4. The One Non-Conference Game And Why It Matters
The ten-game ACC+Notre Dame schedule is already terrific and should be a lot of fun. How much do the 15 ACC teams – including the Irish for this season – want to extend themselves?
As is, the ten-game campaign is going to be rough. Will Georgia Tech want to keep the date with Georgia? Will Florida State want to play Florida, will Louisville want to keep the game against Kentucky, and will Clemson want to keep the series with South Carolina alive and rolling?
Yup. Actually, it’s more like a firm probably.
If there aren’t fans in the stands – that’s still up for debate – the idea of scheduling a cream-puff for that 11th game doesn’t help.
Yes, the TV revenue has to be split up 15 ways, but it still might make more sense to schedule someone from the Big 12 or SEC, or keep a big game against a Group of Five program like UCF – who is previously scheduled to play North Carolina and Georgia Tech – as long as it works out geographically.
There’s a caveat – the non-conference game has to be played in the home state of the ACC school.
That’s not a problem for the potential of GT-UGA, UF-FSU, Clemson-USC and UK-UL, but that would mean that – for example – UCF wouldn’t get the home game against the Tar Heels.
The weekly schedule hasn’t been released yet, but it will be interesting where these non-conference games are put in the respective schedules. If they’re in the middle of the season, they can be skipped if absolutely necessary.
However, to speculate, they’ll all likely be at the very end, with the idea that they could be canceled or changed if the ACC needs to reschedule one of the conference dates.