A once-dignified league now looks tarnished
The Virginian-Pilot
© July 2, 2003

Virginia Tech doesn’t care. It’s got what it wants. The Hokies may not even realize they’ve joined an ACC diminished by the embarrassing expansion process.

Today’s ACC is portrayed as a laughingstock when it isn’t being branded a villain.

Once considered a conference of integrity and class, the ACC’s reputation has been tarnished by its own bungling and crass ambition.

Say this for the ACC-Big East debacle: The last few weeks have been diverting. In the same way that a six-car pileup is diverting.

Few come out looking good, but, then, greed and hypocrisy aren’t pretty.

Neither are the comments aimed at Virginia Tech president Charles Steger by editorialists up and down the East Coast.

Does Tech offer a course in ethics? If so, the Hokies’ duplicitous alliance with the ACC would make for lively classroom debate.

In general, almost all of the educational institutions involved in the expansion mess come off looking selfish and stupid.

The obvious exceptions are Duke and North Carolina. Their presidents seemed to understand that a university’s first order of business isn’t pumping up an already bloated football.

In fighting expansion, Duke and North Carolina sought better balance between the collegiate and corporate approach to big-time athletics. Virginia president John Casteen served the commonwealth’s interests by holding out for Virginia Tech, albeit at the cost of looking like a pawn of the state’s top politicians.

Perhaps the most troubling aspect of the prolonged and clumsy scenario, though, is the way ACC commissioner John Swofford and the presidents went about their scheming.

Back-room deals and covert conference calls may work well for Wall Street power brokers and Hollywood agents, but universities are supposed to be more than cogs in the moneymaking machine.

Seven of the ACC’s nine pre-expansion institutions are public schools. Even Duke and Wake Forest receive subsidies from the North Carolina legislature for each in-state student admitted. They aren’t, in other words, the playthings of a few presidents and athletic directors indulging in a power trip.

Is it asking too much for a taxpayer-supported university to be operated with greater sensitivity to the public good than your average dot-com start-up?

Especially now, when universities are struggling with budget cuts, staff reductions and tuition increases, presidents might be expected to spend more time seeking solutions to actual educational problems than running interference for football.

It would be one thing had this been, to quote Miami president Donna Shalala, only “a bizarre, strange and goofy process.” But it was, in so many ways, a deceitful process, too.

When the presidents explored their expansion plans in clandestine ways, they deliberately hid their intentions from the people they serve. It was a low-class and, as it turns out, damaging tactic by the ACC.

The ACC’s lack of integrity may only be exceeded by its stupidity. There is no guarantee, despite Swofford’s campaigning, that an 11-team football conference will create huge, new revenue for the schools.

To start with, as Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski points out, the pie will now be split 11 ways instead of nine.

Expansion is a godsend for Virginia Tech, but Tech’s presence does little to elevate the ACC. If anybody thought it would, the Hokies would have been invited from the start.

Tech has no regrets. Nobody expects that it will. The Hokies belong to a new alliance that believes size matters. Others hold to the quaint notion that reputation matters more.
 

Hokies AD Weaver enjoys night of acceptance
Ride smooth at final turn

After looking for several weeks like it would be left out on the street, Virginia Tech arrives in the ACC in style.

By AARON McFARLING
THE ROANOKE TIMES

   GREENSBORO, N.C. - The ACC sent a limousine for Virginia Tech athletic director Jim Weaver and his five traveling partners Tuesday. In it, they rode in style from the Greensboro/High Point airport to a posh hotel near the conference headquarters.

    Flanked by Miami athletic director Paul Dee and ACC Commissioner John Swofford, Weaver stared out into a sea of reporters who hailed from New York to Florida and many points in between - none of whom would have predicted this three weeks ago.

    In an hour-and-a-half news conference welcoming Tech and Miami into the ACC, not once did Weaver hear the word "turncoat" or "hypocrite" or any of the other barbs slung the Hokies' way in recent days. Instead, the focus was on the future.

    For Weaver, that future looks bright.

    "This membership is something that the fan base and the alumni and the friends of Virginia Tech have wanted for a long time," Weaver said. "It's home for us."

    Weaver, finally convinced that the bizarre ACC expansion saga had taken its final turn, sipped water and laughed at jokes and answered benign questions about scheduling and rivalries, soaking in a moment that was 50 years in the making.

    "The fact that I have an ACC pin on my lapel that I was given when I arrived, it's beginning to sink in," Weaver said. "But I'll tell you, it's been a process that you just didn't know what was going to happen next."

    A process that began May16 with the ACC voting to talk expansion with Miami, Boston College and Syracuse unofficially ended Monday, when Miami president Donna Shalala announced she would join Tech in accepting the ACC's invitation for membership.

    In between, Tech jumped into and out of a lawsuit and drew criticism nationwide for a perceived lack of loyalty to its Big East Conference brethren.

    Only after Tuesday's news conference ended and many of the video cameras went dark was Weaver asked to address that criticism.

    "I don't read the Internet," Weaver said. "I very rarely read the newspapers. I don't have time. I haven't paid any attention to it. I'm sure it's out there.

    "But we in positions of leadership are charged with making decisions that are in the best interest of our individual institutions long term. ... We tried to do that, and I'm absolutely positive that the decision we made was the right decision for Virginia Tech."

    Then the conversation shifted again - back to the enhanced importance of the Tech-Virginia football game, back to the effect this will have on the basketball team, back to what a great day this was for Tech.

    Someone asked what this meant to Weaver personally to be the AD when the move finally happened. He smiled.

    "You never can get too high when you win and too low when you lose," he said. "I'm delighted for our university. I'm not sure it's really sunk in for me personally.

    "I'm a team player. Teamwork is described as the greatest good for the greatest number. The greatest good in this situation is for Virginia Tech to be in the ACC.

    "And the greatest number are Hokies everywhere."

Big East vows not to punish Tech teams
Mike Tranghese says he understands Tech's move to the ACC and wants the Hokies to enjoy a final year in the Big East.
By DOUG DOUGHTY
THE ROANOKE TIMES

The Big East wouldn't make life miserable for Virginia Tech and Miami in their last season as Big East members, or would it?
"I would think not," Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese said in a conference call with reporters Monday night. "The thought hadn't even crossed my mind."

Theoretically, the Big East could make the Hokies and Hurricanes ineligible for the football championship or prevent them from playing in the men's and women's basketball championships.

"I'm not interested in damaging the student-athletes at Virginia Tech or Miami," Tranghese said. "They haven't done anything wrong. I think, if they're in our league, they have a right to play.

"If either one of them is good enough to qualify for a tournament in basketball and win it, then they should go forward. The way the basketball units are structured, it would remain our property anyway."

On the day that Miami announced it would join Tech in moving to the ACC, Tranghese was especially conciliatory to the Hokies. Athletic director Jim Weaver had notified Tranghese of Tech's position after the ACC voted June24 to extend an invitation to the Hokies.

"I hope it wasn't a difficult call because I told him it shouldn't be," Tranghese said. "Whew, Virginia Tech's been a great member. They really have. I think what Virginia Tech has done with its football program is one of the three or four best stories in the 24-year history of our league.

"I know they're taking some shots, but they basically got politicized into this position. Their fans are probably ecstatic they're in the ACC. They weren't out there trying to get out of the conference. I think we all know the circumstances under which it arrived."

In less than a month, Miami's Larry Coker and the Hokies' Frank Beamer will attend the Big East football media day in East Rutherford, N.J.

"Both Virginia Tech and Miami are in our league for another year and I want to make certain their coaches, as well as the student-athletes, have a great experience," Tranghese said. "Because it's the final year, I don't want us to focus on the fact these two people are leaving.

"As I told Jim, I'm not all of a sudden not going to talk to him. Both Virginia Tech and Miami are expected to have pretty good football teams this year and they need to enjoy it."

There are some potential problems involving schedules after this year. Tech is bound to play Temple in 2004 as part of the agreement by which Temple will be leaving the Big East.

Temple, the lone football-only member of the Big East, had asked the conference to guarantee a full slate in 2004, although Tech could be off the hook if the Big East adds a new member or members by that time.

Tranghese would not discuss new football-playing members, other than to say that Notre Dame does not appear to be a viable candidate for either the Big East or ACC.

"If you gave me a dollar for every conversation I've had with them, I probably could retire," Tranghese said. "They've been part of our bowl agreement and I've taken a lot of criticism for that, but having them part of our group has helped us get better bowl deals.

"I think our members will continue to talk to them, but they've made it clear that they're going to stay that way [independent in football]."

