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Message: [QUOTE="Lou_C, post: 687484, member: 3201"] I think and hope there's a lot of truth in what you said. It's important to look at the little things, and if you do, I think there are more positives than negatives that indicate they get it now. They are late, no question...some of this stuff was very apparent years before the ACC started acting like it. Remember, and I know this may or may not be a sore spot on this board, but the ACC tried to do the 2005 expansion without VT. That's just unthinkable for a conference even remotely thinking football. The SEC would have snapped them up in a second, and everything would have been that much worse. They were saved from their own mess with that one. That said, a few indications that the thought process is turning a bit... 1) Recent comments from the UNC AD about wanting to increase revenue 40%. That's the way to be thinking. One, because UNC has the alumni resources to do so, so they should be, and that kind of attitude finally alligns them with schools that NEED increased revenue to compete at the level they are trying to compete at. If UNC is NOT focused on increasing revenue, that puts them directly at odds with schools like FSU, Clemson and VT. Second, because you don't increase revenue without improving football. You either increase the revenue, and that money partially goes into football (let's face it, how much better can UNC's other sports get?). Or you increase revenue by putting a better football product on the field. I mean, how much more money can UNC basketball generate? No matter what, that's a football comment, even if not explicitly 2) Duke facility improvements. Quarter billion on improvements for arguably the worst BCS football program? Yes please. 3) Tom O'Brien fired. You could make a very strong argument that going to a bowl game every single year is NC St's ceiling. While NC St. has in my mind actually fired mediocre-but-not-terrible coaches before, and seems to want football success more than some other schools, Tom O'Brien's performance is the kind that has traditionally kept a guy employed in the ACC for some time. More importantly, you can make the case that O'Brien was fired at the right time, instead of a season or two late. It's not that the ACC NEVER fires it's coaches, it's that it allows too much damage to be done before it does. That extra year as a lame duck is devastating and leaves the cupboard bare. The SEC errors on the other side of this, and while I think it's actually a bad thing in the wide world, purely on the football field, it pays dividends. The SEC generally fires guys too soon, as soon as things look slightly bad. Nobody has "earned" that extra year, even with a national championship. It's important, because their replacements come in with talent still in place, and before a culture of losing is ingrained. I'll be watching Mike London hard on this front. Not saying it's right, but Mike London would have been fired after LAST season if he was in the SEC. If Virginia doesn't make a bowl for the second consecutive year, does he keep his job? The old ACC says yes, because he's a likeable guy, seems to run a good program, recruits well, and doesn't embarass the university. The new attitude would send him packing, while he's got a stacked roster that would attract a great candidate. I don't want to root against Mike London at all, so I'm hoping they do well this year. Which actually relates to... 4) Smarter OOC scheduling creeping in. Look at Duke's schedule. For the first time in a while, they haven't scheduled themselves as a sacrificial lamb to Alabama or Stanford or the like. They have scheduled all winnable games. NC State has a very good schedule for a rebuilding team. While there are still some bad exceptions, the ACC OOC schedule is getting just slightly smarter. You're Duke, you have nothing to prove by getting pole-axed by a power program that isn't better proven by playing in a bowl game. The ACC schedules way, way harder OOC than any other conference. Wait, you say, they have to because in conference is so weak. That MIGHT hold a little water for schools that are literally competing for a playoff spot and might see strength of schedule come into play. That means nothing to schools like UVA, NC State, UNC, GT etc who aren't going to be competing for a national championship, but are scheduling themselves out of 10 win seasons into 8 win seasons. NOBODY looks and says "but it's a STRONG 8 wins." A big reason why the ACC conference slate is so week for SOS is that just about everyone comes into the conference season with two losses and unranked. Playing a 6-0 #23 ranked Pitt is always going to be better than an unranked 4-2 Pitt with two blowout losses. UVA is the worst at this. They open with Oregon and BYU this year. Last year that had Penn State and TCU. Are you freaking kidding me? They are scheduling to get London fired. And those games mean nothing, other than maybe the PSU game. UVA isn't picking up pacific northwest recruits. Makes no sense when you're trying to build a program, and it doesn't follow the path of any program that has built a winning program out of nothing (at least since Bowden built FSU with a anyone/anywhere philosophy that simply doesn't work in a totally different world today). KSU, Wisconson, South Carolina, Oregon, any formerly awful program that turned themselves around, NONE of them built it by getting their brains bashed in over an over again by teams they couldn't compete with. Bite off what you can chew, and build on it over time, taking smart baby steps. If you're going to take risks, you take them for games that will matter, like Clemson-GA or UNC-So. Car. 5) Conference scheduling. The last two conference schedules have been much, much smarter. A few years ago, the ACC scheduled FSU-Clemson, the premier ACC game of the year, one week after Clemson played Auburn and FSU played Oklahoma. Are you kidding me? Who is that good for? The ACC has been notorious for sending it's better football programs out to something like BC for a Thursday night game in November off a short week. The ACC has literally scheduled for mediocrity in the past. The last couple schedules have been MUCH improved. Another example...finally this year FSU was able to schedule a patsy game before the FSU-UF game, like UF has been doing for years. FSU has always had a ACC game, sometimes a critical road game at that with the conference on the line, the week before a huge SEC-ACC showcase, while the Gators basically had two weeks off and a scrimmage to get ready. This year we were able to get Idaho before the Gators. Clemson gets The Citadel before USC. That's huge, and not just for FSU and Clemson. It's a huge win for the ACC for FSU to win that game. These are kind of small things by themselves, but I'm constantly on the lookout for every factor, and whether it indicates the ACC "gets it" as far as how big time football is played, or whether it is still clinging to old, out-dated philosophies. So far, I see a lot of small positives across the league. [/QUOTE]

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