What renewed realignment shifts mean for the ACC, UVa

The college football world was once again rocked by conference realignment news on Thursday, as USC and UCLA announced they would leave their PAC-12 home for the Big Ten.

That move will officially take place in 2024 but its effects on college sports are immediate. The SEC and B1G are setting themselves up for control of the sport and a windfall of cash, while the rest of the Power 5 leagues are left scrambling for their next move.

Today, we take a look at how this latest movement impacts college athletics overall and where UVa fits into the puzzle.

Super Conferences are on the way

This isn’t a major change, but Thursday’s news underscored this point. The SEC has added Texas and Oklahoma, two more giant football brands, and will be at 16 teams. Now, the B1G is up to 16 as well. The PAC-12 will obviously drop back down to 10, for now at least, and the Big 12 has already replaced Texas and OU with three schools from the AAC (Cincinnati, UCF, and Houston) as well as BYU.

There’s no reason to assume the SEC and B1G will stop growing their membership, and turn the Power 5 into the Power 2. Those leagues were already outpacing the other three P5 leagues in TV money in a significant way and the additions of two recognizable brands in each league certainly won’t hurt future negotiations. The question is where do those leagues pull from? (More on that later.) But at this point, it feels like there’s no way to put the genie back in the bottle: The SEC and B1G are making a power play to rule the sport.

One question remaining is whether there can be a third power conference to join them, though it clearly won’t be as powerful or cohesive.

The ACC is on shaky ground, and falling further behind

The ACC was already in a tough spot from a revenue standpoint. The previous commissioner prioritized league stability and avoiding losing any members after Maryland left for the Big Ten. The league locked itself into a grant of rights arrangement that runs halfway through the 2030’s, which makes it prohibitive for its members to leave the conference without paying significant financial penalties. The ACC also has a bit of an edge with Notre Dame, as it is able to block them (or at least there’s an agreement in place) from joining a different league for some time. But the B1G and SEC schools are making a lot more money from their league TV deals than schools like UVa are, as well as schools in the Big 12 and the PAC-12.

Despite John Swofford’s efforts to keep the league together, their current TV deal makes the league and its members more vulnerable. If there are two super leagues then the ACC will either be relegated to a lower status in the game, lose a bunch of its members to the two major conferences, or both.

If the ACC does lose members to the B1G or SEC it might take time because of the Grant of Rights, but eventually if the TV money gap becomes even more absurd between the ACC and the two biggest conferences then schools may turn their heads and take their chances in court.

Virginia is valuable but doesn’t necessarily control its destiny

If we are moving towards a super league, or two super conferences, what happens to everyone else?

That’s the question that many administrations, including the one in Charlottesville, should be working on. Besides the fate of the athletic teams, there are potentially hundreds of millions of dollars at stake. There will be dozens of teams, especially those in the conferences outside the new Power 2, trying to figure out how they fit in and what the best move will be.

So where does UVa fit into the equation? Virginia is obviously a top public academic institution and the flagship school in a relatively populous state, located right in the middle of the eastern seaboard. Football will be the driver here, and UVa has plenty of work to do there, but overall the Cavaliers boast one of the nation’s top athletic departments annually and have been nationally relevant in basketball over the last decade or so.

Virginia is going to be one of the schools that is being eyed by the two leagues if they look to expand, that seems like a safe bet. But other schools will be in the mix as well. Perhaps the B1G looks to continue raiding the PAC-12, adding Oregon and Stanford or something like that. Perhaps they do try to get into the ACC and break the league up but start with UNC and Duke, with UVa further down the list. There’s also the issue of Virginia Tech. There could be political pressure for both schools to ensure that they don’t leave the other out in the cold, regardless of what that looks like. UVa’s situation might not be as dire as some, but it also will not be as attractive as others given the size of the football brand.

What’s the next domino?

This is key. After all: If the B1G goes after the PAC-12 schools to fill out its conference, where does that leave the ACC schools? Could they try to add schools from another league and stay relevant? Would Florida State and Clemson go ahead and bail for the SEC, leaving the league even less relevant in football?

But if the B1G goes east and tries to find a way to get ACC schools out of their Grant of Rights somehow, the reality is quite different. The “what’s the next move” piece is big for a school like Virginia, where you’re a positive move or two from being set up well even if that means staying in an improved ACC with Notre Dame or something, but you’re also one or two bad chess moves away from being even less relevant.

ACC schools may have a wandering eye now but the Grant of Rights agreement complicates things, perhaps to a point where the B1G doesn’t want to go that route and instead continues to pilfer the PAC-12. Then the ACC and Big 12 try to pick up the pieces.

How locked in are the ACC schools?

This is the million-dollar question, $17 million to be exact, as that’s what each team currently brings home annually in TV revenue. That number is going to be dwarfed by the new B1G and SEC deals, and the gap will widen. That alone is reason for the ACC schools to start looking. Imagine being Clemson, a school that has dominated in recent years, won two national titles in the last decade, and now they’re bringing in far, far less TV money than in-state rival South Carolina? That doesn’t feel sustainable, and both Clemson and FSU seem like very easy, logical fits for the SEC. Then, of course, the B1G could take a look at schools like UVa, UNC, and so on.

