During the Atlantic Coastal Conference’s annual spring meetings, progress was made on a new scheduling model that would see the conference abandon the Atlantic and Coastal Divisions model sooner rather than later. The ACC first adopted divisional play starting with the 2005 season, and they are the only Division I conference whose divisions are not divided by geography. However, on Tuesday, Miami athletic director Dan Radakovich told reporters, “we’re closer to the end (of divisions) than to the beginning.”
The current model the ACC is discussing adopting is known as the 3-5 format. That would give each of the league’s 14 full-time member schools three permanent opponents, while the other ten schools would operate on an every other season rotation for ten seasons, five years on and five years off. That would allow a four-year player to play every conference opponent at least once. Of course, one of the last hurdles that remain for the conference would be to see what their network partner, ESPN, would think of such a move. The league would want to make sure that its most important business partner would be willing to accept a new conference layout.
The ACC has talked for years about dropping divisions in their league. Still, progress was finally made after the NCAA indicated that they would be dropping a rule requiring a conference of 12 teams or more to have divisions to stage a conference championship game. With that rule on the verge of sunset, the question now becomes, “would the Big Ten ever drop the East/West divisions to create a more balanced schedule within the league?” The Big Ten had non-geographical divisions for the first three years following conference expansion with the gone but not forgotten Legends and Leaders divisions. The league would adopt geographic East/West divisions three years later in 2014.
Why would the Big Ten want to drop the divisions and adopt a format similar to the 3-5? For the sake of competitive balance. Since 2014, the year East/West was adopted, the East has been undefeated. That’s right. The East currently holds an 8-0 the advantage over the West division. The dominance continues heading into this season as well as the top four Big Ten football team for 2022 according to ESPN’s Football Power Index all come from the East division (OSU, Mich, PSU, MSU). I would think that the Big Ten would be interested in dropping divisions if for no other reason than to see new title game matchups and create new possible rivalries by having regularly scheduled matchups against rotating teams within the conference.
The ACC would not drop their divisions until 2023, so it would probably take the Big Ten until 2024 or 2025 until they could or would adopt such a format. I hope Commissioner Kevin Warren would embrace the possibility of more flexible scheduling and the opportunity for some of your marquee rivalry games to be played on a stage like the Big Ten Championship Game.
Now a look at the Big Ten division winners and Conference Champions since expansion in 2011.