(12-20-2013 04:14 PM)solohawks Wrote: Notre Dame's "Conference" is Navy, USC, Stanford, and 5 ACC games. If the ACC would be willing to add Navy for football only and guarantee that game to Notre Dame every year, we would be up to 6 ACC games.
From what I can gather, Notre Dame is not going to give up annual matchups with USC and Stanford for two additional ACC games
Notre Dame wants a national schedule. The USC/Stanford pair lets them end their season in California every year. They want to play in Texas. They want to play in the Northeast and in Florida. They want to play in the Southeast.
The ACC gives Notre Dame the "Eastern Exposure" that they crave, but the crux of the bargain is that five games against the ACC (the four that would be necessary for the scheduling freedom ND wants, and one extra to buy Notre Dame's other sports a conference home) still allows Notre Dame to play their "national schedule", while the bargain where the ACC specifies the match-ups and Notre Dame sets the date means that Notre Dame gets the home dates in the second half of the season that are hard for an independent to otherwise arrange.
The upshot is that normally there is space for one Big Ten game on the schedule, and that will normally be either MSU or Purdue because of histories extending well before the 80s.
(12-21-2013 12:25 AM)IceJus10 Wrote: I can hear the spin in 2016 and 2017 if the lack of more big and B1G programs is killing their tv ratings and ticket demand home and neutral site... It'll be their rallying cry for cutting the number of games, as its negatively impacting their media payout and strength of schedule.
And the ACC can answer ~ "let us set the dates, and we'll let you drop down to four". And Notre Dame will say, "uh, no, we'll keep the present deal, thanks".
The reason there were two conferences willing to make a scheduling deal on these terms with ND is that those five ND games were of sufficient value to the Big12 and ACC to concede setting the dates to Notre Dame. And the reason Notre Dame went with the ACC is because it covers more target areas for their "national schedule" than the Big12 would have done.
Both sides getting things they want from the deal is the foundation for an agreement both sides are going to want to stick to.