 

Football will be ACC's top cash cow
The addition of Miami and Virginia Tech will change the economics dynamics in a league long known for its basketball.
By ROB DANIELS LANDMARK NEWS SERVICE

GREENSBORO, N.C. - In the fiscal year ending June30, 2002, the ACC derived 50.2 percent of its athletics income from men's basketball and 49.8 percent from football. That's McEnroe-Borg or Lennon-McCartney balance.
In adding football-friendly, basketball-challenged Miami and Virginia Tech, the league's symmetry in perception and income might morph into Sonny-Cher or Bono-Anybody Else in U2, or perhaps "Refrigerator" Perry-Ralph Sampson on the scales.

Hoops will still be big and worthy of attention, but it may not carry the weight in mind-set and bank account that it has for the league's first 50 years.

If Virginia Tech and Miami had been in the ACC for the past six years, all of the nine current ACC schools would have made more than $100,000 less off the 2003 NCAA tournament than they actually received. The drag comes from the Hokies, who have made one NCAA tournament appearance in the past 17 years.

Expansion has been timed in large part to coincide with the negotiation of the league's next football television contract, which will begin with the fall of 2006. The value of that deal - $21 million in tax year 2001-02 - should increase with the addition of the Hurricanes, whose competitive history and swagger have made them nationally prominent.

How much will they add? Nobody is willing or able to predict with any certainty right now.

The ACC's basketball deal, which runs through 2010-11, jumped from $16 million in the final year of the previous contract to $28 million in 2001-02. An annual escalator clause was built into the extension, but it's unlikely that Raycom, the rights-holder, will feel compelled to pony up more than it has already agreed to pay.

"I'm not sure they can ask," said Ken Haines, Raycom's CEO. "I imagine we will discuss markets and schedules."

Even when the expansion process accelerated in April and May, Haines said nobody from the league consulted him or implied that they would need to strike a new deal. That's still the case.

"We have not had any discussions," Haines said. "There is nothing in the contract that specifies language about renegotiation."

For now, Miami and Virginia Tech simply give ACC basketball two more members with which to split the financial pot.

Miami, which killed its men's basketball program in 1971 and kept it dormant for 14 years, has actually made the NCAA tournament in four of the past six years, producing seven "units" of tournament revenue according to the distribution system in that span. Teams deliver one unit for a bid and one additional unit for every victory through the regional finals.

The Hurricanes' total would place the program fourth in the 11-team ACC in the six-year period - behind Duke (23), Maryland (21) and North Carolina (13).

Tech, on the other hand, hasn't been to the tournament since 1996.

The ACC generated roughly $10 million off the 2003 tournament, which pays out based on a league's performance over the six-year span. Each school made an estimated $1,112,222 from the tournament. With Miami and Virginia Tech in the mix, that would have dipped to $992,727 per school - a relatively inconsequential $119,727 in a $35 million athletics department budget, but the value of a few scholarships at least.

The ACC also splits some revenue from home conference games in football and basketball, and both newcomers will have to improve to generate their standard share of the pie.

The Hokies averaged 4,211 fans per home game last season in 10,052-seat Cassell Coliseum and have not qualified for the 12-team conference tournament - let alone the NCAAs - in their three years of Big East hoops membership.

The Hurricanes didn't sell out their new on-campus arena for the dedication game against North Carolina on Jan.4. The joint has 7,000 seats, one-third the size of the Dean Dome and half that of Joel Coliseum.

Of course, any dip in per-school basketball revenue figures to be offset by gains in football, but things are about to change around here.








In case of ACC expansion, change isn't always good
BOBLIPPER
TIMES-DISPATCH COLUMNIST Jul 02, 2003
Contact Bob Lipper at (804) 649-6555 or e-mail blipper@timesdispatch.com

DUCK, N.C. The winds of change blew across the Outer Banks from Greensboro last night, ruffling sea oats and granules of sand and casting out history with the ebb tide.

This is how landscapes get rearranged. Locals in these parts speak of a time when pinpricks like Buxton and Salvo were remote fishing villages, not cottage communities and tourist destinations. Now it's the ACC that confronts upheaval. It took 50 years for the league to construct a unique legacy and honorable reputation. It took two months to bulldoze both of them to the ground.

The ACC many of us grew up with - the ACC of Everett Case and Vic Bubas and Dean Smith and Len Chappell and Phil Ford and Michael Jordan and, yes, Frank Howard, Randy White and Lawrence Taylor, too - officially went out of business last night. The league eyeballed the spreadsheets and calculated that a half-century worth of heritage couldn't measure up to new football markets.

It sold its birthright to place a franchise at Michael Irvin U.

This was all unnecessary and damaging. Unnecessary because the ACC already was prosperous beyond belief and an influential voice in the boardroom of College Sports Inc. Damaging because a fellow conference was willfully gutted in the process and the ACC's good name squandered.

Once, the ACC was sized up as the do-right league. Now it's been marked down as corporate raider - not to mention the fact it's forfeiting the identity that made it distinct in a crowded marketplace.

The SEC, for instance, is blood feuds and Gothic South intrigue - Faulknarian football with ghosts of the Bear and other legends lurking in the shadows. The Big Ten is Paul Bunyans breathing steam in subfreezing locales and grappling over small parcels of acreage. The Pac-10 sells passing-game genius and golden arms. The Big 12 features brawny galoots from the Midlands and the best mascots in captivity - the Sooner Schooner, Bevo, Herbie Husker, Reveille, Ralphie.

The ACC's calling card consisted of Duke-Carolina, home-and-home tensions and the best basketball tournament on the planet. Now the ACC will be a hybrid - basketball diluted to enhance football. It'll allow Chuck Amato to puff his chest out even further if that's humanly possible.

Football, ironically, always has shaped this league. It was football that birthed the ACC - created after Clemson and Maryland were banned from the 1952 Southern Conference race because they'd ignored league orders not to accept bowl bids the previous season. And it was football that prompted the ACC to add Florida State to its rolls four decades later.

Since then, FSU has given the ACC two national titles and one Charlie Ward. But it's also spawned Foot Locker, Dillard's, Sebastian Janikowski, Adrian McPherson and a mad rush of stadium and facility enhancements to catch up to the Seminoles (as if that should be the ideal).

Tens upon tens of millions of dollars have been consumed in this spending spree. Duke, which hasn't won an ACC game since the Clinton administration, even sprang for a $24-million football headquarters and lowered its admissions standards for select players. No telling what the Blue Devils will do now that Miami and Virginia Tech are coming aboard.

This is no proud episode, last night's trumpet-flourish unveiling notwithstanding. A month ago, in fact, a national coalition of university professors asked the ACC's presidents to curb plans for expansion on the grounds that it represented a dangerous trend toward "major league" conferences that would further separate athletics from a college's academic mission.

"This is a wonderful statement," UNC law professor Charles Daye said at the time, "but it's a little like spitting into a hurricane."

Was it ever.

 

Road tougher for Groh, Cavs
Jul 02, 2003
CHARLOTTESVILLE - A year from now, the landscape in ACC football figures to change dramatically when Big East powers Miami and Virginia Tech come aboard. University of Virginia coach Al Groh's job will get tougher, but he's not shying away from the challenge.

"I think the addition of these two schools to the ACC significantly raises the football muscle and the profile of the conference on a national scale," Groh said yesterday.

"Obviously, it also raises the competitive bar, given the frequency with which the Hurricanes have finished in the top 5. It now gives our conference, in Miami and Florida State, two teams that over the last 10 years have been consistent top-5 finishers."

Such finishes are the Cavaliers' goal too, and so, Groh said, they're "challenged in every area to do better - recruiting, coaching, game performance, fan attendance and intensity, raising money - if we're to stay on track to reach our goal.

"It'll take everybody. It's important that in terms of getting where we want to go, we have to recognize the competitive environment is different, and we've got to respond accordingly. We've got to be better in every area."

U.Va. and Tech already meet annually in football, but the nature of the series will change.

"It's conference competition now," Groh said. "Our goal from the start of every year is to win the Atlantic Coast Conference and to move on from there, so it makes it one of those really important conference games." - Jeff White
 

Commentary: Expansion Lessons - Wanted or Unwanted - Will Linger
by Dan Scott

CLEMSON - As the paint begins to dry on the new ACC logo, it's worth
a look back at what we learned during nearly two months of very
public, sometimes profane expansion talks.
We were entertained. We were sickened. We were informed. We were
bludgeoned.

But we seemingly never went without a new episode of what quickly
became the sporting world's favorite soap opera.

For instance:

- We learned that ACC Commissioner John Swofford, a former North
Carolina athletic director, may not bow to the Tobacco Road Mafia
after all.

