ACC moving to 18 game conference schedule for 2025-26

[OrangeinDC]

Call me selfish but if it brings SU to Cincy any time soon sign me up!

Got a tourney coming up in Cincy at their new Spooky Nook complex... looking forward to checking out food and the area.

 

[Hoo's That]

{snip}

Is this BC trying to get connected to ND in hopes of following them to a new conference? It stinks we lose an extra game against a really bad program. Plus BC is closer and easier to get to for SU fans and alums.

The Superior Generals of the Jesuits and the Congregation of the Holy Cross both called ACC HQ and demanded that they play each other every year.

 

[Hoo's That]

Somebody had to get stuck with SMU, and Louisville made geographic sense.

The Cali schools paired off. The Southern schools paired off.

That leaves the 4 Northern schools. Does ND have more of a rivalry with Pitt, SU or BC?

In football for the longest time it was Pitt. Now, though, the ND fans have a particular bone to pick with "Fredo," as they like to call BC. Maybe because BC was the first Catholic school in history to beat ND in football?

 

[tbonezone]

honest question . will we ever win an ACC championship ?. and if not what does the money even mean ?
true fact . our conference record is abysmal . do you want to be the joe palooka punching bag who never ever gets a title shot or does it make sense to drop down a weight class ? cuz this experiment ain't working

 

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[DomeHolmes]

That's also my interpretation from the deduction of conference games. Except, I'd exchange the "never" (never say never) for 'in all probability' or along those lines.

The ACC generally has been a weak sauce league over the past few years, a trend, that very well may likely continue. Nowadays, ACC teams beating themselves up, where once considered "quality losses," etc., is well in the rear view. The ACC, unfortunately, has swapped out places with yesteryear's SEC, and vice versa.

The ACC schools can't afford to replace those two conference games with weak OOC foes, as that won't help their cause or its current perception. Those two OOC game will need to be against quality opponents, where the ACC will need to win its fair share of, or else the 3-4 bid ACC league will remain just that.

I would respectfully disagree here. You don’t need to look any farther than the mountain West for a template of how to get average teams to make the tournament. Sadly, the template of “beat the hell out of teams in the 200 range, and then your top 50% of conference games are all quad 1 opportunities“ is how they are doing it. Last year, the 5 mountain West teams that made the tournament might’ve had a COMBINED five wins against good out of conference teams.

unfortunately, while the narrative for the Mountain West is “they are a better conference than you think”. If we did that, the narrative would be “the ACC is afraid to schedule people”

 

[orange79]

So everybody misses one opponent every year. Helluva way to run a conference.

Absolutely absurd.

We can all probably guess which NC schools demanded a home-and-home with a primary and a secondary opponent so they could oh so coincidentally each all their home-and-home games in NC

Wait, wait, wait.



There are 18 teams in the ACC.

That means each team has 17 opponents.

17 + 1 opponent twice = 18.


Every team plays every other team. They just play one opponent twice.

 

[ar inj]

Wait, wait, wait.



There are 18 teams in the ACC.

That means each team has 17 opponents.

17 + 1 opponent twice = 18.


Every team plays every other team. They just play one opponent twice.

You are a smart person and have described what the new bball schedule should allow, but alas, that is not what the ACC is planning. Each team will get two games against two league opponents and thus, will not play one of the other teams. Again, it is absurd.

 

[dasher]

honest question . will we ever win an ACC championship ?. and if not what does the money even mean ?
true fact . our conference record is abysmal . do you want to be the joe palooka punching bag who never ever gets a title shot or does it make sense to drop down a weight class ? cuz this experiment ain't working

Is this really a serious post?

 

[orange79]

You are a smart person and have described what the new bball schedule should allow, but alas, that is not what the ACC is planning. Each team will get two games against two league opponents and thus, will not play one of the other teams. Again, it is absurd.

Ah, gotcha. I misread the ACC statement.

I have to assume the variable partner who will be a home and home will be the team not played in the previous season.

Of course, that would make too much sense.

 

[OrangeXtreme]

 

[sutomcat]

Confirmed. This is being driven by ESPN. Of course, the payout for basketball is probably a little higher with this messed up scheduling model. I sure hope so.

 

[OrangeXtreme]

Confirmed. This is being driven by ESPN. Of course, the payout for basketball is probably a little higher with this messed up scheduling model. I sure hope so.

If the preseason expectations are wrong, there will be some really ugly matchups.

 

[cliftonparksufan]

And hopefully we schedule some real good programs and not the little sisters of the poor.

 

[Archbold44]

If the preseason expectations are wrong, there will be some really ugly matchups.

I say we schedule them mid season. Take one weekend. Take all 9 teams that have 1 more road game than home game... and designate them as hosts. Take all 9 teams that have 1 more home game than road game... and designate them visitors. This is decided preseason.

Once you get to the weekend before that weekend... schedule the host with the best record to host the visitor with the best record. And so on. Only exception is to avoid primary rivals. In that case, default to next one on list. Set up 9 TV slots. Schedule games based on viewership... best matchup Saturday at 8 pm or whatever. Set it up for early February after each team has played 8-10 conference games. Everyone knows whether they are hosting/traveling and has schedule open for the whole weekend. Just a matter of where to be held.

Or, do some neutral locations for top games. 1 vs 2 and 3 vs 4 go to MSG or Charlotte or somewhere... with the rest being home/away. Plenty of ways to make it work.

 

[longtimefan]

If the preseason expectations are wrong, there will be some really ugly matchups.

"If"?

 

[Jasoncuse]

So everybody misses one opponent every year. Helluva way to run a conference.

I think they should play the missing games as out of conference games and call it the ACC-ACC Challenge.

 

[jncuse]

As long as margin of victory is a component of the computer rankings, that will only encourage such behavior even more.

