7-5 Duke being in the ACC Championship Game has set off all kinds of alarm bells for the ACC. There’s no question it’s an absolute nightmare scenario for the conference. If Duke beats Virginia, there is a chance ( a pretty good one ) that the ACC would not have a team in the college football playoff. It’s a particularly embarrassing possibility for the league.
ESPN writer David Hale @ADavidHaleJoint surmises in his article how this scenario may be an indictment of the league in a larger sense.
Duke’s presence in Charlotte on Saturday (vs. Virginia, 8 p.m. ET on ABC) is a result of a five-way tie for second place in the league, but also, according to a dozen current and former ACC coaches and administrators who spoke to ESPN, a symptom of longstanding problems — issues some coaches and ADs saw coming more than a decade ago — that have put the conference in increasingly difficult circumstances.
Is this really a new problem due to revenue disparity, though?
In the 2020’s the ACC’s winning percentage against the SEC in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s was lower than it was in the 2020s.
The ACC has a 40% winning percentage against the Big 10 in the 2020s, just 2% lower than the previous 2 decades.
It’s not a defense of the ACC’s current state, but rather pointing out that the issues aren’t new.
Remember just last year when ACC basketball was considered dead for going 2-14 in the ACC/SEC challenge and getting just 4 NCAA bids? Just one year later, the ACC improved by 5 games and went a respectable 7-9, and will certainly see an increase in bids. Things can change fast in the current environment.
So, if Duke actually does win, will it really change anything? We’re a controversial call and Duke last last-second win over Clemson, from this scenario not even being on the table. At the beginning of the season, ACC teams FSU and Miami knocked off two top 10 teams in Notre Dame and Alabama. After week 10, the ACC had 4 teams ranked in the top 16. Georgia Tech was 8, Miami 10, Virginia 15, and Louisville 16, and there was legitimate discussion of the ACC getting 2 or 3 teams into the playoffs.
Is a lack of investment the reason Georgia Tech, Miami, and Louisville lost games within the conference to create the Duke doomsday?
I’m not arguing the points Hale makes, but I’m not sure it’s anything we don’t already know.
What we do know the revenue disparity is very real. It’s not going away, and Jim Phillips has yet to be able to truly address it.
Last though – Miami should be in the playoff over Notre Dame if a spot comes down to both teams. You just can’t deny a head-to-head result.
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