The field for a 12th team in the ACC is wide open
By ED MILLER , The Virginian-Pilot
© July 4, 2003

Having arrived with great difficulty at 11 teams, ACC officials insist they are in no hurry to add a 12th.

“We’re going to take a rest,” said G. Wayne Clough, president of Georgia Tech.

But you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone in college athletics who doubts that the conference will one day welcome a 12th member, perhaps as soon as next year. The ACC sees 12 as its Manifest Destiny, and until it reaches that number, rival conferences have to wonder where the ACC’s next incursion will be.

“I’d say the ACC will try and recruit somebody from the SEC. Maybe Florida, Kentucky or South Carolina,” Arkansas athletic director Frank Broyles told the Associated Press earlier this week. Broyles said he had no evidence to back up his hunch. But in this new open season of college athletics, it’s prudent to be paranoid. “Watch your back” could be the catch phrase of the times.

In addition to the three SEC schools mentioned by Broyles, other names being floated include Pittsburgh, Syracuse, Boston College, Penn State, Louisville and East Carolina.

And, of course, Notre Dame.

“We’re all looking at Notre Dame,” FSU president T.K. Wetherell told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. “The question is going to be, 'How do you work this deal?’ The ACC and the Big Ten are clearly going to start courting Notre Dame.”

The ACC and Notre Dame have talked before, however. In the end, the Fighting Irish football program, secure in its $9 million-a-year deal with NBC, chose to remain independent.

Notre Dame’s agreement with NBC expires in two years. Ratings were up 36 percent last year over the previous season, according to Business Week, and with the program on the rise under coach Tyrone Willingham, Notre Dame could be in position to negotiate another lucrative contract.

Still, much can change in two years. Notre Dame is a member of the Big East in all sports other than football. If the Big East appears unstable, Notre Dame might consider compromising its football freedom for the comfort of a strong all-sports conference.

Can the ACC afford to wait out the Irish?

Much will depend on whether the NCAA grants the conference permission to hold a lucrative football championship game. The ACC plans to ask for a waiver to the current rule, which requires a conference to have 12 teams to hold a championship football game.

If the ACC gets its title game and the cash that comes with it, it can afford to be choosy about its 12th member. If not, the league would be in more of a hurry to add a 12th team.

Clough is a member of the 18-person board that would decide whether to change the bylaw requiring 12 teams for a title game. “Clearly, I would be supportive of it,” he said.

A quick look at the possible candidates for the 12th spot:

Notre Dame: The Irish are the ultimate prize and would make the ACC the top conference in the nation. But Notre Dame has prospered as an independent. And if the Irish choose to join a conference, the Big Ten is a more natural fit.

Penn State: If they were to leave the Big Ten, the Nittany Lions might be more inclined to join the Big East, home of longtime rivals Pittsburgh and West Virginia.

Kentucky: The Wildcats bring great basketball tradition. But president Lee Todd says UK, a charter member of the Southeastern Conference, has no plans to leave.

Florida: The ACC already now has two of the Sunshine State’s Big 3. Adding Florida would lock up the state.

South Carolina: The Gamecocks left the ACC once. Has anyone missed them?

Louisville: The Cardinals boast a top-shelf basketball program and an improving football team. But the Big East likely will come after them hard.

Boston College and Syracuse: Burned once, would either school be willing to listen to the ACC again?

Pittsburgh: See Syracuse and BC above. Also, if the Big East survives, the Panthers are positioned to be a major player.

East Carolina: Pirate fans would crawl from Greenville to Greensboro for a chance to join the ACC, but why add another North Carolina team?

 

Tech's Olympic sports brace for ACC challenge

From golf to soccer to baseball, competition will be stiff in the Hokies' new conference.

By RANDY KING
THE ROANOKE TIMES

   While recruiting top talent and travel will be much easier in the ACC, Virginia Tech's 18 Olympic sports teams will face much tougher competition in their new league.

    "No doubt about it," said men's soccer coach Oliver Weiss, "we're all going to have step things up."

    Weiss should know. He was an assistant coach for North Carolina's 2001 national champion men's soccer squad.

    "I think we'll be challenged," Weiss said. "I think every coach here will look forward to having a winning season within the ACC, which I think would be a good accomplishment right away."

    Unlike in football and, perhaps, in women's basketball, Tech will find winning any league titles soon in the ACC to be a Herculean task. The Hokies won only one conference title - men's golf - last season in the Big East, a league that hardly compares with the ACC when it comes to the nonrevenue sports.

    When the ACC began to take a hard look at annexing Tech a few weeks ago, league officials let Hokies athletic director Jim Weaver know point-blank that they wanted a guarantee of a strong commitment to the Olympic sports from the Hokies. No problem, Weaver said.

    "I don't know that they [the ACC] hammered us on the subject, but they did want to make sure we have a broad-based program," Weaver said.

    "But that has been our goal here since I arrived. It takes facilities and budget dollars and we've tried to enhance that situation, men and women."

