Clemson and Florida State are waist-deep into their respective lawsuits against the Atlantic Coast Conference.
FSU just won a battle to keep its lawsuit in Florida, when Leon County Judge John C. Cooper denied the ACC’s request to dismiss the lawsuit on three counts. On the other hand, Clemson just took a small blow in the ACC’s countersuit in North Carolina.
Both schools are fighting tooth and nail in three states to win the right to move on from the ACC, and that raises a good question.
What is North Carolina doing?
When the ACC voted to bring a lawsuit against FSU in December, three members abstained from voting: Clemson, UNC, and Cal. Clemson makes sense because it brought its own lawsuit against the conference. And Cal makes sense because it’s a brand new team to the conference and probably chose to sit this out so as to not ruffle any feathers. But why would UNC expose itself in the vote against FSU only to sit on the sidelines?
Some lawyers will tell you that the best lawsuits are the ones that settle out of court. And to make the ACC settle, the universities leaving need to cause more damage to the ACC than it would benefit from a win in court. To do so means the battle against the ACC should be fought like a war of attrition. The longer the lawsuits proceed, the more mud is slung on the face of the conference in the eyes of the public and the more resources the ACC has to use to fight the lawsuit. If UNC joins the fight, it opens another front.
But maybe UNC doesn’t actually want out. It had a change in leadership at the same time the ACC voted to sue FSU. UNC’s Chancellor, Kevin M. Guskiewicz, left to be the President of Michigan State when the meeting happened, and it was reportedly interim Chancellor Lee H Roberts’ first day in his position. Like Cal, maybe Roberts was hedging his bets.
On the other hand, evidence points to the university wanting out. Just a couple of weeks ago, North Carolina’s General Assembly floated and then killed a Bill that would force UNC and NC State to play every year. In the ACC, that already happens. Why would North Carolina’s lawmakers feel threatened if UNC didn’t want to leave the ACC?
Rumors are that UNC’s Board of Trustees also wants out. One member, Dave Boliek, puts it clearly that he wants out,
“I am advocating for that,” he said. “That’s what we need to do. We need to do everything we can to get there. Or the alternative is the ACC is going to have to reconstruct itself. I think all options are on the table.”
But for the sake of argument, let’s say that’s the case. The University of North Carolina wants out of the ACC. Now, why isn’t it doing anything? Maybe it was waiting for the General Assembly’s Bill to run its course. If UNC had to bring little brother along after it left the ACC, the negotiation power of UNC would have severely diminished. Then UNC would have needed to amend its cost vs. risk assessment before it opened a can of worms against the ACC.
A more cynical view is that UNC wants to see what happens to FSU and Clemson first, which would be cowardice at the highest level. That would mean UNC signaled its intentions to fight alongside Clemson and FSU, but is now creeping slowly back into the bushes like Homer Simpson until the coast is clear.