(06-12-2016 01:54 PM)IR4CU Wrote:  Notwithstanding any external forces such as the SEC, Big 10, or ESPN, I wonder if the ACC will be able to win the long term battle against it's most deadly enemy - itself. Based on the vitriol from the fans concerning the potential nine game football conference schedule, I have my doubts. On this topic alone, it is clear that the fans are torn, the administrations are torn, and the athletic departments are torn - heck even fans of the same school appear to be torn. No matter how this issue is resolved, some schools are going to be very upset. I think this stems from the fact that as a group, we do not have any overall common ground in terms of history, culture, or athletics.

Think about this ... if each ACC institution could have one and only one men's sports program, which sport would each school pick? Clemson, FSU, Miami, and VT would most definitely pick football. GT, Louisville, and NC State would be torn between football and basketball - I think GT would ultimately pick football and NCSU and UL would ultimately pick basketball. Duke, UNC, Syracuse, Wake, and UVA would definitely pick basketball (although Syracuse might pick Lacrosse). I am unsure where Pitt would fall - I am guessing football but it might be basketball?? Boston College would most likely pick hockey. So, is it any wonder that this league goes through so much turmoil on every decision: it really does come down to basketball vs football where we are pretty evenly divided and as far as I have seen so far, none of the schools are truly willing to make significant compromises.

Then, if you look at geography and history, we have old Big East vs old ACC and North vs South. It's a wonder this conference hasn't already imploded (or exploded!). Now compare this to the SEC - they have one school (Kentucky) that would select basketball, one school (Vanderbilt) who may select either or possibly baseball - the remaining 12 schools are 100% on board for football. I am not saying that this makes the SEC "better" than the ACC but they are most definitely of the same mind and work together for the same goals as a conference - from a football and ultimately from a revenue standpoint, this has served them very well. Will the ACC ever get to this level of like mindedness? Unfortunately, I seriously doubt it will and therein lies the true enemy of our conference and the one that ultimately may lead to it's demise at some point in the future.

(06-20-2016 11:58 AM)Kaplony Wrote:  Great teams don't lose to ECU, Boston College, 5-6 NC State and James Madison. Great teams don't go sub .500 in bowl games. Great teams don't lose championship games to 8 win teams that had lost their previous three games by a combined 89-36 score.

The above is what VT did during their "era" of greatness.

Agreed. I've said before, if VT is the best the ACC has to offer - especially if VT dominates like they did from 2004 to 2011 - that doesn't say much for the rest of the ACC.

Now if a team like the 2001 Miami Hurricanes or the 2013 Florida State Seminoles dominates for a year or two, there's no shame in that. VT just wasn't good enough to dominate - unless the rest of the league was down.

(06-20-2016 12:12 PM)Wilkie01 Wrote:  

(06-12-2016 01:54 PM)IR4CU Wrote:  Notwithstanding any external forces such as the SEC, Big 10, or ESPN, I wonder if the ACC will be able to win the long term battle against it's most deadly enemy - itself. Based on the vitriol from the fans concerning the potential nine game football conference schedule, I have my doubts. On this topic alone, it is clear that the fans are torn, the administrations are torn, and the athletic departments are torn - heck even fans of the same school appear to be torn. No matter how this issue is resolved, some schools are going to be very upset. I think this stems from the fact that as a group, we do not have any overall common ground in terms of history, culture, or athletics.

Think about this ... if each ACC institution could have one and only one men's sports program, which sport would each school pick? Clemson, FSU, Miami, and VT would most definitely pick football. GT, Louisville, and NC State would be torn between football and basketball - I think GT would ultimately pick football and NCSU and UL would ultimately pick basketball. Duke, UNC, Syracuse, Wake, and UVA would definitely pick basketball (although Syracuse might pick Lacrosse). I am unsure where Pitt would fall - I am guessing football but it might be basketball?? Boston College would most likely pick hockey. So, is it any wonder that this league goes through so much turmoil on every decision: it really does come down to basketball vs football where we are pretty evenly divided and as far as I have seen so far, none of the schools are truly willing to make significant compromises.

Then, if you look at geography and history, we have old Big East vs old ACC and North vs South. It's a wonder this conference hasn't already imploded (or exploded!). Now compare this to the SEC - they have one school (Kentucky) that would select basketball, one school (Vanderbilt) who may select either or possibly baseball - the remaining 12 schools are 100% on board for football. I am not saying that this makes the SEC "better" than the ACC but they are most definitely of the same mind and work together for the same goals as a conference - from a football and ultimately from a revenue standpoint, this has served them very well. Will the ACC ever get to this level of like mindedness? Unfortunately, I seriously doubt it will and therein lies the true enemy of our conference and the one that ultimately may lead to it's demise at some point in the future.

If this post came across as "the sky is falling", that was not my intent. When it comes to the ACC, there are many good things going for this conference so the sky most definitely is not falling. However, neither is there a rainbow in the sky. This conference has some problems and my point was we need to learn to work TOGETHER if we are going to survive long term.

(06-20-2016 12:49 PM)IR4CU Wrote:  If this post came across as "the sky is falling", that was not my intent. When it comes to the ACC, there are many good things going for this conference so the sky most definitely is not falling. However, neither is there a rainbow in the sky. This conference has some problems and my point was we need to learn to work TOGETHER if we are going to survive long term.

