The one money point that has not been discussed is where is the break-even? Until the exit fee is determined by a court of law nobody knows. How many years of extra revenue from a new conference does it take to get the exit fee back?
If the $50 million exit fee holds up than we get the following:
Additonal $/ Break-even
2 million = 25 years
3 million = 16.7 years
4 million = 12.5 years
5 million = 10.0 years
6 million = 8.3 years
7 million = 7.1 years
8 million = 6.3 years
All the ACC has to accomplish is to get the BE to something above 10-12 years and the financial incentive starts to be questionable, especially with many cards left to be dealt.
If we believe in the 4 super conference model then the Big 12 and the ACC are on the cusp.
At the moment 63 teams are in the five conferences that will shrink to 4:
Big 10 - 14 (counting Maryland and Rutgers) needs to add 2
PAC 12 - 12 needs to add 4
SEC - 14 needs to add 2
These three need to add 8 teams to get to 16 each.
It is easy to figure out how the Big 10 and SEC get their 16 (after all, they only need 4 between them) but what does the PAC 12 do? What 4 teams are worth the prize?
So, we need to figure out which 16, 20 or 24 teams wind up in whatever combination of the ACC and Big 12 is called. (By the way, the current lineup including ND totals 24.)
Big 12 - 10 needs to add 6
ACC - 13 (counting Syracuse and Pitt; not counting ND and minus Maryland) needs to add 3
Together these two conferences have 23 and need to add 9 teams (not counting ND)
Adding Louisville, Cincinnati and UConn to the 23 teams (not counting ND) currently in the ACC and Big 12 there are 26 teams with an uncertain future. Now, when looking over the teams below think population and TV cable subscribers - ask yourself what better combination is there for the NYC market than SU and ND.
Whatever happens, I simply do not think we are left out of the final mix.
1 Baylor
2 Boston College
3 Cincinnati
4 Clemson
5 Duke
6 Florida State
7 Georgia Tech
8 Iowa State
9 Kansas
10 Kansas State
11 Louisville
12 Miami (Florida)
13 North Carolina
14 North Carolina State
15 Oklahoma
16 Oklahoma State
17 Pitt
18 Syracuse
19 TCU
20 Texas
21 Texas Tech
22 UConn
23 Virginia
24 Virginia Tech
25 Wake Forest
26 West Virginia