In an article in Saturday’s Washington Post, post staffer Steve Yanda reflects back on the five years since the ACC expanded to include Boston College, Virginia Tech, and Miami.
What’s most interesting to me about the expansion of the ACC is that it was done to solidify the conference’s reputation as a football powerhouse, a move that hasn’t worked
out so well. As Yanda points out, the conference has yet to ACC earn an at-large BCS bid and is 0-3 in BCS bowls since expanding.
The point that stuck out to me was how Yanda seems to argue that the expansion of the ACC, which robbed the Big East of some of its most prestigious schools, has actually strengthened the Big East and done little to improve the football stature of the ACC, which has remained the most mediocre power conference in all of college football.
While that’s true to an extent, the Big East is hardly the juggernaut that the other espouses is to be. Yes, the addition of Louisville, Cincinnati and South Florida have been well-qualified replacements for VT, BC and Miami but one can’t help but wonder how much of that success is predicated on how relatively weak the Big East has been in the post-ACC expansion era. One would have to assume that the aforementioned teams would struggle mightily playing a conference schedule that included trips to Tallahassee, Death Valley, Chestnut Hill and Blacksburg.
So maybe the relationship between the ACC and the Big East is far more complicated than simply the ACC tried to make itself stronger and in so doing turned the Big East into a football (and basketball — seriously the Big East has 28 conference teams in basketball, law of average tells you that at least half of those teams are garbage, sorry Providence) powerhouse.
By taking their best teams, the ACC allowed the teams that had difficultly winning with VaTech, Miami and BC in the conference (see: West Virginia, Rutgers) to shine and also allowed for the replacement teams (USF, Louisville, Cincinnati) to prosper in a significantly weaker conference. Sure, the profile of the conference has been raised slightly but it’s hard to argue that it’s a better conference.
The ACC has certainly been helped by the addition of Virginia Tech but the demise of NC State, Virginia and Maryland have all served as obstacles in the way of the conference becoming a legitimate power.
What’s interesting to note is the ACC has the second-most guaranteed slots in bowl games. Only the SEC has more – and for a conference that hasn’t produced much in the recent past, their seven guaranteed tie-ins would seem out of place.
Outside of Louisville last year, the three new teams have done well out of conference. Off the top of my head, South Florida beating Auburn, Cincinnati killing Oregon St., and Louisville beating Miami two years ago. The worst thing about this is that the Big East has taken the hit on their strength of schedule due to those teams leaving. And the schedules are just now starting to be populated with the Auburn’s and Oklahoma’s of the college football world. We’ll get a better idea of how good the Big East is this year. If I’m going to argue one point, it would be that Boston College is not a tough place to play. At least for West Virginia.http://wvustats.com/football/opp.php?team_id=308&opp_id=25
Great blog! This is a point that I have been trying to argue with many naive West Virginia fans who seem to think that their school has achieved some level of superiority inside of their so called powerhouse conference in College Football. Any reasonable person is able to see that WVU and Rutgers have only gained this notoriety with the exit of VT, Miami, and BC. As I’ve previously argued, before the exit of the “Big 3″ in the Big East, the best bowl game during the BCS era that WVU was able to make it to was the Continental Tire Bowl. The aforementioned Big East teams should be thankful that my Hokies, Miami and BC aren’t still in their conference, otherwise they’d still be enjoying their annual New Year’s Day trips to Charlotte. Don’t believe me? Check WVU’s and Rutgers’ final records pre and post 2005.
And sure… the ACC hasn’t been the conference that it once was, but one could credit that to things being shaken up with the addition of three tough teams from a once tough conference in VT, Miami, and BC. So in essence, the weaklings or stragglers that once roamed around in the ACC and would beat up on the likes of Duke and Wake Forest, yet would consistently finish in the top 5 in the ACC behind the likes of Florida State and Clemson/Georgia Tech/N.C. State depending on what year it was, are finally being exposed for their flaws and weaknesses by the new 3. The ACC as a whole is just suffering from a couple of down years. We’ll be back soon enough! But I would love to see WVU and Rutgers try and make it through the ACC like they do in the post-2005 Big East.
Johnny, I think there is a point to be made about the Big East scheduling respectable out of conference opponents but I don’t think, aside from USF’s trip to Auburn last year, that you can make a substantial case on that. Cincinnati beating up on a pretty mediocre Oregon State team at home and a Louisville game from two years isn’t exactly compelling. The Big East will have to continue to schedule non-conference monsters (i.e., Auburn and Oklahoma) if it intends to be a respectable football conference.
You are right about BC, they don’t have anywhere near the home field advantage that they should have and will not be anywhere near as good as they were last year now that Matt Ryan is in the NFL. I’d look for a 7 or 8 win season out of the Eagles.
Why did the chicken cross the road?
To join the ACC…
The Big Easy has become diluted and they are worse but they are benefiting from a media perspective. The OSU-Cincinnati at home should have been a given- beating a rock bottom, injury ridden team at home, but the expectations were that simply beating any PAC 10 team makes you respectable. PAC 10 hype gone insane.
Same thing with South Florida beating Auburn, another consistently overrated SEC team at Auburn. Auburn should never have been No. 17 at the time- pure SEC hype gone wild. This was worse for the SEC because it showed a top heavy conference that sane people know it is.
When Oregon without its starting QB, RB and top WR beat the living $hit out of a healthy South Florida (despite a 56 to 21 it wasn’t even that close) in what was practically a South Florida home game it was clear that the Big East was still far worse than a strong PAC 10 team even if it was far better than a over-hyped SEC mid level team (Auburn).
The ACC has used the SEC marketing plan- padding winnings for their mediocre teams, signing up bowl games, setting up a championship game. The final stage will be using Big East marketing- scheduling games with low level and down on their luck teams in the SEC and PAC 10. I doubt the SEC or most of the PAC 10 want to take the risk but that would finalize their arrival as a power conference.
(Btw, as an SEC team fan I’ll admit that the PAC 10 is the fastest conference and at least just as good top to bottom but I think we are the most physical conference with more top teams. I’d love to see playoffs with Oregon, Cal, USC, LSU, Georgia, Tenn and maybe ASU and Florida. I think every team there could beat Ohio State.)