With the College Football Playoff expanding to 12 teams for the first time this year, doors will be open for teams that would have previously been considered an afterthought.
The latest iteration of the Playoff will award automatic bids to the four champions of Power Four conferences, as well as the top Group of Five team, plus first-round byes, on-campus games and more opportunities for teams to make the sport’s new postseason format.
Enter Miami and NC State. A recent analysis titled the “six sneaky contenders and sleepers” that could play their way into the 12-team Playoff has the Hurricanes and Wolfpack as two programs that could still be standing in postseason play when the regular season and conference championship games conclude in December.
While Clemson and Florida State have consistently been given the best odds of reaching the Playoff as the ACC champion, Rotoballer’s Jackson Sparks lists Miami as the strongest dark horse among possible conference contenders.
Per Sparks:
“It’s time to turn the page on (Miami’s) disastrous 2023 campaign and look forward to the Cameron Ward-led offense in 2024. Ward heads to Miami from Washington State, where he threw for just under 7,000 yards and 48 touchdowns. He added 13 scores as a rusher.
If you add in his two seasons at Incarnate Word, the Texas native has compiled 13,874 passing yards, 119 passing touchdowns, 30 interceptions, and 16 rushing touchdowns over the last four years. The Hurricanes have been missing a game-breaking quarterback for a long time, so Ward’s arrival is a significant development.”
Miami doesn’t have Clemson on its regular-season schedule for 2024, and they get a break by playing Florida State at home on October 26. The ‘Canes open the season against Florida in Gainesville on August 31 in a nationally televised contest on ABC (3:30 p.m. EDT).
Elsewhere in the ACC, North Carolina State made Rotoballer’s list of dark horses following a nine-win season in 2023, during which Dave Doeren’s team won six straight games — beginning with a 24-17 upset over Clemson in Raleigh.
With that momentum and some key transfer portal editions, the Wolfpack could be poised for bigger things in 2024.
Writes Sparks:
“NC State is another program that landed an impact quarterback transfer this offseason. After five years at Coastal Carolina, Grayson McCall decided to make the move up to the ACC.
In four seasons as a starter, McCall racked up over 11,000 (all-purpose) yards of offense and 108 total touchdowns while throwing just 14 interceptions. He arrives in Raleigh with a 33-7 career record. To help McCall’s chances to succeed, NC State secured the No. 3 ranked tight end (Justin Joly, UConn) and the No. 10 ranked wide receiver (Noah Rogers, Ohio State) in the transfer portal.
NC State visits Clemson on September 21 but avoids Florida State in regular-season play. The Wolfpack face a tough test in non-conference play in Week 2 when they face Tennessee in a primetime contest at Charlotte’s Bank of America Stadium. It will be a nationally televised game on ABC.
Tennessee topped Rotoballer’s list as the biggest sleeper team entering the 2024 season. Utah, Kansas and Boise State also made the list.
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