Despite his Tar Heel ties, Swofford openly defied the wishes of North
Carolina's basketball-wielding power players and ultimately saw that
the ACC did indeed expand. True, the original expansion plan
involving Syracuse and Boston College fell through - due in part to a
shifting of stance by UNC and its fellow stone wall, Duke (along with
Virginia Governor Mark Warner. More about him later.) - but Swofford
found a way to negotiate through the muck and strike a deal which, in
the long run, could end up being more beneficial to the conference.

And while there are those both within the confines of ACC country and
across the nation calling Swofford such cute names as "buffoon" for
his struggle to close the deal, the mere fact that he was able to
shuck, jive, jab and counterpunch every haymaker thrown his way -
political and otherwise - proves to this camp that his savvy was
exceeded only by his patience.

Kudos, John. Now, about that 12th team...

- We learned that both UNC and Duke are still, well, UNC and Duke.

Given the opportunity to play the role of visionary and help forge a
brave, new place for the ACC in the hierarchy of major college
football, our Tobacco Road twins instead did everything they could to
scuttle the deal. Why?

Basketball tickets.

For many at UNC and Duke - including those who carry the large
checkbooks - the ACC's only real purpose is to support their
basketball habit. That, of course, is because too many at those
schools the ACC is now, and forever will be, just a basketball
conference.

Officials at the two schools can say what they want in public, but
those in the know understand the real reason behind the constant
objections and no votes:

Those big-money boosters threatened to withhold those big-money
checks if those in power at each school voted for expansion, which in
turn would cut into their allotment of ACC basketball tournament
tickets.

Too bad, Blunder Twins. Expansion happened anyway.

- We learned that politicians have no shame.

Okay, we knew that politicians have no shame. But this whole process
only served to reinforce the notion.

Really, who the heck ever heard of Richard Blumenthal until he, as
Connecticut attorney general, took it upon himself to file a lawsuit
to try and stop the ACC from taking teams from the Big East?

As the preposterous news broke Tuesday that the suit might seek as
much as $100 million in damages, Blumenthal vowed to press on despite
serious evidence which brings into question its very merit. The fact
that there have been over 50 changes in conference affiliation in the
past 10 years - including the Big East expanding FOUR times in the
1990s - apparently escaped Blumenthal's notes.

So did news that, believe it or not, every conference has rules in
place which allow for the free movement of teams in and out of its
confines.

But Blumenthal can take all this publicity and turn it into a nice
little television package when he decides to seek a higher office.

Of course, that never crossed his mind, did it? Surrrrrreeee...

Just like it never crossed the mind of Virginia Governor Mark Warner,
who held the University of Virginia hostage until he could force
Virginia Tech into the mix.

Viva La Election Day.

- We learned that a good, decent man like Big East Commissioner Mike
Tranghese can be pushed into making stupid, inflammatory statements
while watching the crown jewels of his conference waste little time
in bidding him adieu.

It was Tranghese, you recall, who told us all the the ACC was going
to expand by publicly chastising Swofford back in May. Stay out of my
conference, Tranghese said.

Swofford, as it turned out, had other ideas.

But understand this. Anyone who knows Tranghese will tell you he is a
sharp individual who is very good at what he does. Just because he
couldn't keep Miami and Virginia Tech in the fold, don't
automatically think the Big East is dead.

Mike Tranghese is a good commissioner. He just stumbled into a fight
he couldn't win.

- And finally, we learned that Duke head basketball coach Mike
Krzyzewski's credibility is at an all-time low. If only anyone would
notice.

Krzyzewski, who has the national image of a kindly, almost deified
bit of hoops royalty, has again proven that in reality he's little
more than a selfish, basketball-only Little Napoleon.

Not only can Coach K throw around profane words in the manner of
Bobby Knight - strangely without all the ESPN coverage - his anti-
expansion rhetoric showed him to be little more than a hypocrite.

While he was telling national audiences that the ACC needed to
remain "geographically sound" to curb travel expenses and the like,
he conveniently forgot to mention this:

In the last five years, Duke basketball has traveled to Alaska,
Hawaii, New York (at least 7 times), Chicago (at least twice),
Indianapolis, Boston, Philadelphia, Portland (Ore.), Oakland and
Anaheim, Calif., and Ann Arbor, Mich. (twice) - all during the
regular season

Geography didn't matter then, did it Mike? Neither did travel
expense.

Do us all a favor and go away.

 

Bright road for Hokies
Published July 2 2003
David Teel

GREENSBORO, N.C. -- So we're haulin' fanny down I-85 Tuesday afternoon headed for Virginia Tech's ACC coming out party when all of a sudden ...

Brake lights. Lots of 'em.

And there we sat. Forty-five minutes, four miles. Not an acceptable ratio. But certainly an omen.

Virginia Tech is ACC-bound, and come the 2004 football season, Tobacco Road's highways and byways will be clogged with maroon SUVs headed for Kenan Stadium, Death Valley and points beyond.

Mirroring the ACC's expansion priorities, Virginia Tech - and fellow newcomer Miami - bring big-time football to a conference renowned for its basketball. Better yet, the Hokies, unlike the Hurricanes, also bring fanatical supporters who think nothing of packing up the kids and coolers to head off for a Tech road trip.

But the Hokies bring more than just Frank Beamer's special teams and Bud Foster's zone blitzes - namely facilities and finances. Among Tech's new conference comrades, only North Carolina has clearly superior stadiums, arenas and practice structures. Tech's $26 million budget has grown more than 60 percent in the last five years, and the department operates in the black.

Tech's challenge is to get more from its money. The Hokies this year finished 112th in the Directors Cup, an annual ranking of overall Division I sports excellence. Georgia Tech, at 53rd, was the lowest-ranked ACC school, with North Carolina (No. 8) and Virginia (No. 19) in the top 20.

National championships speak even more to the monumental challenge Tech faces in the ACC. No Hokies team has ever won a national title. Since its inception in 1953, the ACC has produced 88 national-championship teams. Miami accounts for 10 others, and every conference member except N.C. State boasts a national title within the last 15 years. Baseball, men's and women's golf, women's soccer, men's and women's lacrosse, field hockey: The ACC excels in those sports.

During Tuesday's painfully staged festivities (ponderous speeches, ACC shirts and hats for the newcomers) at Grandover Resort, Tech athletic director Jim Weaver vowed to upgrade the Hokies' "broad-based" program and said ACC membership will hasten the process.

What now for the ACC?

With 11 teams, the ACC falls one shy of the number the NCAA requires for staging a football championship game. The conference will sponsor legislation to lower the minimum, and there's no logical reason why the legislation should fail.

Still, bank on the ACC trolling for a 12th to create six-team divisions and clearer scheduling formulas. The key is patience.

Notre Dame, the obvious top choice, still craves its football independence. But following the 2005 football season, two key contracts expire - Notre Dame's exclusive television deal with NBC, and the Bowl Championship Series' arrangement with ABC.

If the BCS, or whatever form postseason football takes after 2005, isn't as kind to Notre Dame, and if NBC low-balls in negotiations, the Irish may be pushed - kicking and screaming, no doubt - toward full conference membership.

Until resolution with Notre Dame, the ACC ought to sit tight. Commissioner John Swofford and Georgia Tech president Wayne Clough indicated the conference is prepared to do just that, saying conference officials need a break from expansion after two years of often contentious debate.

That debate, to everyone's surprise, concluded a week ago Tuesday with the ACC presidents voting to invite Virginia Tech and Miami. Representatives of both schools were giddy Tuesday, and the only downer for Tech was President Charles Steger's inability to attend. En route from Switzerland, he was delayed by poor weather in Atlanta.

Hokie Nation will not be so deterred. Brace yourself, Tobacco Road. Traffic is about to come to a screeching halt on many an autumn Saturday.
 

Weaver ready for new challenges
By Norm Wood
Daily Press
Published July 2, 2003

GREENSBORO, N.C. -- Though it would be another seven weeks before Virginia Tech would be invited to join the ACC, Jim Weaver had a good feeling when he came to Greensboro in early May to meet conference commissioner John Swofford.

As Weaver, Tech's athletic director, strolled down a hallway at the Atlantic Coast Conference's headquarters, his attention turned to a portrait bearing his namesake. A man named Jim Weaver was the ACC's first commissioner. A portrait hanging two spots down was of a man named Bob James, the ACC's third commissioner, whom Weaver said went to high school with his mother and father.

So, as Weaver stood at a podium Tuesday night in Greensboro as ACC officials introduced Tech as one of their conference's two new members along with Miami, he reflected on that stroll.

