalanced in the ACC than it is in the SEC. And there are many fewer impact programs in the ACC than the SEC. It is a little easier to swallow going a decade without playing LSU, when you know you have USC, UF, UGA, Alabama on the schedule each and every year.

And going to nine conference games like the other conferences is a non-starter as well, because the SEC rivalry games and five games a year against ND.

After a lot of discussions with posters various places and on Twitter, I've become intrigued with the idea that the best approach is to simply scrap the idea of divisions. I decided to just set aside the obvious big question of how to fill the conference championship game for a moment, and try to take a look at whether that would really be a schedule improvement.

There would obviously be a multitude of ways to schedule a 14 team conference, but my approach was to stipulate groups of annual rivals with protected games against each other every year. These break down fairly geographically:



Protecting these games makes sure the far-flung ACC maxes out the opportunity to develop rivalries (virtually all of which other than USC-Notre Dame are based on proximity) and facilitate fan engagement. It also protects many rivalries, such as UVA-UNC, VT-UNC, CU-GT, FSU-UM, FSU-CU, UNC-NCSU-Duke, as well as assuring games that SHOULD be rivalries, such as SU-Pitt, FSU-GT, etc.

It isn’t perfect as Wake Forest gets somewhat severed from their North Carolina brethren. I’m not a total “screw Wake Forest” type of guy, so if someone is going to be screwed, they’ll be screwed to the tune of more Florida exposure and a more attractive schedule, and the recruiting juice that should come with it, than any of their state-mates. Pretty good consolation prize.

Once you protect those games, you fill out the rest of the schedule as equally as possible between the other two groups. I worked out a theoretical six-year schedule, which I’ve placed at the end, for the sake of it’s a lot of spreadsheets.

Because of the uneven numbers in the groups it’s not water-tight, but it’s pretty darn equitable. The majority of the games take place in a home-and-home setup, but not all were able to be that way. There will be some one-offs to make things line up a little better. However, as you will see below, matchups won’t go 6-10 years without getting played. I would consider them less like one-offs, and more like the way OOC arrangements are sometimes scheduled with seasons between the return game.



As you can see, the biggest difference is from current scheduling is that instead of there currently being several matchups which take place twice every 12 years, there are now no matchups that take place less than twice every SIX years. But even better, more than half the non-annual matchups will come around even more frequently than that, happening three or even four times in a six year cycle. With additional cycles, which matchups get two and which get three could change, but no more out-of-sight-out-of-mind for any team in the conference, let alone teams in the same region.

But over six years, does it work out equitably? It’s not perfect, but it’s not too bad either.



Two potentially problematic things off the bat…

1) Wake Forest no doubt takes a hit in its home state compared to the other NC schools. With the current schedule, Wake Forest in six years would play a North Carolina team 12.85 times over six years, and in this case they drop down all the way to seven games in six years. I understand that is not really fair to them, but in compensation, they have a massive exposure advantage than the other NC schools in Georgia and Florida. And they would actually see UNC more frequently than they do now. Is that an acceptable trade for not getting both Duke and NCSU every year?

2) The Atlantic group of rivals loses about 1.2 games each per six year cycle against a Florida school. That’s not great, but I don’t think it’s devastating. And it is probably worth it for the opportunity to showcase in both North and South Florida. Florida is a big state, and it probably pays off to not be almost exclusively tied to just one or the other. The Northern rivals keep the same pace of about 1 Florida opponent a year.

3) Yes, that gives GT and Clemson more Florida access than other schools, but that's going to happen in any system that respects geography at all, and I think most people agree that has to happen. And even just by the nature of where they are located, they'll be more of a presence in Florida anyway. Trying to artificially "correct" that is pointless and hopeless. More important to make sure that say, Syracuse doesn't have massive Florida presence while Pitt has almost none, or the same between Virginia and North Carolina schools. The exception is Wake Forest, as we've mentioned, and that's a tradeoff.

There are certainly other ways to assign groups of protected rivals that could change this. The NC schools could go together in a block of four, UVA and VT could join the more Northern group, and Louisville could join the South. But frankly and unfortunately for Wake, I suspect that UNC would choose the UVA game over the Wake game. This just flat out makes more sense for everyone else.

I’m sure some of you are thinking, yeah dummy, this is just pod scheduling, and I guess it is. But despite my color coding, I’m trying to avoid labeling these as pods. For the sake of the conference, we want to avoid the sense that there are pods or quasi-divisions. I’d prefer to leave them unnamed. They are simply protected games for each team. It’s no different than when the Big 10 had 11 schools and an 8-game schedule, but Michigan always played Ohio State, Michigan State, and Minnesota. This is all one conference, no divisions.

