Category Archives: ACC

Rating the 2010 Non-Conference Slate, Part 1: ACC

The ACC actually has a lot of make-or-break out-of-conference games this year, a big deal for a conference hoping to live up to their new TV deal. As an ACC fan, let me tell you a lot of folks in this conference (especially from the “southern wing”) suffer from what I call “SEC-envy”. Unlike many of these folks, I don’t think the media is actively biased against the conference. That said, sometimes the conference doesn’t really help itself. But with the nation’s 2nd toughest OOC schedule as a group (with a “legit average” of 0.3177) the ACC will have its chances to show its mettle. Let’s get started.

Oh, I should note that in some cases, schools were tied with the same rating, in which case the tie is broken first by the number of DI-AA teams on the schedule and then completely arbitarily.

  1. Florida State (2.5 legit, 1 DI-AA): Samford, @Oklahoma, Brigham Young, Florida. Hope of getting back to the ACC forefront abounds in Tallahassee this year, and this schedule can help with 3 pretty legit teams on the slate. Florida is of course a rivalry game, but Seminole fans have to be hoping Christian Ponder can show Sooner fans what they’re missing this year. If FSU can win two of the big three of these they will finish the season ranked, provided their defense doesn’t catch fire within the conference again.
  2. Miami (1.75, 1): Florida A&M, @Ohio State, @Pittsburgh, South Florida. Okay, this isn’t, your, um, older brother’s Miami team, but a rematch of a national title game is always fun. 
  3. Clemson (1.75, 1): North Texas, Presbyterian, @Auburn, South Carolina. Well, it’s not Clemson-Georgia but Tigers vs. Tigers is always fun. 
  4. North Carolina (1.5, 1): N-Louisiana State, @Rutgers, East Carolina, William & Mary. Well, the biggest thing here is the season kick-off neutral site against LSU. Most ACC partisans feel LSU is ripe for the pickin’ in this game, but then they turn around say that UNC themselves is extremely beatable. So we’ll see. I will say that if there’s year that LSU seems vulnerable, to me, this is it.
  5. Georgia Tech (1.5, 1): South Carolina State, @Kansas, Middle Tennessee State, @Georgia. Well, we get post-Mangino Kansas in Lawrence. Um, outside of that, there’s not really much to say about this slate, other than that the MTSU series is a 2-for-1 and I think the trip to Murfeesboro is next year.
  6. Boston College (1.25, 1): Weber State, Kent State, Notre Dame, @Syracuse. I have no idea what to say about this schedule. They’ll be favored to win all of these except ND, and even then they should have a pretty good chance. Oh, and it just gets worse from here.
  7. Duke (1, 1): Elon, Alabama, Army, @Navy. Let’s be clear here: two of three are on the schedule because this is Duke, which is also the reason they’re on Alabama’s joke of a schedule. 
  8. Maryland (1, 1): N-Navy, Morgan State, @West Virginia, Florida International. The Navy game is in Baltimore, which should be fun except that I think Navy is probably going to win. I wish Maryland could play Colorado in the “battle of coaches who probably should have been fired a year ago” bowl.
  9. Virginia (1, 2): Richmond, @Southern California, Virginia Military, Eastern Michigan. The only ACC team playing two DI-AA teams, they probably need it the most. At least their new coach probably shouldn’t lose to Richmond.
  10. Virginia Tech (0.75, 1): N-Boise State, James Madison, East Carolina, Central Michigan. I don’t know if the VPI-Boise State game is THE MOST IMPORTANT GAME IN ACC HISTORY, but it is a big deal for the conference. Once again, VPI can use their opening game as the kick off to a darkhorse national title run, while this is the most important game on Boise’s schedule. So that is one to watch. The rest of this schedule? Not so much.
  11. Wake Forest (0.75, 1): Presbyterian, @Stanford, Navy, @Vanderbilt. Let’s see… anything clever to say about this? Well, um, both Vandy and Wake have gold and black as their primary colors. Um. Yeah, I got nothin’. Oh, well, yes, Stanford is still only worth 0.5 points, one year does not grant you legitimacy. 
  12. North Carolina State (0.5, 1): Western Carolina, @Central Florida, Cincinnati, @East Carolina. Who is the AD at NCSU? How did you end up scheduling two mid-majors away in the same year? There are a lot of schedules worse than this one. But there are also a lot of better ones. But then again, NCSU has been pretty solidly “mediocre-to-bad” since 2003, so if the same AD has been there the entire time (I’m too lazy to look) they should have been fired a long time ago anyway.

