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Message: [QUOTE="WoadBlue, post: 3037286, member: 1145"] VT had wanted more than anything to be part of the ACC from before it was founded, from when it was little more than a rumor that Dook, UNC, Maryland, Clemson, and SoCar were leaving the SoCon and would want 3 more for their new league. VT always was going to go ACC. Tad Foote decided before the ACC invited FSU that the best way for Miami to both get a handle on its to rowdy football program and to rise in academic prestige was to join the ACC. Miami tried hard to be the ACC's #10 when FSU joined (instead of taking the SEC offer). Miami then was necessary to the creation of BE football. Cuse, BC, and Pitt all had told the BE office that Penn St going Big Ten and then the SEC expanding to 12 and the ACC adding FSU to go to 9 meant that if the B E did not start football, they might have to explore leaving. That forced the hand of the BE to create a separate division. Miami was trying to get the ACC to add it before it had played 3 BE seasons. In fact, the BE knew all along what Miami was doing, with the full backing of FSU. In either '97 or '98. Tranghese, who having half a brain knew that any BE school offered by the ACC was gone, offered to let the ACC 'borrow' Miami, BC, Cuse, and Pitt for football season. That would have killed BE football, but saved BE basketball at full strength. The ACC declined, in part because nobody but FSU then wanted to have 12 football members, and nobody wanted 13. So I have no doubt that VT and Miami would have gone ACC even with PSU in the BE. I also think that if PSU had had people smart enough and tough enough to overrule JoePa, PSU may well have been part of the ACC expanding to 12 instead of 9. We'd have wanted FSU, PSU, and Cuse. [/QUOTE]

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