ACC expansion: Louisville, Notre Dame on board

Maryland, a founding member of the Atlantic Coast Conference, left its longtime home conference for the seemingly greener pastures of the Big Ten on Nov. 19, 2012. It was a blow to the ACC, and made some in the conference realize how tough it may be to compete with other richer leagues.

North Carolina athletic director Bubba Cunningham was among those concerned. A number of emails from shortly after Maryland announced its decision, unearthed by Andrew Carter of the Raleigh News & Observer, reveal some of the worries that were plaguing Cunningham. Chief among them: money. With other conferences signing huge television contracts as a result of expansion, the UNC AD was afraid the ACC wouldn’t be able to remain competitive.

EXT. BATTERY PARK - DAY

It’s July in New York City. A summer day like any other. It’s warm, but not too warm. Climate change and all that. Tourists flock to the city, intoxicated by the allure of the bright lights and the buzz of the crowded streets.

Martin: Well here we are, and it looks like the ACC is in better shape than ever before during the realignment games. The grant of media rights guarantees a whole bunch of cash to the teams that stay, and it looks as though the solidarity pact was more than just a fraternity pledge. What does this move mean? And how (if at all), as an incoming member, does it solidify that joining the ACC was the right choice?

Mark: Well, to be fair, the ACC wasn’t really a choice for Louisville. Louisville was a choice for the ACC. With the benefit of absolute hindsight, winding up in the ACC is the best thing that could’ve happened to Louisville. A conference with academic neighbors better than Louisville is or will be for some time, a conference that has all of its current sports, a conference that’s located in the places where Louisville has historically drawn its players (the Southeast, Florida), the nation’s best basketball conference, and a conference that is in the cool kids club for college football is exactly what Louisville needed.

The move means, narrowly, that this is the ACC for the next decade. No qualifying statements needed when discussing the league. It also means the other power conferences are basically locked in now too. We might get to go back to talking about sports in the summers instead of airports and the size of media markets.

Martin: Well that’s no fun now, Mark, is it? I liked debating hotels and restaurants and coaches taking jabs at other cities. It felt like Twitter. But I like how you put it: the next decade. What feels right about this is the ACC is being proactive again. It kind of pushed conference realignment in taking those Big East teams, it added Cuse and Pitt later, it added Notre Dame and Louisville based on what it wanted and not as a reactionary move. For all the heat Swofford takes, he calls his own shots. It doesn’t necessarily matter whether he’s right or wrong; he’s making moves for the ACC, not as a result of what other conferences are doing. Losing Maryland still hurts, but that was Maryland’s decision, not a result of something the ACC did.

I know it’s hard out there being a Florida State fan. Playing in a conference that is beneath you, wanting more of the cut than everyone else despite the ACC’s commitment to sharing everything, making memories, and being friends.

And yet, the Noles want more. They’re jealous of their brothers in Gainesville for having it all. They make themselves feel better by finding ways to make fun of their other brothers in Miami. It’s a great family dynamic.

Update, July 1, 2014: All this is official now, pending just a couple more moves. The TV realignment era is now juuust about completely dead.

Conference realignment is not over, despite the ACC’s members agreeing to pledge their TV money to each other for the next 14 years. And it is fitting that it was TV money that provided stability, seeing as it was the college sports TV boom that broke the country apart all along.

The ACC will announce a 15-school grant of media rights deal through 2027, North Carolina radio host David Glenn, also of ACCSports.com, reports. CBS Sports’ Jeremy Fowler and ESPN’s Brett McMurphy have since confirmed. This would essentially curb speculation of schools leaving the conference for the immediate future.

Update: This is official, but no other details are available.

Texas athletic director DeLoss Dodds spoke recently about several different topics, including a potential alliance between the Big 12 and ACC that he thinks would help to stabilize both conferences. The two leagues would schedule games against each other every year, and they would be able to share television revenue. Dodds believes this would help the leagues avoid becoming major expansion targets for the Big Ten, SEC or Pac-12.

The Big 12 has been exploring a potential alliance with the ACC since January, and have had or are having discussions with other leagues as well.

Update: This is official.

According to Sports Illustrated, the Big East presidents will vote on the issue on Tuesday morning and make an announcement following the end of the conference call.

That report from earlier in the week about North Carolina having a Big Ten offer, which came from a source with a track record on the subject? It gets juicier, for those who like juicy things:

Now that Notre Dame’s sort of off the conference realignment table, by way of joining-but-not-really-joining the ACC, it would appear that the Tar Heels have taken over as the program with the longest line of suitors, based on reports at least. And it would make sense.

The Big East has seen no shortage of defectors in the past year, and Cincinnati doesn’t want to get left behind as the conference loses its status as a major conference power. The school is looking to expand and improve its football stadium, and it made sure to let ACC presidents know over the holiday. Cincinnati sent Christmas cards and details of the stadium renovation to each of the schools in the ACC, according to Cliff Peale of Cincinnati.com.

As Peale details, the renovations are expected to cost around $75 million and will add 1,200 box seats, 44 loge boxes, and 28 private suites. Those are the types of seats that often pull in as much revenue as the rest of the stadium combined. Completion of the project is expected to come just before the 2015 season. CBS Sports obtained a copy of the cards sent out to ACC presidents.

The statement from every ACC school president, released for pretty much no apparent reason, in response to rumors that pretty much died down a week ago:

ACC Twitter was impressed and comforted! It had the following reaction, along with some helpful commentary from some friends of ACC Twitter:

It’s been another crazy week in college football realignment. Fresh off the heels of Rutgers and Maryland moving, Louisville has left the dumpster fire that is the Big East to the moderately less on-fire ACC. As is becoming custom, I’ve made a meal to help them celebrate their new conference. Today we’ll feature famous Louisville foods, as we’ll be creating a Hot Brown and mint julep!