So the question is two-fold: How much do the schools want to stick together in this league and can they afford to? Based on other recent movement around the country, it feels like the ACC schools are operating in harmony, to some extent at least. The Grant of Rights deal was a sign of good faith from all parties that they felt that the ACC would be home for a long time to come. The ACC got through the COVID football season, and added Notre Dame to the league for a year, without the squabbling we saw in some other conferences. And while the ACC isn’t the neat fit of a conference it once was, there has been some stability. Plus, a lot of these schools have complicated, tangled relationships with one another and their state governments that may make it tricky to move out of the league. Could you imagine the reaction if UNC left for the SEC leaving Duke (and that rivalry) and NC State behind?

But eventually, money talks. And schools in the ACC will have to decide if they are okay making less money but still being on TV, playing for a conference title and so on, while being relegated a bit to second-class citizens as the two super leagues run the sport. That includes schools like Clemson, who although as relevant as it gets in college football could be outside of the power structure if the two super leagues decide to basically break off from the rest and have their own postseason, etc.

What’s the best fit for UVa?

I think fans would agree that the best fit for UVa is in a strong ACC. But that might be a thing of the past, depending on what comes next. Right now, the ACC is in a weaker financial situation than the SEC and the B1G but still has access to the playoff, and is on something resembling a level playing field. The same goes for the Big 12 and the PAC-12, at least for now. But if those two super leagues expand to a point where the other leagues are totally irrelevant in football, moves need to be made or a big shift in priorities will need to happen.

Football is an expensive sport to play, but the windfalls from it support the rest of the athletic department. A strong football program benefits every student athlete. But if football remains expensive, and the new TV money doesn’t match up because the ACC is no longer part of the legitimate power structure, then what?

Both the SEC and the B1G offer attractive elements. The SEC is obviously the king of college football, and though UVa would likely struggle to truly compete, people might buy season tickets just because of the quality of games. And recruits would follow the move, surely. But the B1G seems like the better fit, if UVa had to make a move at some point. Virginia is part of the AAU, which is an informal membership criteria for that conference. Every member of the league is in the AAU, except for Nebraska who was in when they began joining, and other schools like UNC, Duke, Cal and Stanford are members as well. The B1G would have high-quality football too, and would allow the Cavaliers to have more of a presence in the northeast, reignite a rivalry with Maryland, and so on. For basketball, the B1G would be a quality conference, as it already is, and especially if the likes of UNC and/or Duke also joined. There are some downsides, though, as baseball isn’t as big a priority in colder-weather climates, but it’s probably better to make compromises and have a seat at the table than not at all.

What does “missing out” look like?

This is a big question that remains unclear, and really could impact the way a school like Virginia views realignment. If the B1G and SEC form a super league for football and break away from the NCAA, then being left out is a big deal. The TV networks are going to prioritize those schools and games, and while college football would continue elsewhere, those schools would lose influence, TV money, and in a sense, access to championships.

There’s another scenario where those two leagues break off from the NCAA and designate athletes as employees, paying them a salary to play. There would be far-reaching implications for entire athletic departments if that happens and many schools like Virginia may prefer to continue in the current model, accept less money, and stay tied to the NCAA for football as well as the other sports. Speaking of other sports, if a league breaks from the NCAA and amateurism for football, can they keep their other sports with the NCAA? Do non-revenue sports become non-scholarship teams? What happens to the NCAA Tournament, which generates a fortune in TV revenue for the NCAA, the conferences and the schools? All of these answers will factor into the decision.

There’s another scenario where these two leagues grow, make more money, and have major influence in the sport, but for the most part things continue as they have. The SEC and B1G would have the best teams for the most part, with some exceptions from year to year. The other conferences do the best they can to compete, while also understanding that they don’t have the resources to do so with schools like Ohio State and Alabama. In many ways, that’s already the case; the gap would just get larger. Recruits would more and more prioritize those two conferences, and while they aren’t paid a salary, there are better NIL opportunities at those programs, as well as the exposure that goes with playing in one of the two premier conferences. So basically, you’d have the Power 5 become the Power 2 and the Middle Class 3 (or four if you want to throw the AAC in) and then the Group of 5 continues on as well.

In this scenario, perhaps a school like Virginia, and the rest of the ACC really, just stick it out and do the best they can. It won’t have the TV money other schools have, but it can still field solid football teams as there’s more than enough talent to go around still. And for basketball and other sports, not much would change besides funding. There would certainly be a few schools in the leftover three leagues, like Clemson for example, that value their football program too much to accept this fate, and they would certainly move on to the SEC as soon as they were able to.

This is basically the scenario we were already heading towards with yesterday’s news, the timeline has just sped up a bit and the financial gap just got a bit wider. Maybe this move pushes the sport over the edge towards something new, maybe it doesn’t.

But administrators, like those at UVa, can’t sit around waiting to see about the next move. They should be taking the temperature on options, what’s going to happen with the rest of their conferences, and how things could shake out for sports governance. Because as the PAC-12 schools found out this week, if you think everything is fine and everyone is on the same page, prepare to be surprised when another school seizes the moment and leaves you in the cold.