"I knew things would turn out well at the end of the process," said Weaver, who represented Virginia Tech at the press conference along with John Rocovich, the rector of Tech's Board of Visitors.

It was a tongue-in-cheek statement. Later in the press conference, Weaver admitted he thought Virginia Tech was out as long ago as May 16, when the ACC seemed to be leaning toward inviting Boston College, Miami and Syracuse. However, with the help of Virginia Gov. Mark Warner and Attorney General Jerry Kilgore, Virginia Tech's 50-year-old dream of playing in the ACC came true.

Now, Tech must work to make a home for itself in its new conference.

After paying a $2 million entry fee to the ACC, the Hokies will have to work out scheduling issues in their 21 sports. Weaver said he wants his football program to play eight ACC games in 2004 and would like to have West Virginia take the annual non-conference slot that has been reserved for Virginia.

"Quite honestly, I think it will be easier for (Miami AD) Paul (Dee) and I to re-tool our schedules than it will be for several of the current member institutions simply because we have a game or a series scheduled with North Carolina and North Carolina State over the next four years," Weaver said. "(Those) will now be a conference contest for us."

Also, the Hokies will have to overcome a perception that they may have to spend some time putting the "student" back in student-athlete when it comes to their football program.

In the most recent four-year graduation rate studies released by the NCAA, which measured the rates from the 1992-'93 freshman class to the '95-'96 freshman class, Virginia Tech had a 40 percent rate in football and a 46 percent rate in men's basketball. Those numbers put the Hokies 10th in football in the new 11-team ACC, and third in men's basketball.

Weaver said Tech's athletic program is improving its graduation rates. He said in the last two years 70-72 percent of Tech's student-athletes graduated.

Georgia Tech president Wayne Clough, who was present at the press conference, said Virginia Tech's graduation rates were "one of about 150" issues considered by the ACC's presidents in expansion. Clough, the former dean of Tech's engineering schools, defended Tech's graduation rates.

"I personally don't think the basis that graduation rates are calculated on is a good basis," Clough said. "Four years ago, Georgia Tech was labeled as having a 33 percent graduation rate (in football). That was through a coaching change six years ago. We're now lauded as one of the top 10...These things tend to cycle up and down. Virginia Tech has overall had a very good graduation rate of its student athletes."
 

Call the ACC names, but this move was right
TOM SORENSEN

Joining the ACC 'has been a bizarre, strange, and goofy process,' Miami president Donna Shalala said Monday. 'But it has allowed us the opportunity to have the distance to decide who we are, where we are and where we want to go.'

What a mess. The ACC struggles, cajoles, wrestles, retracts, begs, bullies and waves bye-bye to its reputation as Southern gentlemen.

And after all that, the ACC's only reward is it becomes the MOST POWERFUL FOOTBALL CONFERENCE IN ALL OF COLLEGE ATHLETICS.

Now, I love SEC football. The SEC is the standard against which all other conferences are measured. Even the SEC schools whose programs have become mediocre, such as Alabama, still sound more menacing than, say, Wake Forest.

But to Florida State and up-and-comers like Maryland, N.C. State and maybe Virginia, the ACC adds Miami and Virginia Tech. If the Hokies play defense this season, they will return to the top 10. The Hurricanes reside there.

Adding Miami and Virginia Tech to football is like adding Mike Krzyzewski and Gary Williams to men's basketball. The rest of the conference will have to get better. If they don't, they will, because of the sudden improvement, get markedly worse.

The Hurricanes and Hokies, which officially join the conference today, will be forced to feel like outsiders for more than a decade. Florida State, which joined the ACC in 1991, still feels like an outsider. The dynamic is not peculiar to the ACC. I went to a Big Ten party and wondered how the Penn State folks got in.

But Georgia Tech, which joined the conference in 1978, feels inside now. The question is what will happen first: The Hurricanes and Hokies cease to feel like new guys or the rest of the conference, Florida State excepted, will raise the level of their craft so they can compete.

I get tired of ACC boosters annually claiming and sportswriters annually writing that this season, the one coming up, is the one in which ACC football will emerge. Look out world because here they come.

And then one team -- except for the Seminoles, they take turns -- breaks away from the pack to slip into the bottom of the top 10 and everybody else is Among Other Teams Nobody Fears. The boosters, of course, contend that next season is the one they were talking about.

The Hurricanes are not next season. The Hurricanes are now. Except for an officials' induced loss to Ohio State in last season's national championship, they would have won back-to-back titles.

Although critics claim Virginia Tech, which has been voted the school most likely to sue itself, will turn mediocre when coach Frank Beamer leaves, it's missing a quality integral to a program's success.

A big-time team needs big-time fans, and except for Florida State, there is not a school in the ACC whose fans are as passionate about their team as the Hokies are about theirs. N.C. State's fans are passionate now -- they ought to be. But football is a bigger deal in Blacksburg, Va., than it is in Raleigh or Clemson.

So welcome, Hokies, and welcome, Hurricanes.

Fiasco, embarrassment and greed are terms commonly applied to the ACC's expansion effort. Here is another. Good work.

 

FSU president: Get Notre Dame for ACC's 12th school
By Randy Beard
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER

With Miami officially added to the Atlantic Coast Conference roster, T.K. Wetherell believes now is the time to tackle another football power.

"We need to go after Notre Dame, and we need to do it quickly. As far as I'm concerned, it ought to be No.1 on the agenda," said the Florida State president Monday evening.

Wetherell knows the football-independent Fighting Irish - with their $9million-per-year broadcast deal with NBC - won't present an easy target, but he is at least willing to give it the ol' college try.

"In my mind, the recruiting of Notre Dame has already started. I don't know about the rest of (the ACC presidents), but that's who we should be going after ... We ought to be sending coach (Bobby) Bowden and anyone else who wants to go to talk to them."

The additions of Miami and Virginia Tech in the past week will expand the ACC to an 11-team league beginning in the 2004-05 athletic year.

FSU athletic director Dave Hart, in Chicago for a Bowl Championship Series meeting, said the conference's goal is to add a 12th team but that the ACC presidents would have to decide on a timetable for further expansion.

"I would hope we would not wait too long and be too comfortable at 11," said Hart. "I would hope that we would treat that as a very high priority for reasons that are obvious."

The main reason would be to stage a conference championship football game, which is limited to leagues with at least 12 teams by a NCAA bylaw. Both Wetherell and Hart expect the ACC to petition the NCAA to change the rule, but they aren't optimistic that will happen.

"I'm not sure, at the end of the day, the various championship committees would want to set that precedent set," said Hart.

With the Big East now forced to replace Miami and Virginia Tech to remain a viable football conference for a BCS berth, Hart said most conferences are expected to increase their exit fee.

That's another reason Wetherell believes Notre Dame will be courted by the ACC, Big Ten and Big East. The Irish already compete in the Big East in all sports but football.

"I think Notre Dame has to be sitting around thinking what they are going to do. If it was up to me, I'd put a team together and go up there and start talking to them immediately," said Wetherell.

Hart is just glad that the wait for Miami ended on a positive note Monday after a weekend of negotiations between the two conferences.

"It was a very, very difficult process, but it has culminated in a very positive step," he said. "It means a lot both to FSU and to the conference to have Miami and Virginia Tech as members of the ACC. We did not intend to end at 11, but we still accomplished a lot of the things we set out to do in terms of raising the profile, particularly of our football programs."

Yeah, but it could be better, argues Wetherell.

"If we had that 12th team, and if it was Notre Dame, I don't think anybody could touch us," he said.

 

Terps won't be able to punt, hide in new ACC
Mike Preston
Originally published Jul 2, 2003

FOOTBALL IS STILL the king of college sports, but will it be at the University of Maryland?

Unless litigation stops the University of Miami and Virginia Tech from joining the Atlantic Coast Conference in the 2004-05 school year, all of this incessant whining about the ACC lacking morality and integrity will come to an end. Finally.

When has big-time college sports ever been concerned about morals? For decades, college coaches wouldn't recruit athletes based on skin color. Alabama recently fired its football coach and Georgia its men's basketball coach for unethical behavior. Allegations about improper recruiting and athletes not attending classes appear in daily papers as often as box scores.

So what the ACC did to lure Miami and Virginia Tech away was nothing more than the animals eating their own, a corporate takeover where two prominent football powers will put more money in the pockets of ACC schools.

But locally, you have to wonder if Maryland's football program will make a similar investment and get enough support to keep pace with the Hurricanes and the Hokies as well as traditional power Florida State and the rising programs at Virginia and North Carolina State.