That's a great point, IR4CU. Pointing out problems is not the same as being alarmist (or even simply complaining). Defining the problem is the first step - especially when it's accompanied by a possible solution.

There's a good reason the ACC feels like a bunch of "little brothers" -- because historically, that's exactly what they are. Can little bro grow up and beat big bro? It happens all the time, but there WILL be obstacles and growing pains along the way!

Yes..But the ACC my have a new commish if ESPN does not agree to an ACCN by 2020!

(06-21-2016 05:04 PM)GTFletch Wrote:  Yes..But the ACC my have a new commish if ESPN does not agree to an ACCN by 2020!

Doubtful.

(06-20-2016 11:58 AM)Kaplony Wrote:  Great teams don't lose to ECU, Boston College, 5-6 NC State and James Madison. Great teams don't go sub .500 in bowl games. Great teams don't lose championship games to 8 win teams that had lost their previous three games by a combined 89-36 score.

The above is what VT did during their "era" of greatness.

it was going to good bowl games every season, and won a lot of confernce titles. that is more than most teams.

sorry, we can't have just have Saban coached teams and FSU under Bobby Bowden and with Winston in the ACC.

why don't you go root for a SEC team. you complain so much about the ACC. it is just entertainment.

(06-13-2016 04:49 PM)Lou_C Wrote:  I think the whole "dysfunctional" aspect of the ACC is a bit overblown (...)

(...) these divisions just add to and amplify the patchwork image of this conference. (...)Trying to "hide" the old Big East schools by shuffling them in with the old guard is actually disruptive to unity, highlights strange bedfellows, and is an insult to the old Big East teams.

It makes this team look and feel like a Frankenconference instead of what it is, a reasonable combination of the ACC and Eastern independents. (....)

Yes, fan-board talk of a 'dysfunctional' conference is overblown. But so is fan-board talk of Frankenconferences and 'insults' to 'bedfellows'.

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ACC athletic directors have many priorities to consider. Blurring the lines of conferences that no longer exist is not at the top. Further up the list are issues of travel costs, access to warm weather, access to recruits, access to alumni, access to media centres, and a number of other things.

Our present divisional arrangement is a compromise. It represents trades made by every school involved. It's not ideal for any member but everyone gets something important that it wanted.

Will the ACC keep this structure going forward? Well, we know the variables are changing. We've already seen the ACC take action to put more options on the table. Clearly there is some interest in alternatives. We'll see what happens.

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I can't go along with the strange drama shared here of 'insulted' bedfellows. Is it really true that Virginia Tech and Syracuse ADs feel 'insulted' by the ACC not placing them in a 'North' division? Do they really feel slighted by the sight of Georgia Tech and Florida State on their schedules? If so, I missed the presser where the ADs took offence.

What I have seen is representatives of both schools indicating that they do want regular conference games against the league's southern schools. And VT officials have been emphatic from early on that they don't want a division within the ACC that looks like the old Big East. That's the opposite of what you are endorsing here.

As for talk of 'patchworks' and 'Frankenconferences': do we really see emotionally loaded smears like that being made at our conference by fans nationwide? I don't. I see shots of that sort taken now and then by certain ulcer-driven subsets of Florida State and Clemson fans, together with a few unhappy subsets elsewhere (WVU, UConn). But generally? Not at all.

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The ACC does claim a mix of schools. Our combination of public and private schools, small and larger universities, isn't one you see in other P5 leagues. That's true. And here's the thing a lot of fans don't get: that's normal. It's exactly what you'd expect.

A mix of schools = higher education on the Atlantic coast. University life here will be conference life for any conference formed on the turf of the original 13 US colonies.

Other leagues bind land-grant universities to each other. People who don't know better think that this is how all leagues should look. But the term 'land grant university' didn't even exist until 1862. It was the product of an expanding nation. The term referred to a program of enhancement for agriculture schools.

The Atlantic coast claims a long history that precedes 1862. Here we find greater variety in higher education. We find schools that were founded for a greater variety of reasons. Some began as liberal arts colleges, some as seminaries, some as law schools. Here we find a higher proportion of private institutions and religious schools relative to public schools. Compared to the later land-grant institutions that sprawled on the grounds of a nation expanding west, campuses on the east coast are often compact.

Geography is history. It is no accident that all the Ivy League schools share our footprint, as do the country's two oldest service academies. The New World alma maters of Thomas Jefferson and other signers of the Declaration of Independence? Look for them here. You won't find many of them in Texas.

The Atlantic coast presents a knobbly, variegated, eclectic mix of schools. That's natural. It goes with the territory. We find the variety in our conference that anyone acquainted with higher education here would expect to find.

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This brings us the matter of conference identity.

If the proposal is to define the ACC as 'a reasonable combination of the ACC and Eastern independents', well... how is that definition even reasonable? It's a contradiction in terms. The ACC does not 'contain' itself and it doesn't contain assorted 'independents.' This is thinking in terms of yesterday's newspapers.

The ACC contains conference members. When you're in, you're in. It's one conference and it looks exactly like what it is.

The Atlantic Coast Conference.