Its still margin of victory relative to opponent strength, not just margin of victory. Merely playing Q4's to boost your overall margin won't be much of a solution if you are a bad team or conference. You need to win these games by an average of at least 28 points or so, to be above average for a P4 team.

This is not to say Q4 games and margin is not problematic -- it certainly is -- better teams (i.e not Syracuse 2024) can try to run up score towards the end, or push tempo for all the game, take out starters a few minutes later than normal. But its not a solution to pump a bad league into anything meaningful.

The ACC won its Q4 games last year by an average of 19.2 points. The average team from another P4 conference won them by 26.4 points (data as of Dec 17). That 7 points is a huge delta. Playing more Q4 games may have actually made things a bit worse for the ACC last year.

 

[jncuse]

Don't you think it's easier to beat a Q4 team by 20+ than it is to win a Q2 game by 10+. From the in-depth examination of the ranking system you gave us last year, that's how it looks to me.

Yes, the ACC underachieved against tomato cans last year, and it was a shockingly major factor in the conference being rated 7th overall instead of, say, 4th best league.

But it's certainly easier to run it up against over-matched opponents than it is to beat 2 challenging opponents with your extra 2 games.

Of course it's easier to beat a Q4 team by 20+, than a Q2 team by 10. But for NET a Q2 win is better for you than a bottom half Q4 win of 20. For those bottom half Q4 teams to be meaningful to increasing your NET relatively, they need to be on average at least 30.

Average margin Q4 bottom (P5) = 28.4, (30.1 excluding the ACC)
Average margin Q2 game (P5) = 1.3

There was no solution for the ACC last year. It was just bad.
It was terrible in Q4 games... winning the bottom feeder games by 19.4 while the other P4 was winning them by 30.1. And it won 36% of Q2 games.

Now if the ACC became a whole bunch better, they could perhaps take advantage of the Q4 like the B12 does margin wise. Strategies to beat up Q4 teams may be helpful -- it is has helped the B12 a decent amount (even though they play the same % of them as everybody else). But at the baseline the ACC needs to be a much more competent conference than the ACC was in 24/25, to try to take advantage of it.

 

[Orangefizz]

18 games means that you still have to play everybody in the league once, and you play two rivals home & away each year.

Everyone will have to make the west coast swing.

I think it’s only one rival 2x and then play the other 16 teams once

 

[jncuse]

I would respectfully disagree here. You don’t need to look any farther than the mountain West for a template of how to get average teams to make the tournament. Sadly, the template of “beat the hell out of teams in the 200 range, and then your top 50% of conference games are all quad 1 opportunities“ is how they are doing it. Last year, the 5 mountain West teams that made the tournament might’ve had a COMBINED five wins against good out of conference teams.

unfortunately, while the narrative for the Mountain West is “they are a better conference than you think”. If we did that, the narrative would be “the ACC is afraid to schedule people”

You need to come up with a different angle on the MWC. They are not bottom feeding more than others in OOC. They are actually playing less games against bottom feeders. I'm not saying there is or isn't an inherent flaw in the NET that helps them, but it certainly isn't scheduling against cupcakes.

Q4 Games (24/25)
P5 - 47%
MWC - 43%

"Teams around 200", i.e top half Q4 games (160-260)
P5 - 18%
MWC - 19%

They do play more Q2 than Q1, so that is one imbalance but that is not going to rock the NET.
P5 - 21% Q1 / 16% Q2 = 37% total
MWC - 12%/23% = 35% total.

I see 2 factors for why the MWC does well in NET and getting in.

#1) If there is one possible inherent flaws in the NET that help the MWC it is road games - and they play more OOC road games. NET values road games at a factor of 1.4. So if you are playing more OOC road games than the other competent conferences, and you are a fairly competent conference yourself get a group boost.

The easiest way to observe this boost is compare the average conference NET vs average conference KP. For the P4+BE. the average of the two has been quite close the last few years, which is understandable as they comparable systems. But the MWC always does better in NET vs KP -- and my theory is that its the road games.

#2) Compared to the ACC, the MWC league bottom feeders don't "turn it on" in conference play. Those MWC teams that do well or bad in OOC seem to stay that way, ACC teams like Georgia Tech seem to crap the bed in OOC play, then they start winning in ACC, making it worse for everybody.

It does introduce a sinister theory -- one that I would need to validate before claiming it happens. Do the MWC bottom feeders, whose NET is benefitted by OOC road games, allow themselves to get beat up even more in conference play if they know their season is over?,

 

[Hoo's That]

I think it’s only one rival 2x and then play the other 16 teams once

No. The ACC already said that there will be 1 team that you don't play each season.

1 permanent home-and-home rival
1 "rotating" home-and-home
14 single games, 7 home and 7 away
1 rotating opposing team you don't play

Yes, it sucks. However, one lucky team gets to avoid Duke and another gets to avoid UNC.

 

[jncuse]

I can tell the ACC one immediate solution that would give them a huge boost in NET. Much more than the negligible boost from playing one or two more cupcakes.

Play a substantial amount of Q4 games on the road. There is nothing better for the NET than terrorizing a cupcake on the road, where your winning margin gets a 1.4 boost. (a home win actually reduces your margin by a factor).

Do you think they would take that advice? LOL
Or would I get fired on the spot.

 

[Orangefizz]

No. The ACC already said that there will be 1 team that you don't play each season.

1 permanent home-and-home rival
1 "rotating" home-and-home
14 single games, 7 home and 7 away
1 rotating opposing team you don't play

Yes, it sucks. However, one lucky team gets to avoid Duke and another gets to avoid UNC.

Well that’s strange. Didn’t know that; thanks for the information

This must be a rule to favor North Carolina because I think they would have to play Duke and NC State annually