"I think it's great for the ACC as a whole," said Mike Jarmolowich, a stockbroker and former Maryland linebacker in the early 1990s. "I don't know if there is going to be a much better conference. For Maryland, the biggest obstacle was always Florida State. Now there are two other hurdles called Miami and Virginia Tech."

Scott Whittier, a former teammate of Jarmolowich's, said: "If this happens, College Park is about to blow up. You've got to find the players and make commitments. Maryland fans have always been lukewarm, but hopefully this will bring in some of the fans who have been sitting on the fence."

Lukewarm is putting it nicely. Area fans weren't filling Byrd Stadium consistently even when the Terps were turning out quarterbacks like Boomer Esiason, Stan Gelbaugh and Frank Reich when Bobby Ross was coach.

Ever since Ralph Friedgen came to coach at Maryland two years ago, he has been campaigning for larger attendance and financial contributions. He wants to build an academic center for players with lab offices, tutoring rooms and a 160-seat auditorium for team meetings, lectures and clinics.

He wants an indoor practice facility and more leniency from the administration to get in players with borderline grades and SAT scores.

At some time, Maryland is going to either make these moves, or it won't be able to stay on the playing fields with the conference's new big boys. Raising money has been a problem at Maryland, and it was a problem for former athletic directors Lew Perkins and Andy Geiger.

Some wonder why current AD Debbie Yow stays at Maryland since it's so difficult to raise money.

"We didn't have a clue until Ralph got here," Whittier said. "As long as we have Ralph in place, we can get it done. As a person involved in commercial real estate and banking, I would often talk to people who would say they would come to College Park if they played an Auburn, an Alabama or a Miami.

"I'm not sure we'll get new fans, but I believe you'll see those guys on the fence coming in," he said. "Because now we have a Miami and we have a Virginia Tech."

There isn't much to complain about Maryland during the past two years. Season-ticket sales have climbed from 10,000 two years ago to 22,000, with an immediate goal of 30,000.

Before Friedgen, the Terps' last bowl appearance was in 1990. With Friedgen, the Terps are 21-5 with a 56-23 loss to Florida in the Orange Bowl 18 months ago, and a 30-3 blowout of Tennessee in the Peach Bowl on New Year's Eve.

But Maryland hasn't arrived yet.

The Terps lack depth and speed. They haven't signed a blue-chip quarterback prospect, one you can build a team around. All of these problems will show up on Saturday afternoons in the fall when Maryland has to play Miami, Virginia Tech, Virginia, Florida State and N.C. State.

Unless, Friedgen gets additional ammunition to recruit. Right now, they aren't ready.

"For years, Maryland lost a lot of players to Virginia Tech, and Virginia Tech lost a lot of players to Maryland," Jarmolowich said. "It's a natural rivalry. Now with this overall talent in the league, people are going to want to play in the ACC, and we're going to have to get our share."

Well, that's what the ACC wanted.

It wanted to become a super conference on par with the Big 12 and the Southeastern Conference. League officials still have to petition the NCAA to lower the 12-team requirement for a football conference championship to 11, and eventually they'll get the game, even if it has to add another team. Too much money involved.

Prestige and money will also force the league to discontinue its storied history of having its basketball teams play each other twice a year during the regular season.

That's what this is all about, money, right?

Miami's football program reportedly made a $5.8 million profit in 2001-02, and the Hurricanes reportedly could make $6.2 million overall in each of their first two seasons in the ACC. In the third season, Miami could make more than $9 million.

It has been interesting to note that as soon as the Miami announced it was going to the ACC, Big East officials called Conference USA officials to let them know they might be interested in Louisville. They prefer flirting publicly as opposed to privately.

Maryland, though, will do some flirting with a steady diet of bigger and better competition. The concern is if it's flirting with success or mediocrity.



 

ACC enters era of `bad feelings'
By AL FEATHERSTON : The Herald-Sun
Jul 2, 2003 : 12:20 am ET

GREENSBORO -- The ACC always has prided itself on the good relationships between its member schools.

"In the ACC ... we're like a family," Georgia Tech president Wayne Clough said Tuesday night. "In any family, you're not going to agree on everything, but we have a history of once we decide to do something, we all band together and go forward."

But that might change in the wake of the bitter six-week struggle to expand the league.

"There is a lot of bad feelings," said one ACC official, who asked not to be identified. "It's gotten so some people won't get on conference calls if they know some other people are on."

Florida State athletics director Dave Hart, who described himself as one of the most fervent advocates of expansion, admitted the process had damaged the ACC's traditional fellowship.

"There are some wounds," Hart said. "I think anybody who says anything different than that is not being candid. I guess that was some of the disappointment I felt.

"Clearly the process was frustrating, particularly coming down the stretch."

Wake Forest athletics director Ron Wellman suggested that the debate went beyond normal disagreements.

"We disagree all the time," Wellman said. "This one was a very, very important issue. So the feelings were deep, and nerves were exposed."

While no ACC official was willing to discuss the details of the debate, one highly placed ACC source said that most of the anger was directed at North Carolina and Duke -- the two consistent opponents of expansion. While Virginia president John Casteen also voted against several expansion scenarios, his colleagues understand that he was the victim of outside political pressure and that he was not free to vote his pro-expansion beliefs.

They are not so understanding about UNC and Duke.

"I've never seen people as mad as people are at Duke and Carolina," that high-placed ACC source said. "It isn't that they opposed expansion. Everybody could understand that. It's that 8-1 vote [to pursue expansion with Miami, Boston College and Syracuse].

"That was understood by everybody, except Duke and Carolina, that was a vote to admit those teams if nothing turned up on the site visits. Then when they turned around and voted no after that ... let's just say a lot of people were mad."

Duke president Nan Keohane doesn't understand how any of her colleagues could have confused the one vote she and UNC chancellor James Moeser made to pursue expansion talks with three schools with approval of expansion.

"Let me be clear," Keohane said Tuesday. "The league voted 7-2 for expansion. I was against it. But since the vote had the required majority, I felt it was worth voting to support the approach to the three schools to advance the process and at least address some of the subjects that were of concern to me.

"James Moeser and I were quite clear that we were not voting to invite those teams. We said, `This is not a final vote.' "

Keohane even sent an e-mail to her fellow ACC presidents (and later released to the public) that listed her concerns about expansion.

"I thought my issues with student-athletic protection, travel and division lineups would be part of the conversations we would be having," she said. "But as the process went on, the problems I had [with expansion] didn't get a lot of attention."

All the Council of Presidents meetings were held via teleconference, leaving no paper trail to prove who is right and who is wrong.

"Part of the problem is that we didn't get minutes of our meetings," Keohane said. "If you could hear tape recordings, you'd see that Moeser and I were quite clear about our positions."

ACC commissioner John Swofford declined to address the issue.

"I can't really go there," Swofford said. "That's an internal matter. With this kind of thing, different people have different opinions and different constituencies to respond to."

However, Swofford did hint that there was at least some misunderstanding.

"One of the things we probably need to look at is the process that got us to the point of making site visits with schools we ultimately didn't invite," he said. "That's something that needs to be revisited internally."

The ACC official quoted earlier was more blunt.

"I know that on the site visits, we told those people [at Boston College and Syracuse] that it was a done deal," the source said. "That's embarrassing ... and a lot of people blame Duke and Carolina for it."

Swofford conceded that the process had created some bad feelings but suggested that the wounds would heal quickly.

"First of all, the fiber of this league is very, very strong," he said. "It's always had the ability to deal with tough issues and come back stronger than ever in terms of relationships and what we refer to as the culture of the league and the ability to get along from within and work effectively with each other.

"I've seen it over the years -- when Florida State game into the league, when we went to football and basketball television and postseason basketball, the equal sharing of dollars; a tough process for the league internally -- in every case, the league has come back and gone forward in a very unified way. I would expect nothing but that with this."

Keohane also suggested that the ACC could heal quickly.

"I think the relationships in the league are pretty resilient," she said. "I don't think any anger or bitterness will be long term. Certainly, I can't speak for everybody, but as for the presidents and chancellors, we have good relationships.

"If some were piqued, there's no doubt [our good feelings] will bounce back."

But the original source isn't so sure.

"I know when it's over, people will say, `Kiss and make up,' " he said. "Well, it's not going to be that easy. There is some real bitterness there, and it's not going away ... not right away, anyway."

FSU's Hart insisted it could be done with hard work.

"I think we all have an obligation to participate in the healing process," he said. "This has been a wonderful league and a league that has been noted for getting along. We can disagree and have different views. We've got to get back to that."

 

Swofford deserves credit for his vision
By FRANK DASCENZO : The Herald-Sun
fdascenzo@heraldsun.com
Jul 2, 2003 : 12:16 am ET

GREENSBORO -- John Swofford wanted to enjoy the night, and in so many ways, he did.

