More Details Come Out About Notre Dame Joining the ACC

ACC (Photo credit: @jbtaylor)

Here are some more details about Notre Dame‘s move to the ACC.

• With this move the ACC is to academics what the SEC is to football… okay for all you who do not like reminders of SAT questions the bottom line with the addition of Notre Dame it increases the number of member institutions to 11 that are ranked among the 58 in the 2013 U.S. News & World Report.
• With the addition of Notre Dame the ACC Council of Presidents unanimously voted to increase the exit fee to over $50 million. This stops any rumors of the Big 12 or SEC looking at ACC teams to expand there.
• Notre Dame will have to play five games each football season- but still maintains its football independence. This will be a three-year rotation for each ACC member school which will end regular rivalries between Boston College, Miami, Georgia Tech, and new ACC member Pitt.
• Notre Dame plans to leave the Big East asap- but their contract requires a 27-month waiting period.
• Under this agreement the school gets to keep 100 percent of its television revenues from football and hockey, including BCS bowl games.
• Notre Dame will get to take advantage of ACC non-BCS bow games but this gets complicated- for these non-BSC bowl games the Irish get FULL PRIVELGES of being an ACC school. There is a provision that in order to have Notre Dame as part of one of these bowls the football team must be within one victory better than an ACC team. So if Virginia Tech doesn’t go to the Orange Bowl but has a 10-2 record and Notre Dame has a 9-3 record then Virginia Tech is first in line.
• The football season contests for the Irish will be 3-2 format- 3 home games against ACC members and 2 away in the first year. It is not clear is neutral sites are included in this because the Irish have a habit of moving what should be away games to neutral sites and then filling the stands with Fighting Irish.

Again some big questions- and I still have a problem with the football independence. But the deal is done. Some good things out of this deal is that it completely strengthens the ACC in terms of basketball and other sports. It also sores up the cracks, because I doubt there will be any ACC schoolswilling to pay $50 million to leave the conference. Other good news is that with the non-BCS bowls the ACC can negotiate better terms because the Irish fan base travels and travels well.

Team raising their helmets to the student section after a win (or loss) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

One more point- television. With this new deal, the ACC can ask for more money for its games on ESPN and fellow networks.