LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Besieged by a bout of geographic vertigo after the latest round of conference realignment, I finally had a vision after seeing a line on the ESPN crawl Monday night.
It said that the ACC was interested in pursuing the four remaining Pac-12 schools, particularly Stanford and Cal. I was reminded of a proposal I made in jest several years ago, saying that the ACC and Pac-12 should merge to form the Atlantic Coast-Pacific Coast Conference.
Or the LOL League. Whatever.
Here we are. This is college sports in 2023. What once sounded ludicrous now seems just crazy enough to work.
Put them together. At least they are both (semi) coastal. It’s a true bi-coastal arrangement. ACPC. It even sounds cool. They could play "Highway to Hell" at the announcement.
Manifest Destiny, it isn’t. More like Manifest Desperation. But what the heck. Pat Forde of Sports Illustrated reports that ACC Presidents will take up the discussion of adding Stanford and Cal on Tuesday, after conference athletic directors talked about it on Monday.
Here's how my (admittedly illogical) idea works. Maintain the ACC through its current grant of rights. Cobble together enough West Coast schools to allow for some semblance of a conference. Adding just two schools from the west coast isn't enough.
You need a semi-stand alone Western Front. Stanford, Cal, Oregon State, Washington State. Maybe launch a hostile Big 12 action involving BYU, TCU, Houston and Kansas. Or move on the Mountain West. Not as sexy, but Colorado State, San Jose State, Boise State and UNLV are better than nothing.
In football, men’s basketball and women’s basketball, compete primarily in Eastern and Western Divisions, with enhanced East-West competition. In all other sports, compete regionally, with only selected cross-division "highlight" games between the best schools in various non-revenue sports, just for a little TV juice.
Break up the conference basketball season with a huge midseason tournament. Go hard on television innovation. Embrace weeknight football games. Mic up the coaches, quarterbacks, anybody. For conference games, make changes that people have wanted to see. Embrace technology in the game. Make the ACC the most fun and interesting league to follow.
You’re not going to match the tradition of the SEC or Big Ten. But with enough innovation, you can make them look old.
The battleground is viewership, streaming and broadcast. The goal is eyeballs. Households. Survival.
Let’s face it. There is no way for the ACC to significantly increase its value to members, not with the speed or in the amounts that the SEC did, not with a group of schools 2,000 miles away.
But whether the ACC expands or not — and expansion itself could crack open the door long enough for Florida State or someone else to make a run for it — its best bet is to keep its core together, and survive until the college sports financial landscape changes. With so much of it based on money from media rights, it’s bound to change.
The revenue disparities created by media rights deals are temporary. They’re a huge advantage now, but they will unravel, either by missteps by the conferences themselves, or by lack of leadership in college sports, or by lack of leaderships on the media side itself.
The best gift the ACC could give its members is to urge them to generate revenue for themselves. It won’t make up the disparity in numbers with the major conferences, but it will allow them to compete, and it will last beyond any fluctuation in the media landscape.
None of this is new. Penn State joined the Big Ten 33 years ago after a century of football independence. Two decades later, Nebraska joined the Big Ten, followed by Maryland and Rutgers in 2012. Even as all that was happening, the ACC was taking a carving knife to the Big East, eventually claiming Florida State, Miami, Boston College, Syracuse and Louisville.
Sometimes, you see, that light up ahead really is a train, and it really is headed straight for you. It's best when you realize that, and act accordingly.
There’s an awful lot of track between Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and Palo Alto, California. Maybe linking up the two will slow the locomotive’s arrival for the ACC.
Still, even with sports wagering to start up soon in Kentucky, I wouldn’t bet on it.
Copyright 2023 WDRB Media. All Rights Reserved.