On his right were athletics directors, Paul Dee of Miami and Jim Weaver of Virginia Tech. On Swofford's immediate left was Wayne Clough, president of Georgia Tech.

The support was there for Swofford's growing ACC. People smiled. People applauded, and when the news conference, held Tuesday night at the Grandover Resort to introduce the ACC's two new schools, ended, what was left was this. ACC expansion was all about football and what it could do for the league.

"We're bringing in two schools that are national caliber football programs," Swofford said almost as if sending a message to those within the ACC who might still question his methods. "These programs have superb television ratings. They will strengthen our football in the postseason, and we will be in excellent shape in that regard. The strength of the ACC is tremendous."

Those who say the ACC, with 11 teams and in no rush to go to 12, never will be the same are right. And those who claim bigger isn't always better are partially right. But consider Swofford's path to getting here. Once he figured he had Miami, Syracuse and Boston College in the ACC. He nearly did. Six ACC presidents were for it. Swofford needed seven.

The ACC took a risk in changing its landscape, opting for a couple of football schools. But the risk would have been far greater to remain a nine-team league, known for basketball success and for one (Florida State) legitimate football power.

While Miami is the football jewel the ACC really coveted, Virginia Tech is the next best thing to Syracuse and BC. Some might argue even better, considering the Hokies' location -- in ACC country -- and their passion for football, along with money, is what this expansion is all about.

It's easy to want to criticize Swofford for a deal that dragged way too long. But in reality, without his movements -- and without his securing one outstanding football team and one very good one -- the ACC's image in football wouldn't be as strong as it is today.

While there has been talk about fences needed mending and about lack of loyalty, there's been an obvious concern from ACC basketball people. In reality, basketball didn't need help. ACC football did. And Swofford should get credit for knowing that and doing something about it.

What would Swofford do differently? Make it clear up front that a visit -- like the ones he and his entourage made to Syracuse and Boston College -- doesn't guarantee an invitation. More face-to-face, instead of conference calls, with conference presidents. Eye contact goes a long way when major decisions are needed. This wasn't done smoothly, but as Clough mentioned, things aren't always agreeable in a family.

The ACC might not be the same, but as Swofford said, "The ACC is stronger today than yesterday and maybe stronger than ever."

There were words "perfect fit" used to describe Miami and Virginia Tech. True, the ACC's logo didn't need much altering, a couple of new stars, one in south Florida and another in western Virginia.

Perhaps Wake Forest athletics director Ron Wellman, arguably the best in the ACC right now, put it best when he said, "It's been a long and often times frustrating party, but John Swofford did a superb job."

The contrast in the Hurricanes and Hokies is obvious. True, they are football schools, but the Canes clearly are the more famous, and better, of the two. Dee sounded more like the guy who couldn't wait to unleash his football team on the ACC, while Weaver sounded much more relieved that the Hokies weren't left out in favor of the Orangemen and Golden Eagles.

"Elated," Weaver said when asked how he felt when he found out Virginia Tech would be invited to join the ACC.

"We had to look to the future for our program," Dee said, an obvious reference to the better financial package the ACC offers its members compared to the Big East.

"The world is very different today," Swofford said. "I think it would be fair to say that many in our conference, throughout this evaluation, felt there may well have been greater risk at staying at nine than going to 11 or 12."

When everybody walked out of the building, there was one thing made perfectly clear. The ACC cares about football and in a big way.

 

Bowled over?
By NEIL AMATO : The Herald-Sun
namato@heraldsun.com
Jul 2, 2003 : 12:13 am ET

The ACC's addition of Miami and Virginia Tech could cause a chain reaction in the college football bowl system.

At the very least, it will cause bowls that have Big East affiliations to follow that league's next moves and possibly begin looking for other schools. After this season, the Big East is left with six Division I-A football members, none of which has played in a Bowl Championship Series game the past four seasons.

Gator Bowl president Rick Catlett said his bowl, which matches an ACC team against either Notre Dame or a Big East team, could do little now but wait. However, Catlett will be watching closely.

"We'll be very interested bystanders," Catlett said. "We've still got this year's game, and we still have a relationship with Notre Dame. We'll just have to wait and see how [the Big East reacts] to the loss of these two programs."

Catlett said the Gator Bowl contract with both conferences lasts three more seasons. There is a provision in the contract to seek other affiliations if one conference has "a substantial change in makeup," Catlett said.

Miami and Virginia Tech's exit after this season would qualify as such a substantial change. However, Catlett and other bowl officials say the Big East is likely to replace the losses with other schools. Candidates could include Louisville and Central Florida.

The prospect of adding teams to fill the gaps left by the Hurricanes and Hokies would keep San Francisco Bowl executive Gary Cavalli interested in the Big East.

"My first sense is to stay with the Big East," said Cavalli, who had Virginia Tech against Air Force in last season's inaugural game. "Our first step would be to see [what schools] are involved. Once we learn that, we'll see what our options are. One of those options could be the ACC."

The ACC now has six bowl tie-ins for its nine current members. The 11-team ACC would be in line for one more, giving it the same number of bids as the 12-team SEC. The conference with the most bowl bids is the Big 12, which has tie-ins with eight games.

Cavalli said the ACC's move could lead to other conferences getting bigger or a change in the BCS format, which will be renegotiated after the 2005 football season. The BCS system is made of four games, which rotate staging the computer-determined title game.

"I think this is just the start of a lot of different dominoes falling," Cavalli said. "We all have to be aware of what comes next."

Ken Haines, the executive director of the Continental Tire Bowl in Charlotte, said his game was still in a good spot despite having a tie-in with the Big East. Last year's game was the financial surprise of the bowl season, with Virginia beating West Virginia in sold-out Ericsson Stadium.

Haines said the bowl's contract with the ACC and Big East lasted two more years. He said that he hoped to continue working with the Big East and added that one team with a large following remained on his radar.

"We want to be a bowl that fans can drive to, and we still have plenty of teams for that, including Virginia Tech," Haines said.

No matter what happens to the Big East, the BCS or the other bowls, the Gator Bowl's Catlett is certain of one thing: The ACC is no longer FSU and the eight dwarfs.

"I don't think there's any doubt the ACC has strengthened its football reputation," Catlett said. "I'm a football guy. I don't know what it does for them in other sports. But I know in football, they're much better. They added two of the strongest programs in the country."


 

ACC could target SEC for No. 12; Louisville shopping

By CHIP TOWERS
Atlanta Journal-Constitution Staff Writer

The ACC has taken two teams from the Big East. An SEC team could be next.

"I'd say the ACC will try and recruit somebody from the SEC, maybe Florida, Kentucky or South Carolina," Arkansas athletics director Frank Broyles said Tuesday. "I wouldn't be surprised at all if the ACC went after one of our schools."

College sports experts say the ACC's addition of Miami and Virginia Tech this week is the beginning, not the end, of a shakeup in conference memberships that could go nationwide.

And if the SEC wants to avoid getting raided, it might look to change its rules. Miami and Virginia Tech had to pay $1 million apiece to leave the Big East, but there is no such provision in the SEC, and it's doubtful such a meager buyout would stop anybody anyway.

"There's nothing like that in our bylaws," said Mark Womack, executive associate commissioner of the SEC. "Currently an institution could be invited or could resign at any of our annual meetings."

That probably will change.

"I think it may be something that our presidents and athletic directors will discuss just based on this latest movement," Womack said.

Said Broyles: "I feel strongly that every league will start making preparations for what to do if a team left. I would think in a conference like the SEC, there would be a cost of about $10 million to $15 million on [a buyout]. I mean, that's the value of it."

One of the schools Broyles mentioned as potential targets, South Carolina, said it hasn't received any overtures.

"I've not been contacted," athletics director Mike McGee told The State newspaper. "That is so highly speculative, I wouldn't do anything other than to say we could not be happier in the SEC."

The ACC needs a 12th team to qualify for a football championship game under NCAA rules, and it isn't the only league looking for another team. The Big East needs two more football teams to have the eight required for it to remain a football conference.

Broyles said the strong level of football and basketball played in the SEC makes its members attractive targets. But the money the SEC generates might help it hold onto its members. The SEC distributed $101 million in revenue to its members in May.

Whatever movement takes place, Louisville clearly wants to be a part of it. The Cardinals have made no secret about their desire to improve on their situation within Conference USA and would be interested in joining either the Big East or the ACC.