I don’t think there is any question at all that this is a MUCH better schedule for this conference, but it begs the question…how do you fill the ACC Championship Game? Legally, you can’t even hold a championship with this type of setup, as per NCAA rules.
I’m not worried about that.

The time has never been so right to get the NCAA to deregulate, and there’s simply no damn reason the NCAA should be stipulating rules like that to conferences anyway. The ACC would already have an ally in changing that in the Big 12, who might wish to hold a championship game themselves with 10 teams. I don’t see the other conferences fighting the change. What would be the purpose, spite?

It could be as simple as the first and second place team face off in the ACC Championship Game. That would at least guarantee the two best teams face each other, which could only help a game that has struggled to find its audience. It would also guarantee the ACC has a legit quality champion, and avoids the nightmare scenario of a 11-1 Clemson team losing to a 7-5 VT team in an ACC championship game.

I’ll let someone else discuss other scenarios for filling the championship game, but my philosophy is that there’s no sense in devaluing 13 weeks of a regular season over slight concerns over a single game. And it’s not like the ACC Championship game has been some rousing national success that is being put at risk. Just figure out how to put the best two teams in, and it can’t be any worse. But the regular season and the ACC schedule can be a hell of a lot better with this change.

Below, you’ll find six years of schedules. What do you think?
Better than current?
Does anyone not end up better off (except maybe Wake Forest)?
What are the problems?
Did I make any mistakes?

More than any other rule changes (besides Indiana mascots), I wish the NCAA would change things to allow CCG with 12 teams without round robin divisions. I don't know if the conferences would go without divisions or not still (more teams can compete for divisional trophies with 5/6 opponents for longer than for a conference title with 11/13 other teams), but it would lead to a lot more frequent play.

For the Big Ten, I figured if everyone had 3 locked opponents, you could keep all rivalries and play everyone else 60% of the time with a 9 game schedule. As other pointed out to me, not all teams need 3 and really I think you could you could get away 2 for the vast majority which would further increase that percentage.

Since you don't have an equal number of teams in each "division" anyway, why not do one division of six and two of four?

North
BC
Syracuse
Pitt
Louisville

Central
UVa
VT
UNC
NC State
Duke
WF

South
GT
FSU
Clemson
Miami

Like this approach, but one thought. I know the big groups makes scheduling easier, but maybe just have 3 locked games a piece (or something like that). I'm not an expert on all ACC rivalries so some changes would have to be made here probably, but maybe something like this:

Locked games for each team:
Syracuse: Boston College, Pitt, Louisville
Louisville: Boston College, Pitt, Syracuse
Boston College: Louisville, Syracuse, Pitt
Pitt: Syracuse, Louisville, Boston College
Virginia: Virginia Tech, North Carolina, Wake Forest
Virginia Tech: Virginia, Miami (FL) , Clemson
North Carolina: Virginia, Duke, North Carolina State
North Carolina State: North Carolina, Duke, Wake Forest
Duke: North Carolina, North Carolina State, Wake Forest
Wake Forest: Duke, North Carolina State, Virginia
Clemson: Georgia Tech, Florida State, Virginia Tech
Miami (FL): Florida State, Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech
Florida State: Miami (FL), Georgia Tech, Clemson
Georgia Tech: Florida State, Miami (FL), Clemson

Wake Forest does miss out on North Carolina as annual, but they get the other two and still will play North Carolina more than they do now. The only games there that felt completely random were Wake Forest-Virginia and Clemson-Virginia Tech. Maybe I'm missing some big rivalries and this wouldn't work, but I think you could get it to be better than the current set-up with tweaks.

Even if we assume the ACC stuck to an 8 game schedule, that still means you'd play everyone at least 45% of the time.

(06-20-2013 11:23 AM)WakeForestRanger Wrote:  Since you don't have an equal number of teams in each "division" anyway, why not do one division of six and two of four?

North
BC
Syracuse
Pitt
Louisville

Central
UVa
VT
UNC
NC State
Duke
WF

South
GT
FSU
Clemson
Miami

I'm open to other variations. But for that group of six, if they play each other annually, that SIGNIFICANTLY reduces their exposure to FL/GA. My guess is when push comes to shove, that's not going to fly, and Wake Forest joins the big boys table (ha ha just joking).

It would also mean the South and North would be playing each other a ton more than they would play the Atlantic. I like mine better, but I'd be open to that if its what all the others could agree on.