Join us next time, for the Big East!

My ACC Championship Game Adventure

Well, someone has to liveblog the ACC title game, right? While all the cool kids are off with their “undefeated teams” and “national title implications” I’ll be at the throbbing, vibrant heart of ACC football: Tampa, Florida.

Okay, perhaps not so much. But still, I’ll be there and updating – not this blog directly, but on those newfangled Twitter and Facebook things. If you already read this on FB, well, you’re good to go. If not, or you really like Twitter, you can follow me at asimsports.

Edit: Twitter updates will now also appear on the sidebar to the right.

Yeah, the World Really Needs Another SEC-Big Ten Matchup

So I read Georgia Tech sports message boards. This is oftentimes a mistake, but sometimes has a payoff.

So I was just reading the latest about how ACC leadership is screwing the pooch and thinking it’s the usual amount of hyperbole and, as one poster once said, “hand waving freak-outery”. The problem is that this time it’s completely justified:

The Gator Bowl is returning to what its chairman considers “Jacksonville’s roots,” with the announcement Wednesday that the game will match a Southeastern Conference team against the Big Ten beginning with the 2010 season at Jacksonville Municipal Stadium.

So if you’re the ACC, you just lost your only traditional New Year’s Day bowl outside of the BCS. What do you do to make up for this? You, uh, decide to replicate the Gator in the Champs Sports, just for old time’s sake:

The Champs Sports Bowl in Orlando has been elevated to the number three spot in the ACC’s contracted bowl selection order for 2010 through 2013, conference officials announced Wednesday.

That article also notes that the Gator wanted the ACC to drop its team selection rules, which I generally support. But the ACC needed to replace the Gator on the New Year’s day schedule, and needed to schedule someone other than the Big East. Don’t worry though, the ACC was right there to sweep the SEC’s crumbs in the lovely destination known as Shreveport: Wright told the club it looked like the 2010 matchup in the AdvoCare V100 Independence Bowl would match teams from the Atlantic Coast Conference and the Mountain West Conference.
Well, I guess you could argue that the Mountain West is somewhat more prestigious than the Big East at this point.

Anyway, back to my original point. Provided the SEC keeps the rest of its current bowls, they’ll have the following lineup next year (not necessarily in order, as the slots are still being worked out):

  1. Capital One (vs. Big Ten)
  2. Cotton (vs. Big 12)
  3. Outback (vs. Big Ten)
  4. Gator (vs. Big Ten)
  5. Chick-fil-a (vs. ACC)
  6. Music City (vs. ACC)
  7. Liberty (vs. C-USA)
  8. Papajohns.com (vs. Big East)

Yes, this world really needs three SEC-Big Ten matchups on the same day. At least get a Pac-10 team in there or something just to mix it up a little.

By the way, here’s my projected pecking order for the ACC:

  1. Chick-fil-a (vs. SEC)
  2. Champs Sports (vs. Big East/Notre Dame)
  3. Music City (vs. SEC)
  4. Sun (vs. Pac-10)
  5. Car Care (vs. Big East)
  6. Independence (vs. Mountain West)
  7. Eagle Bank (vs. at-large)
  8. GMAC (vs. MAC)

At any rate, this is huge blow to the conference’s prestige and likely to be a huge financial blow in terms of TV contracts are negotiated and bowl payouts (with the Gator effectively replaced by the Independence, though the Sun will presumably pay more than the Emerald did). I can only hope that by 2014 the ACC’s situation has improved, which is something that is largely in their hands, both on the field and off.