"At this point, it is all speculation," Louisville athletics director Tom Jurich said in a statement provided to the AJC. "If any opportunity does exist to better the position of our university or improve the experiences of our student-athletes, we want to be in position to explore those options. . . . I have made it very clear [to Conference USA commissioner] Britton [Banowsky] that we will be very aggressive and very ambitious about our future."

Louisville probably is the most ready to move. The Cardinals spent $32 million on varsity sports last year, more than any other non-BCS school. They are annually one of the best football teams in their league and play in a relatively new football stadium. Also, Jurich two years ago hired former Kentucky and NBA basketball coach Rick Pitino, who made the Cardinals No. 3 nationally in basketball attendance last year, behind only Syracuse and Kentucky. Louisville would have to pay C-USA $500,000 to leave.

Conceivably, Louisville would be just as viable an addition to the ACC as to the Big East. However, its recent problems with academic performance and gender equity may be looked upon unfavorably by current ACC members.

The ACC, Big East and Big Ten all reportedly would like to lure Notre Dame football into their leagues. But it will be difficult to lure the Irish away from its football independence as long as NBC continues to write multi-million-dollar checks for broadcast rights of its games.

Wherever the Big East and ACC find new members, those moves will create vacancies, which could lead to more moves. The resulting domino effect could flow from conference to conference and from coast to coast.

"I'm not sure anybody knows what will happen," Womack said. "It's just a matter of individual institutions deciding what's best for them. When we expanded, I remember people saying it would completely change the landscape, and that hasn't happened."

Regardless of which teams join the Big East, that apparently won't have any immediate effect on the league's status as a BCS participant. There is no rule in the current contract, which expires after the January 2005 bowls, regarding the makeup of a member conference.

Wind burned

Hurricanes' move to ACC is a blow to the Big East

By Joe Burris, Globe Staff, 7/1/2003

Weeks of speculation, teleconferencing, proposals, counterproposals, and crossed fingers came down to a nod. The University of Miami, the southernmost big-time college athletic program on the East Coast, yesterday accepted an invitation to join the southern-based Atlantic Coast Conference, leaving the northern-based Big East and taking its coveted football program in the process.

Coupled with Virginia Tech's decision to accept the ACC's invitation last week, the loss of the Big East's top football programs shifted the balance of power in East Coast college football to the ACC and the Southeastern Conference, and it prompted uncertainty in the North.

The Big East now must face what many believed was inevitable -- filling the void left by two teams that have accounted for nine of its 12 league titles.

''We accept the invitation from the ACC with enthusiasm,'' Miami president Donna Shalala said yesterday in making the announcement from Florida. ''The ACC has built a remarkable conference based on high academic and athletic expectations. This decision allows us to provide an opportunity for all of our student-athletes to compete at the highest level.''

Miami has won six of the 12 Big East football titles. Virginia Tech has won three. Miami has the best all-time record in the Big East (66-10), with Virginia Tech (53-23) next. Over the last three seasons, Miami has the best record among all Division 1-A football programs, 35-2. Virginia Tech is tied for eighth (29-9).

Miami accepted the ACC's invitation after reviewing a counter-offer by the Big East, which was said to be a guarantee of $45 million over the next five years to stay.

''Our decision was based upon many factors,'' said Miami athletic director Paul Dee, ''including the future of our overall athletics program and our financial and competitive interest over the long term.''

Initially, Miami was targeted along with Syracuse and Boston College by the nine-member ACC in its 12-team scenario. But last week the league surprisingly told BC and Syracuse they would not receive invitations, despite both schools meeting all the requirements of the expansion process.

Instead, the invitations went to Miami, which had insisted upon BC and Syracuse's inclusion, and Virginia Tech, which was invited, in part, to appease state officials. Syracuse and BC led the counter-offer on behalf of the Big East and communicated with Miami officials throughout the weekend.

''I thought the presidents of the schools of the 1-A [football] programs devoted a great deal of effort and made a strong case for Miami to remain in our conference,'' said BC president the Rev. William P. Leahy, S.J. ''But as we all know, Miami chose to move in a different direction, and now the Big East will concentrate on strengthening itself.''

Miami and Virginia Tech may begin playing in the ACC as soon as the 2004-05 school year. Both remain Big East members for 2003-04, since schedules for the upcoming academic year already have been set.

The Big East must regroup in a way that not only strengthens it but keeps it from being further encroached upon.

Big East president Mike Tranghese was asked yesterday what kind of commitment he needed from BC and Syracuse that they wouldn't vault to another conference.

''Our six football schools, as well as our other members, are going to have to come together, look each other in the eye, and talk about it,'' Tranghese said. ''Until [yesterday] morning, I did not know what Miami's decision was, so our football schools were focused on trying to retain them. We haven't spent any time on [such questions], but obviously they're going to have to be addressed, and they're the only ones who can address them.''

Tranghese said regardless of the defections, the league's Bowl Championship Series affiliation remains intact for the next three years (through the '05 football season). He said he is confident that will not change. ''We chaired the presidential oversight BCS committee [yesterday]. I'm the current chair of the BCS for at least another year. We met from 10 to 5, and no one brought it up. The contract does not contain a composition clause, and we're signatory to it, and I don't get the sense from other conference comissioners that they will change anything.''

Still, Tranghese said the league has some work to do.

''The NCAA mandates that in order to be a 1-A conference, we're going to have to get [eight teams by '05],'' said Tranghese. ''We're going to have to do the best we can. We're losing two pretty important football schools.''

Tranghese said he has spoken to Atlantic 10 commissioner Linda Bruno and Conference USA commissioner Britton Banowsky regarding expansion and said the Big East's attempt to increase membership will not be similar to that of the ACC.

''I've given both [Bruno and Banowsky] my word that they won't get blindsided,'' said Tranghese. ''We have an idea how we want to go about it. We just don't want to blindside people. When we arrive at a decision as to what we want to do or don't want to do, we're going to share it with them before we approach schools.''

Tranghese said other schools have attempted to approach him in recent weeks, ''and you can ask any of them, they've been shut down,'' he said. ''I have not been involved in any discussions about people coming into our league.'' He said the Atlantic 10 and Conference USA commissioners ''reached out to me because they were concerned about what we might do.''

Tranghese said Connecticut, which is expected to become football eligible in the league in 2005, may be asked to come aboard a year early. He said the league also will consider toughening its exit policy, which is currently a $1 million penalty. He said that Big East presidents already have asked him to look into what other leagues do to maintain their numbers. But, Tranghese added, ''I think at the end of the day, if someone doesn't want to be with you, they're not going to be with you.''

He did not say whether Temple's football program, which is scheduled to leave when Connecticut becomes Big East-eligible, will be asked to remain. He said the football schedule past the 2003 season ''is a problem, and we're going to have to look at that quickly.''

Miami's decision ensures that the lawsuit filed by Big East football schools Rutgers, Connecticut, West Virginia, and Pittsburgh against it and the ACC will continue. The suit contends those schools spent millions on their football programs based on presumed loyalty from schools they had been aligned with, including Miami. Virginia Tech was originally a plaintiff before it also decided to join the ACC.

BC originally was among the defendants, but it has stated it will not involve itself in the suit.

Jeffrey Mishkin, lead counsel for the Big East plaintiffs, issued a statement yesterday: ''We will continue vigorously to protect the Big East in the courts of Connecticut. The ACC's 50th anniversary will now be marked with depositions and document discovery exposing the ACC's predetory conduct and Miami's conspiratorial actions.''

In a prepared statement, Connecticut attorney general Richard Blumenthal, who represents UConn in the lawsuit, said: ''Our lawsuit is now a certainty. We will pursue this legal action tenaciously and vigorously, seeking remedies on a fast track.''

BC athletic director Gene DeFilippo said yesterday that though Miami's departure is ''a blow to the Big East Conference,'' the league will rebound and rebuild. ''This is a bump in the road,'' DeFilippo said. ''We'll work hard, and we will go about this thinking very, very big. We'll rebuild this conference, and it will be a very, very good conference.

''We're going to be able to keep our BCS affiliation for the next three years. After that, who knows what the future will be? It could very well be that there's a playoff. And if there's a playoff, that would take the place of the BCS. It could very well be that they may expand the BCS.

''But Eastern football, with Syracuse, Boston College, Pittsburgh, West Virginia, and some of the other schools that are in this league, we control a lot of television sets. We've got a lot of history and tradition here, and as long as we have a spot in the BCS and the playoff, we will be able to play football and carry on at the very highest level.''

Asked if he knew whether the league had been in contact with other schools, DeFilippo said, ''At this point, that's too premature. We have spent all of our time in trying to make sure Miami remain a member of the Big East. We'll get together as athletic directors sometime in the very near future and make some recommendations to the presidents.''