(06-20-2013 11:33 AM)ohio1317 Wrote:  Like this approach, but one thought. I know the big groups makes scheduling easier, but maybe just have 3 locked games a piece (or something like that). I'm not an expert on all ACC rivalries so some changes would have to be made here probably, but maybe something like this:

Locked games for each team:
Syracuse: Boston College, Pitt, Louisville
Louisville: Boston College, Pitt, Syracuse
Boston College: Louisville, Syracuse, Pitt
Pitt: Syracuse, Louisville, Boston College
Virginia: Virginia Tech, North Carolina, Wake Forest
Virginia Tech: Virginia, Miami (FL) , Clemson
North Carolina: Virginia, Duke, North Carolina State
North Carolina State: North Carolina, Duke, Wake Forest
Duke: North Carolina, North Carolina State, Wake Forest
Wake Forest: Duke, North Carolina State, Virginia
Clemson: Georgia Tech, Florida State, Virginia Tech
Miami (FL): Florida State, Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech
Florida State: Miami (FL), Georgia Tech, Clemson
Georgia Tech: Florida State, Miami (FL), Clemson

Wake Forest does miss out on North Carolina as annual, but they get the other two and still will play North Carolina more than they do now. The only games there that felt completely random were Wake Forest-Virginia and Clemson-Virginia Tech. Maybe I'm missing some big rivalries and this wouldn't work, but I think you could get it to be better than the current set-up with tweaks.

Even if we assume the ACC stuck to an 8 game schedule, that still means you'd play everyone at least 45% of the time.

If that adds up, that's perfectly fine for me as well.

Lou, I like the thought and creativity you brought here. I think it's something that should be, at the very least, discussed at the conference level. Do you know if the ACC has even heard or considered something like this?

Lou, fantastic post. You definitely sold the no divisional idea to me indeed. I love this idea. Great job.

(06-20-2013 11:23 AM)WakeForestRanger Wrote:  Since you don't have an equal number of teams in each "division" anyway, why not do one division of six and two of four?

North
BC
Syracuse
Pitt
Louisville

Central
UVa
VT
UNC
NC State
Duke
WF

South
GT
FSU
Clemson
Miami

I'd be in favor of that if it is possible. As long as we'd have either Miami or FSU on the schedule every year. And either GT or Clemson on the schedule every year.


edit : Also VT in the south would work for me as long as we have a perminant cross over with UVA.

North
--------
BC
Syracuse
Pitt
Louisville

Central
--------
UVa
UNC
NC State
Duke
WF

South
--------
Clemson
FSU
GT
Miami
VT

(06-20-2013 07:48 PM)texasorange Wrote:  Lou, I like the thought and creativity you brought here. I think it's something that should be, at the very least, discussed at the conference level. Do you know if the ACC has even heard or considered something like this?

I've never heard any rumors that the idea has been discussed at all, or even heard any national writers or pundits mention it. It's not my original idea, I've heard people mention it places (probably on here too) when divisional allignment is discussed.

If you don't want to "divide the conference", I get that. So don't. Go all the way and eliminate divisions altogether.

But there's a reason nobody else does non-geographic divisions.

The biggest problem right now is NCAA rules. I would very like to do away with divisions, but the CCG has proved very resistant to change. It wasn't originally designed for I-A football at all, but the SEC saw it in the rule book and took advantage.

Since then several power conference have wanted to do CCGs with less than 12 teams and that didn't lead to rule changes. I can see it being altered eventually, but it will probably take a united effort from the power conferences to do it.

For the record: I was against a rule change till recently. I'm not a fan of CCGs and didn't want the Big Ten to get one. With that question now over though (and over for everyone besides the Big 12 and Sunbelt), I'd just assume alter them to make for better set-ups in big conference.

(06-21-2013 10:58 AM)ohio1317 Wrote:  The biggest problem right now is NCAA rules. I would very like to do away with divisions, but the CCG has proved very resistant to change. It wasn't originally designed for I-A football at all, but the SEC saw it in the rule book and took advantage.

Since then several power conference have wanted to do CCGs with less than 12 teams and that didn't lead to rule changes. I can see it being altered eventually, but it will probably take a united effort from the power conferences to do it.

For the record: I was against a rule change till recently. I'm not a fan of CCGs and didn't want the Big Ten to get one. With that question now over though (and over for everyone besides the Big 12 and Sunbelt), I'd just assume alter them to make for better set-ups in big conference.

I think the time is right for a change. NCAA deregulation is in the air, conferences are talking about walking away from the NCAA for just this kind of reason. There's no reason any more that the NCAA should need to mandate this sort of thing to a conference.

The ACC would already have an ally in the Big 12, and I would think all the other conferences would support something that left their options open, especially if any of them ever hit 16 members.

I can't imagine it not going through. The conferences are flexing their muscles, and the NCAA's reputation and authority are at an all time low.