Rating the 2009 Non-Conference Slate, Part 1: ACC

If I were convinced anyone were waiting for this, I’d congratulate you for waiting this long! Anyway, here we go, with the ACC.

  1. Virginia Tech (1.75 Legit, 0 DI-AA): (N) Alabama, Marshall, Nebraska, @East Carolina. VPI has, by far, the most interesting OOC schedule of any ACC team this year, and that would probably be true with just the opening weekend game with Alabama in the Georgia Dome. Add to that a game at ECU, Nebraska’s return trip, and the lack of any DI-AA teams and we have ourselves a winner. Provided ‘Bama and Nebraska are decent, this could even break right for a darkhorse run to the national title game.
  2. Georgia Tech (1.75, 1): Jacksonville State, Mississippi State, Vanderbilt, Georgia. The rivalry game with UGA carries the most weight, of course, but playing two other SEC teams (even though they are Vandy and Miss State) allow GT to rack up enough legit points to take second.
  3. Miami (1.75, 1): Oklahoma, Florida A&M, @Central Florida, @South Florida. Major props for Oklahoma, though unless this Miami team is drastically better than last year’s edition it’s hard to see how that will turn out well. Somewhat more minor props for playing both UCF and USF, though I think I speak for most football fans when I say I’d rather see them playing Florida instead of FAMU, UCF, or USF.
  4. Florida State (1.5, 1): Jacksonville State, @Brigham Young, South Florida, @Florida. The showdown with Florida at the end there is the jewel of this schedule, of course, but FSU deserves some credit for playing in-state Big East rival USF, and also for trekking out to Provo, though I have a feeling I’m more excited about that trip than most of FSU’s players.
  5. Maryland (1.25, 1): @California, James Madison, Middle Tennessee State, Rutgers. I just Cal ran out of SEC teams to play, as UMD will take up the reigns this year of providing us the third-most interesting inter-sectional game of the year. The rest of this schedule is uninsipring, to say the least.
  6. North Carolina State (1.25, 2): South Carolina, Murray State, Gardner-Webb, Pittsburgh. Decent BCS OOC opponents bookend two DI-AA schools. For shame, NCSU, and the ACC I guess – 3 teams have 2 DI-AA opponents, while in the other 5 BCS conferences there are only 3 teams that have done so. (Though I suspect Rutgers may join the 2 DI-AA ranks as well, as I’ll explain later.)
  7. Boston College (1, 1): Northeastern, Kent, @Notre Dame, Central Michigan. This is where the quality of schedules starts to drop a bit. BC is only up here due to ND’s inflated legit ranking, which in a way reflects how overrated ND is anyway.
  8. Clemson (0.75, 1): Middle Tennessee State, Texas Christian, Coastal Carolina, @South Carolina. Nothing to see here except the obligatory rivalry game, though TCU has the potential to make it interesting.
  9. Duke (0.75, 2): Richmond, @Army, @Kansas, North Carolina Central. Well, I guess Duke is playing to their level now, but hey, there’s two gaurunteed wins here, a probabale win against Army, and well, that’s 3/4ths of last year’s win total right there!
  10. Wake Forest (0.5, 1): Baylor, Stanford, Elon, @Navy. Wake needs to watch out for Baylor, which has a slight chance of not being completely terrible this year. Outside of that, well, maybe they’ll make a return trip out here for Stanford in a couple years?
  11. North Carolina (0.5, 2): The Citadel, @Connecticut, East Carolina, Georgia Southern. The “I Wish This Were a Basketball Game” series returns, but outside of that, not much to comment on here, other than the usual slap-on-the-wrist for scheduling 2 DI-AA teams.
  12. Virginia (0.25, 1): William & Mary, Texas Christian, @Southern Mississippi, Indiana. The sad thing is that TCU and USM are probably more interesting matchups than Indiana, but that’s not saying much. And there’s still a chance they could go 1-3 on this slate.

Next: The Big East. Stay tuned!