With 11 teams, it is not inconceivable that the ACC would come calling again to Big East members to even out its ranks.

Asked if he would consider another invite, DeFilippo said, ''I'm not going to deal in what-ifs, I'm really not. Right now, things are what they are, and we're a member of the Big East and happy to be so. After what we've been through the last six days, I haven't thought about that, to be candid.''

O'Brien: A coach stays in his stance

By Bob Ryan, Globe Columnist, 7/1/2003

I half-expect to find him out on a ledge, with Newton firemen down below, holding a big net and pleading with him not to do anything rash.

''Why is that?'' inquires Tom O'Brien, the head football coach at Boston College.

Well, I just kinda thought that this business about Miami leaving the Big East might have shaken him up some, since all the experts are saying it means the death of the Big East as a serious player in major college football.

What I learn (not for the first time, but it's a lesson that simply is not easy for we laymen to absorb) is that people like Tom O'Brien do not think the way people like you and me do, and that they did not get where they are by panicking. People like you and me really do worry about things we can't control. The Tom O'Briens of the world do not.

''Miami can do what it wants,'' he says. ''It's a big loss for the conference, yes. But there is nothing I can do about it.''

O'Brien is adopting the Yogi Berra approach to the matter. In his mind, this story isn't over until it's over. The Big East has its cherished BCS berth for two more years, and he is content to see how things will work out.

''The silver lining in all this,'' he says, ''is that Syracuse is still here with us. This is a league with West Virginia, Pittsburgh, Syracuse, and ourselves, and I would think there will still be a place at the table for a league with those schools.''

Misplaced bravado? Myopia? Sheer denial? Some might argue that O'Brien's stance is all of that. Didn't his own athletic director state right at the beginning of this sordid process that Miami was the ''lead dog,'' and BC would have no choice but to follow? Well, the lead dog has woofed its way to the ACC, and BC had its own invitation superceded by a curt note telling it to, well, ''never mind.''

Some might look at all this and say BC has been put in its place, both by the ACC, and by Miami, which has chosen to associate itself with new playmates. BC, which had been deemed by the ACC to be a ''good fit,'' was eventually spurned in favor of Virginia Tech, which was shoved into the ACC thanks to some political strong-arming at the highest levels of Virginia state government. I mean, it was real hardball stuff. Virginia wasn't going to vote for ACC expansion unless Virginia Tech got in, and it wasn't because the Cavaliers have any real love for the Hokies.

Do these sound like the kind of people you'd like to associate yourelf with, anyway?

O'Brien just sat back and watched all this unfold. ''I really didn't know any more about it than you [i.e. the media] probably did,'' he says. It was clear to him, and all the other Big East and ACC coaches, that they were not a direct part of the negotiating process.

''All this played out so far above us,'' he says, referring to his coaching peers. ''Even when we met in Ponte Vedra [Fla.] at the league meetings, we realized that in this matter we were just employees. It was all happening at the AD and presidents' level, and particularly at the presidents' level.''

O'Brien's calm stance should come as no surprise. He is not an impulsive man. He is a thoroughly organized man. He is not entering into a panic mode because it just isn't in him. Truth be told, he is grateful to be in a situation where any of this matters. It would have been a pretty irrelevant issue when he first took over as coach of BC in 1996.

He was being asked to clean up a major mess. BC's image had taken a big hit with the gambling revelations. The team was coming off 4-8 and 5-7 seasons, and the task was pretty daunting.

''When I came here in December of 1996 there were all kinds of problems with BC football,'' he says. ''Looking back, who knew what the future had in store? All we could do was work to improve the situation. We needed to make BC the best team it could be, and see where that would put us.''

Now there is a new crisis. Miami and Virginia Tech will leave. But no matter what any pundit says, nothing is certain. The universal assumptions are that the ACC will remain a BCS league, that the Big East will lose its BCS status and that there is nothing anyone can do to fix the Big East's problem.

O'Brien says maybe yes, maybe no. ''I wouldn't be so hasty to say that,'' he insists. For one thing, he wonders whether or not all these machinations won't lead to the institution of the much-discussed playoff system when the current BCS agreement expires in 2006. If the BCS system breaks down, and a playoff system is put in place, then ''we'll have a chance to compete along with everyone else for the championship,'' and that's all he's asking for.

Call him naiive. Call him fearless. Call him a dreamer. But do call him if you know where he can find a good football player.

''All we can do right now is try to make ourselves into the best football team we can be,'' says Tom O'Brien.

One more thing. Don't call him for Notre Dame tickets. Unless your kid is a 315-pound tackle with quick feet who bench-presses a tractor trailer, of course.

ACC parties, minus a guest
By Craig Barnes and Ira Schoffel | College Correspondents
Posted July 2, 2003

GREENSBORO, N.C. -- In the spirit of Atlantic Coast Conference cooperation, each member institution had a representative at a news conference Tuesday night to celebrate the addition of Miami and Virginia Tech.

For Virginia Tech Athletic Director Jim Weaver, one of the speakers on behalf of President Charles Steger, it was different from when he visited the ACC offices on May 6 to evaluate expansion. But Virginia Tech was not included when the presidents initially voted to discuss expansion with Miami, Boston College and Syracuse. Asked then whether he thought Virginia Tech would be included, Weaver answered, "No," but the Hokies received the required seven votes on June 24.

"The ACC affiliation is as if Virginia Tech has finally come home," Weaver said.

For Miami Athletic Director Paul Dee, who represented President Donna Shalala, the experience was "a surreal one." He found himself saying hello and goodbye at the same time.

"It is bittersweet for me," Dee said. "It's great to say hello to a new group of colleagues and look forward to tackling future challenges with them.

"At the same time, it is tough to say goodbye to a group of colleagues in the Big East. I hope that we can maintain our relationships with them in the future."

In the mind of ACC Commissioner John Swofford, the addition of Miami and Virginia Tech looks stronger than where it would have left the ACC with Boston College and Syracuse included.

"The more that I've digested the situation, the better I feel about it," Swofford said. "With the addition of Miami and Virginia Tech, we are as strong and well-positioned as we have ever been.

"For us, not growing and remaining at nine was a bigger risk than expanding. I feel badly that we weren't able to accommodate Boston College and Syracuse, but our football inventory has never been stronger."

The ACC now has a minimum of six teams in football, basketball and baseball that would qualify for national ranking, a feat no other conference matches. It also has the potential for an academic consortium much like the Big Ten, something attractive to Shalala.

Duke and North Carolina, which were resolutely against expansion, damaged themselves among their colleagues by fighting so strongly against expansion.

"I am very concerned about the financial implications of an 11-team league," Duke Athletic Director Joe Alleva said. "I am concerned that this will be detrimental to several sports, especially basketball, and change the culture of the league significantly."

The voting configuration of the ACC will change. With 11 members, it would take either seven or eight votes to add a 12th team, or the bylaws could be changed to require only a two-thirds majority.

"Our institutions will decide when to add another team," Swofford said. "Right now, we need to take a deep breath. It is probably on the back burner, but it could be moved to the front burner at any time."

Florida State Athletic Director Dave Hart says a 12th team can't arrive soon enough.

"I hope that we will, at the appropriate time, pursue a 12th member," Hart said in Tallahassee. "I have thought for a long time that 12 is the best place we could end. I thought that's where we were going to end for much of this process. This particular alternative of 11 is not one that had been discussed or had even been on the table until the final conference call."

Hart said the conference's athletic directors already had determined the scheduling format for a 12-team league in football and basketball before that proposal was voted down.

In the football scenario, FSU and Miami would have been placed in opposite divisions but would have played each year as permanent opponents. That would have created the possibility of the Seminoles and Hurricanes meeting in the regular season and in a league title game.

Notre Dame is the preferred choice of the ACC presidents. Kentucky, South Carolina, Boston College, Syracuse and Connecticut are other possibilities.

"I think they'll go get another team," Arkansas Athletic Director Frank Broyles told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. "I'd say the ACC will try and recruit somebody from the SEC, maybe Florida, Kentucky, or South Carolina. I wouldn't be surprised at all if the ACC went after one of our schools."

Broyles said schools should be prepared to face ACC overtures. "All conferences today had better have an emergency plan ready," he said.

Legislation will be reviewed this month to allow teams with 10 teams or more to have a championship game. A conference now needs 12 teams.

"The NCAA members would be receptive, based on fairness," Swofford said. "A couple of conferences shouldn't have a financial advantage simply, because they have one or two more teams. I also think the legislative change could stabilize the landscape."

Meanwhile, Florida Attorney General Charlie Crist on Tuesday filed a motion to have four Big East members' lawsuit dismissed.