(06-21-2013 08:30 AM)Lou_C Wrote:  

(06-20-2013 07:48 PM)texasorange Wrote:  Lou, I like the thought and creativity you brought here. I think it's something that should be, at the very least, discussed at the conference level. Do you know if the ACC has even heard or considered something like this?

I've never heard any rumors that the idea has been discussed at all, or even heard any national writers or pundits mention it. It's not my original idea, I've heard people mention it places (probably on here too) when divisional allignment is discussed.

If you don't want to "divide the conference", I get that. So don't. Go all the way and eliminate divisions altogether.

But there's a reason nobody else does non-geographic divisions.

I actually like the concept because you cycle through the conference faster and keep some old rivalries. I like what you posted.

every conference with more than 10 members would probably go to this if it were allowed.

I don't get the ACC's current divisional configuration.

I wish we could do VA/NC/Miami and the rest in the other. I would want GT as our cross-division.

UVA-----Louisville
VT-------Pitt
UNC-----GT
Duke----Syracuse
NCSU----Clemson
Wake----BC
Miami----FSU

(06-23-2013 01:52 PM)mufootballfan Wrote:  I don't get the ACC's current divisional configuration.

competitive on the field and recruiting with 1 florida school and 2 north Carolina schools in each and it is what the original teams agreed too

(06-23-2013 04:10 PM)esayem Wrote:  I wish we could do VA/NC/Miami and the rest in the other. I would want GT as our cross-division.

UVA-----Louisville
VT-------Pitt
UNC-----GT
Duke----Syracuse
NCSU----Clemson
Wake----BC
Miami----FSU

Actually, that would be great for me too. Pitt gets FSU, Clemson, BC, and Louisville instead of UVA, UNC, Duke, and Miami. I would miss the Miami game but that's not a huge deal.

I don't think FSU would care either, they're basically getting Georgia Tech and Pitt instead of NCSU and Wake.

(06-23-2013 04:10 PM)esayem Wrote:  I wish we could do VA/NC/Miami and the rest in the other. I would want GT as our cross-division.

UVA-----Pitt
VT-------Clemson
UNC-----GT
Duke----Syracuse
NCSU----UL
Wake----BC
Miami----FSU

I don't mind your divisions but I switched your crossovers. You HAVE to have VT and Clemson facing each other every year. You CANNOT have UL playing one of the worst ACC teams every year. UL and NC State make some sense and then Pitt/Cuse/BC get stuck with UVA/Duke/Wake in some fashion.

=================

BUT the whole purpose of rearranging the divisions should be to DO AWAY with crossover rivals. That's why switching UL and Miami would be the perfect setup, imo. It preserves all of the NC/VA school rivalries and the FSU/Miami rivalry. It also keeps FSU/Clemson and makes FSU/VT and FSU/Clemson more frequent (albeit at the detriment of making VT/Miami less frequent). I think it's likely a net win scheduling wise in increasing the number of marquee matchups for tv and fans. As much as I don't care to face some of the schools in the conference, it doesn't make any sense to play the better couple teams in the opposite division just twice over a 12(?) year period.

And I don't recall if it's been said, but if you eliminate divisions and have one big pool of teams, you HAVE to have (at least) 4 permanent schools you'd face EVERY YEAR to keep rivalries alive. Basically it becomes "pods" although I don't think they can be 100% geographical. For example:

Florida State - Clemson, Miami, Georgia Tech, Virginia (solely due to the Jefferson-Eppes "Rivalry" Trophy)
Boston College - Syracuse, Duke, Clemson, Pittsburgh
Clemson - Florida State, Georgia Tech, Virginia Tech, Boston College
Duke - NC 3, Boston College
Georgia Tech - Florida State, Clemson, Louisville, Pittsburgh
Louisville - Virginia, NC State, Georgia Tech, Syracuse
Miami - Florida State, Virginia Tech, Syracuse, Wake Forest
North Carolina - NC 3, Virginia
NC State - NC 3, Louisville
Pittsburgh - Virginia Tech, Syracuse, Boston College, Georgia Tech
Syracuse - Boston College, Louisville, Miami, Pittsburgh
Virginia - Florida State, North Carolina, Virginia Tech, Louisville
Virginia Tech - Virginia, Miami, Pittsburgh, Clemson
Wake Forest - NC 3, Miami

(I think I have everyone facing only 4 other schools.)

(06-23-2013 07:32 PM)Chris02M Wrote:  

(06-23-2013 01:52 PM)mufootballfan Wrote:  I don't get the ACC's current divisional configuration.

competitive on the field and recruiting with 1 florida school and 2 north Carolina schools in each and it is what the original teams agreed too

I understand that but I guess I'm a map guy.
Geographically based divisions just make too much sense to me.