It always struck me as weird and bizarre that the ACC ditched its divisional format last season in the pandemic but then chose to return to a divisional format this year.
Notre Dame’s temporary one-year stay in the ACC created a non-divisional schedule and an ACC Championship Game between the two top finishers in the conference, Clemson and Notre Dame. It’s true that North Carolina and Miami were good teams last season, meaning that the prospect of a four- or five-loss team representing the ACC Coastal in the ACC Championship Game was not very likely.
Yet, in the future, if the ACC Coastal champion isn’t especially strong, the ACC should not want to be saddled with a Clemson-Pittsburgh or Clemson-Virginia title game everyone knows will be a blowout.
The Big 12 already puts its two top teams in the title game, because it doesn’t have divisions. Oklahoma keeps winning the Big 12 title — much as Clemson keeps winning ACC championships — but you will note that Big 12 Championship Games have generally been very competitive in recent years. Abolishing divisions creates better or more interesting title games (sometimes both). Clemson-Notre Dame in Charlotte wasn’t extremely competitive, but the game was a huge TV draw, and it should have been enough to get the ACC to permanently leave behind the divisional format… but that did not happen.
However, the introduction of a 12-team playoff could represent a movement in college football which forces the other Power Five conferences to adjust with the times:
Once leagues went to 14 teams, divisions made no sense. They distorted schedules, devalued championship games – but Florida got to hang a banner and give Jim McElwain a bonus for going 9-4. Who did that benefit? https://t.co/UPZIrSxPAZ
— Dan Wolken (@DanWolken) June 15, 2021
If the ACC wants a second team in the playoff, it can’t have a weak Coastal opponent playing Clemson in Charlotte. That’s a waste of TV inventory and everyone’s time.
Some people will make the argument that if Clemson blows out its ACC title game opponent, that will hurt — not help — the team trying to get a second at-large bid while also putting Clemson at risk. That’s a reasonable point… but remember that we’re talking about a 12-team field, not a four-team field.
Clemson and other teams can’t lose more than one game under the current four-team playoff setup, but in a 12-team field, there will be plenty of two-loss teams. A Clemson loss would affect the Tigers’ seeding but wouldn’t knock them out of the field. An opponent — if it played Clemson tough — would actually gain respect even if it lost by a small margin.
The big point to make is that if the ACC regular season did not pit Clemson against a high-profile opponent, we would all want that opponent to face Clemson in the title game. This brings up a point: The ACC could make a rule that if a conference title game is going to be a regular-season rematch, the opponent has to be in the top 20… and if it isn’t, the league could pick a third-place team if that team is a top-20 team.
You can see the larger point here: Conferences need to be smart about adapting to the realities of the 12-team plan. What worked in a four-team layout won’t carry over.
There is one other big point to emphasize — and one could say I’m saving the best for last: Aside from the handling of the ACC Championship Game, getting rid of divisions would, at long last, enable the ACC to schedule its regular season properly.
Instead of being locked into a framework where teams play six division games every year — which leaves certain ACC matchups severely underplayed over larger stretches of time (Clemson-Duke, Carolina-Wake Forest, etc.) — the removal of divisions would clear the way for the “3-5-5” schedule rotation which would enable every ACC team to play each other on a much more continuous basis.
The 3-5-5 plan is not that complicated: three fixed annual games against rivals and/or geographically close neighbors, with the other 10 ACC opponents flipping over every other year, five one year and the other five the next.
Getting rid of divisions could finally be upon us. If you hate the 12-team playoff — which I completely understand — ACC scheduling reform might help you hate the 12-team playoff little bit less… maybe even a lot.
