With 17 schools and a membership that now covers three different time zones, the ACC enters its media days with issues that run far deeper than a depth chart and carry more weight than an offensive line that “got bigger this summer.” When commissioner Jim Phillips addresses the media on Day 1 of the ACC Football Kickoff on Monday in Charlotte, he’ll be expected to address the future of a conference that’s currently engaged in lawsuits with its two premier football powers.
Florida State and Clemson’s legal challenges of the ACC’s Grant of Rights are a threat to the stability of a league that those two programs have combined to win 12 times in the last 13 seasons. The ACC Football Kickoff will feature the simultaneous messages of how the league stacks up nationally to the rest of the power conferences, but also why the future of the conference is bright even as it faces existential threats from the same schools anchoring its position in the national conversation. Phillips will be asked how he plans to stabilize the conference’s position with priority members looking to leave, and while no one is expecting a game-changing announcement or revelation at the commissioner’s forum, it will be one of his best chances to give insight into the long-term thinking of the league office.
While the methods and cost of an exit are unknown, it seems clear that Florida State does not wish to be a part of the ACC under its current media rights contract, which runs until 2036. With legal maneuvers that have gone as far as to include the involvement of the state’s attorney general, the school itself seems to be using every tool imaginable to establish a new home elsewhere. There may not even be a place to go at the moment, but that might be a bridge that Florida State won’t worry about crossing until it has its moment of “freedom.”
With Clemson following along, a couple months behind in their own legal battle with the ACC and certainly less publicly passionate about their pursuit of an exit, the conference must consider a future without the two teams that begin the 2024 season as the favorites to win the league.
But that’s one thing that will be refreshing about the ACC Football Kickoff. Florida State and Clemson will continue to dominate the conversation, but the event itself will turn the attention away from the court rooms and redirect it to the field. No one expects Mike Norvell and Dabo Swinney to offer insight on look-in clauses or a Grant of Rights document. We do, however, want to hear how former Clemson quarterback DJ Uiagalelei has settled in with his new Seminole teammates, whether current Tigers signal-caller Cade Klubnik is set for a step forward win Year 2 with offensive coordinator Garrett Riley, and to continue the discussion comparing the vastly different approaches to the transfer portal used by Norvell and Swinney.
Florida State and Clemson battling for league supremacy is ACC football at its best. And now that we’ve introduced not only an automatic bid but a first-round bye to the top four conference champions in the College Football Playoff, there are national championship stakes to the conference title race. Leave the conference realignment chaos in the court room, because unlike legal battles, we’ll have clear-cut winners and losers when we decide it on the field. Florida State, Clemson and a handful of hopeful contenders are gearing up for fall camp and a 2024 ACC season that will be unlike any in the league’s history.
Strength under center
The official press release announcing the players that will be in attendance at this year’s media days declared the league as the “Conference of Quarterbacks.” It’s a bold claim worth discussing and debating, but no one can argue with the ACC’s strength in numbers when it comes to signal-callers stepping to the podium during talking season. A whopping total of 19 quarterbacks are set to be in attendance at the ACC Football Kickoff, with every team but Florida State and Wake Forest bringing at least one. Cal, Duke and North Carolina are all bringing two quarterbacks, so any questions about those upcoming quarterback competition can be answered directly.
But flooding the event with quarterbacks is not just sharp marketing, it’s also the starting point for the season outlook for many of the most intriguing teams and stories in the ACC, starting with the returning starters. Clemson’s ceiling is likely to be determined by the improvement of Klubnik; Virginia Tech’s ability to contend as a top-tier ACC team rests with Kyron Drones; and there’s plenty of interest in the next steps of development for electric playmaker Thomas Castellanos now that Bill O’Brien is the coach at Boston College.
Then, there’s the transfer quarterbacks whose additions have their new teams hopeful for what’s ahead in the fall. Uiagalelei won’t be there himself, choosing to allow his Florida State teammates enjoy the spotlight in the wake of last year’s ACC Championship win, but he’ll certainly be at the center of the conversation for the Seminoles as the former Clemson quarterback makes his return to the conference. Miami, on the other hand, is bringing its star transfer quarterback to the event, and Cam Ward’s ability to turn the Hurricanes into a dynamic and dominant offensive team is the key to a breakthrough season for Mario Cristobal in Year 3 at his alma mater. The group of transfer quarterbacks in attendance also includes recognizable names for any college football fan, like Grayson McCall (NC State), Kyle McCord (Syracuse) and Tyler Shough (Louisville).
What’s in store for media day champion Miami?
Speaking of that potential breakthrough season for Cristobal, Miami will arrive in Charlotte in the familiar position of carrying offseason hype that will fuel some of the preseason prognostication. This is nothing new for the Hurricanes, who have long been the apple of the media’s eye in July. From 2013-22, the ACC media picked Miami to win the Coastal division five times, yet the ‘Canes pulled it off just once (2017). Cristobal has been recruiting at a high level out of high school and will see some of those early efforts pay off here in Year 3, but the urge for improvement has also powered a hefty transfer portal haul that ranks No. 10 nationally among transfer classes, per 247Sports. Quarterback Cam Ward is obviously a huge piece of predicting success for Miami in 2024, but this is a team that added proven contributors at defensive line, edge rusher, linebacker, safety and running back to a roster that already solid thanks to their recruiting efforts.
But Miami’s has talent before, and it’s clearly received the adoration and expectations from the media in July before. So what’s holding the Hurricanes back from connecting the dots and having their true breakthrough moment? Since joining the ACC in 2004, Miami has exactly one 10-win season (2017) and finished ranked in the final AP Top 25 poll just six times with zero top-10 finishes. And for all his recruiting success and championship memories he can evoke, Cristobal is 12-13 as Miami’s coach. The narrative around Miami might not be whether 2024 is the year that results meet expectations, but rather the year that results need to meet expectations.
Frequent flyer miles for the newcomers
After rotating throughout the Southeast for a number of years, the ACC Football Kickoff has been held consistently state of North Carolina since 2009 and in Charlotte, now the location of the league office, since 2016. It’s a morning or afternoon drive for a handful of the ACC’s schools, but about 1,000 miles from SMU and 2,700 miles from Cal and Stanford. Each of the three new ACC schools arrive in their new conference at vastly different points in their football program trajectory, but all are going to have an adjustment period as they get used to life in a new league that is no longer constricted to the Atlantic Coast.
SMU will bring the most intrigue as it arrives fresh off an 11-win campaign that included winning the American Athletic Conference championship on its way out of the league. Quarterback Preston Stone thrived in his second year with coach Rhett Lashlee, who has an opportunity to make a name for himself as one of the rising stars in coaching if he can successfully guide the Mustangs through this transition to the power-conference level. Cal boasts one of the top running backs in the entire country with Jaydn Ott and an experienced team that might be overlooked as Justin Wilcox prepares for his eighth season as the Bears’ coach, while rival Stanford is just in Year 2 of a rebuild under Troy Taylor following a 3-9 debut in 2023.
