The 2011 ACC college football schedules have been released by the conference, stirring up the usual melange of outrage and relief up and down the East Coast. Our ACC communities’ reactions ranged from shrieking fury to smug complacency.
Backing The Pack is happy to have an easy early ride to break in Mike Glennon under center:
2011 ACC College Football Schedules: Roundup & Reactions
That’s a soft and advantageous September for a football team that’s probably going to be starting a new quarterback. Wake Forest figures to be better, but we still have three games to start the year that we should win with no problem. Liberty is a I-AA school, while South Alabama (also a I-AA school) only recently started a football program. Three weeks for Glennon to get acclimated.
Streaking The Lawn realizes with a start that Virginia beating Duke is now an aspiration, not an inevitability:
Virginia gets the dreaded task of traveling to Tallahassee to take on what should be a very good Florida State squad -- my off-season pick to win the ACC next year.
The good news is that the Cavaliers will be hosting Duke at home, and looking to break a three-game losing streak to the Blue Devils. I can’t believe I really just typed that.
Testudo Times thinks Maryland’s opening games will serve as a scarily early referendum on the Randy Edsall hire:
Pretty difficult start, with a Monday night game against Miami followed up by a traditionally tough matchup with West Virginia. Nicely, though, both are home games. If they can win both, they should have a lot of momentum rolling into the meat of the season. If they lose one or, god forbid, both, you can already hear the sky falling, both around the season and the Edsall hire.
To the south, Shakin’ The Southland already doesn’t like what’s being heard out of Dabo Swinney’s office:
For the last few years we’ve done an early projection on how we expect Clemson to finish based on the new schedule, but this year we aren’t going to do it.
The reason why is obvious: the Head Cheerleader managed to take a team with plenty of talent and run it into the ground last year. We have no confidence in his leadership of the team to say that we’ll win one game or another. Even Troy or Wofford can sneak up on us. He has made hires I approve of and wanted, and recruited his ass off, but until we see results we aren’t going to have confidence in his leadership.....and he doesn’t think we should focus on results in 2011. Great.
And down in Tallahassee, Tomahawk Nation is on the warpath over what they’re characterizing as a bureaucratic vendetta on the part of the ACC against the ‘Noles:
It'll be a quick turnaround in another brain-dead decision by the ACC schedule-makers, as they send Florida State to play the Boston College Eagles on Thursday, November 3rd. Playing a road game on four-days rest is a recipe for disaster and this is clearly the ACC sticking it to FSU for refusing to open with Miami on Labor Day. The war between the ACC and FSU is on. Why increase the chance for your marquee program to incur a loss on national TV? BC always plays FSU very tough, with their great defense and disciplined approach. BC's offense will still be a question. FSU should be a favorite of less than a touchdown in what is slightly more than a tossup game in Chestnut Hill.
Playing on a Thursday, however, means two days of extra rest for the next opponent. And that next opponent just happens to be the Miami Hurricanes, who travel to Tallahassee on November 12th.
Conspiracy? You tell us.
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