STEP 1: Louisville is famous for hosting many of America’s fast food franchises. So, for the first ingredient, find 2 week-old slices of Papa Johns.

Martin: We didn’t think it would ever actually happen, but it did. Louisville is joining the ACC. I know you were sweating and struggling with how things were going to shake out, but walk us through how this all came to be from the Louisville perspective.

Mark: For Louisville folks, it really looked like conference realignment was done for a while. Having missed out on the Big 12 last year, and the ACC having rejected West Virginia last year as well, it was initially viewed as something of a lost cause from the outset. But the longer things went without the ACC making a decision, the better it looked like Louisville’s chances were.

The most important aspect of Louisville’s move to the ACC has nothing to do with the ACC. It’s all about getting away from the Big East.

Long thought of as the worst major conference in college football, the Big East lost its traditional AQ status in the new playoff system, which begins in 2014. That makes sense, because the Big East continually lost its best programs to other conferences, including Miami, Virginia Tech and West Virginia since 2005, plus Syracuse and Pitt beginning in 2013.

In September, I began work on a story about the uncertain, hopeful future of Big East football. That moment was between the start of the season, during which negotiations were ongoing between commissioner Mike Aresco and TV networks, and the defections of Rutgers to the Big Ten and Louisville to the ACC.

The narrative was to center around the Oct. 26th Keg of Nails game between one-loss Cincinnati and undefeated Louisville. The two perennial conference powers, plus Rutgers, would shape the outcome of the 2012 Big East championship. The winner would receive an automatic berth in the BCS, the second-to-last time the conference would be awarded an instant spot in a major bowl game.

As a Louisville fan, Louisville’s announced move to the ACC is the worst thing that has ever happened to me. In fact, it may be the only thing that has ever happened to me, but that is outside the scope of this particular discussion.

At Card Chronicle, Mike Rutherford neatly lays out an argument for why this is such good news for Cardinal sports. He fails, though, to account for my complexes, fear of change, and abject dread, which of course are the considerations around which I expect the world to be arranged. Though it exhausts and frightens me to do so, I will lay out, in a number of reasons, why I am so miserable this morning.

The ACC has altered course, adding Louisville and its solid sports programs to replace Maryland instead of continuing to try and secure the Northeast’s big TV markets, according to Brett McMurphy. The choice came down to Louisville or UConn. That was a crucial choice, and this is a rare realignment win for sports and for sports fans.

This also likely puts a brief (maybe very brief!) halt to realignment happenings, with Dan Wetzel reporting the ACC won’t jump to 16 yet. Thus, please scroll through the following spreadsheet for a refresher on who’s going where once the dust settles (the dust will never settle). This will be updated and dropped into new posts whenever a FBS move is made:

Good morning! By the time you’re reading this, the ACC’s presidents might have already been meeting to talk conference realignment for quite a while. Things start incredibly early in the ACC -- like 7 a.m. ET on Wednesday early. And according to ACC Sports Journal’s David Glenn, the docket will essentially be a thumbs-up or thumbs-down on adding Louisville:

David Teel later said the ACC is “poised” and “expected” to add Louisville, Dan Wetzel said Louisville could be added “immediately” (among multiple scenarios) and Jeremy Fowler describes the ACC as “‘zeroing in’ on” the Cards.

College conference realignment is once again in the forefront of the sports world. On Monday, Maryland’s Board of Regents approved a move from the ACC to the Big Ten conference, effective for the 2014-15 academic year.

Maryland’s move could have a domino effect on the rest of the college landscape. Rutgers is expected to approve a move from the Big East to the Big 10 on Tuesday, further strengthening the Big 10.

The ACC could add to their conference “pretty quickly,” according to a CBS Sports article by Jeremy Fowler. Major factors that will play into the ACC’s decision are geography and television market visibility. All this is happening during the Big East’s television negotiation.

Look through SB Nation’s many excellent college football blogs to find your team’s community.

Look through SB Nation’s many excellent college football blogs to find your team’s community.

In response to Maryland’s exit for the Big Ten, the ACC is likely about to do what the ACC does: pluck a school from the Big East. It’s the default ACC response to pretty much every source of external stress. When John Swofford has stomach disquiet, he takes a school from the Big East. They do not dissolve quickly.

Its choices, if it wants to remain somewhat geographically congruent, are UConn, Louisville, Cincinnati, and then all the new guys and non-football members. UConn and Louisville are the clear front-runners.

The Big Ten could add charter members from the ACC and Big East this week, with Maryland regents voting unanimously on Monday to enter the Big Ten, according to Brett McMurphy. If they go, Rutgers likely goes as well. (This is not a drill.)

UPDATE: Maryland to the Big Ten is official, and Rutgers is reportedly gone too.

Maryland and Rutgers are probably going to join the Big Ten. What? I know. According to reports from multiple outlets*, the Big Ten will absorb charter members from the two East Coast conferences, and just as it did last time, start up a whole new round of conference realignment. Expect the ACC to pluck another from the Big East (UConn’s been believed to be next in line) and the Big East to just continue spackling.

* And quite a few others, some of them just as confused as we are. I mean, yeah, the whole thing’s about those NEW YORK CITY TV SETS and their Washington D.C. counterparts. We’re all smart enough to get that. Makes it not one bit less perplexing.

The Maryland Terrapins are (likely and reportedly) going to the Big Ten soon. The University of Maryland’s official Twitter account is already saying goodbye:

Look through SB Nation’s many excellent college football blogs to find your team’s community.