    Since Weaver became Tech's AD in 1997, the Hokies have built a softball stadium, built a training room for the whole athletic department and hired a full-time nutritionist for all sports. Tech will christen another new stadium this fall for its two soccer teams and its women's lacrosse squad.

    "It's not like we've just been standing still on this, that's my point," Weaver said. "Having a broad-based sports program is one of the ACC's philosophical approaches and we are committed to that.

    "Now that football has sold out for virtually the last four seasons, we've been able to generate new revenues we've never had before. We've reinvested a lot of that money into our Olympic sports program and raised our budgets. We're just going to continue doing what we've done and get better. It's not an issue at all, I think."

    Weiss said it was that attitude that helped lure him to Blacksburg.

    "From a soccer point of view, there are things that have been set in motion here for a year and a half now that will guarantee our chance of competing with anybody in ACC men's soccer," said Weiss, whose team tied for seventh in the Big East last season.

    "I can't speak for the other sports, but I would think our boss, Jim Weaver, will have all intentions to make every sport competitive."

    While winning won't come easy, there will be numerous upsides for Tech in its new home. Tech coaches seem to be unanimous in the opinion they will be able to recruit better athletes in the ACC.

    "I think it's going to give us a real boost," said Tech baseball coach Chuck Hartman, whose club finished fourth in the Big East last season. "I think being in the Atlantic 10 and Big East cost us some players. Being a better conference - if you throw Miami in there, the ACC had six teams in the final top 25 rankings - you'll get better players.

    "But we're going to have to raise our level of play and hope to be competitive, and, hopefully, play for a conference championship in a few years. It's going to be a very tough situation to get up to that level as quickly as possible. But we're going to get there. We're going to plan on it anyhow."

    Then there's the travel issue. The ACC wins that department hands down over the Big East, where Tech's sports teams faced numerous 10-hour bus rides or plane flights to get to road venues.

    "I'm thinking about going another 10 years now," quipped Hartman, 64.

    Weiss said Tech's sports teams will have a better chance to succeed in much more geographically friendly ACC.

    "Going on the road in the Big East is very tough," Weiss said. "Winning Big East away games is something that doesn't happen much. Getting on a bus to go to Wake Forest an hour and 40 minutes down the road ... we'll have a great game versus getting on a plane Friday, playing Saturday night in New York City and flying back home on Sunday.

    "Now our longest away trip will be 4 1/2 hours to Clemson. Our shortest trip in the Big East was five hours. In men's soccer we don't have Georgia Tech, Florida State and Miami, so my travel budget will generally be cut in half."

    Of all of Tech's nonrevenue sports teams, the men's golf team figures to be the most adjusted to the new challenge. Despite being in the Big East, Jay Hardwick's club still played most of its golf in the South, where it faced most of the ACC teams in tournaments.

    "We think it's a wonderful opportunity," Hardwick said. "Obviously, the ACC is the No.1 conference in the country in golf - Clemson was the national champion and six teams finished in the top 25 this year. But the last three years we've made it to the NCAA. We're hoping this is going to open up a lot of doors for us in recruiting."

    Hartman and Weiss said they expect to see a lot more interest in their teams and a lot more folks in the seats on game days.

    "Our guys are going to play before more people in the first year than they've played in front of the last five years combined," Hartman noted.

    "I would contend that if Tech would compete against an ACC school in basket-weaving people would show up and they would pay to see that," Weiss said. "People love these rivalries. Now it's up to us that we are winning so the excitement will be even greater."

Hokies aided by location
Short road trips give ACC more class time
BY JOHN O'CONNOR
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Jul 04, 2003

Virginia Tech had geography on its side.

The Hokies, along with Miami, were introduced Tuesday as future ACC members (expected to start in 2004-05) at a league event in Greensboro, N.C. The more you listened to those involved with the unpredictable expansion exercise, the more the term "student-welfare issue" surfaced.

"That [became] a central theme, it seemed, during the latter part of process," Virginia Tech Athletic Director Jim Weaver said.

In short, "student-welfare issue" involves boarding buses rather than airplanes and the comparison in missed class time. There also is cost consideration. Had the ACC expanded to include Syracuse and Boston College in addition to Miami, as was originally projected, ACC schools would have increasingly sent students to games that included flights, more overnight stays and extended class absence.

Virginia Tech became a more attractive candidate to the nine-member ACC after it became apparent to league officials that the seven votes needed to add the triumvirate of Miami, Syracuse and Boston College weren't forthcoming.

"I think what we learned from it ulti- mately is that in terms of a consensus and in reaching the seven-vote level that maybe geography in the [league's] footprint came to mean more at the end of the process than it appeared to mean at the beginning and during a large part of the process," said John Swofford, the ACC's commissioner.

"I do think that had something to do with bringing us to the consensus of where the presidents ended up."

Geography worked both ways. It was also one of the major attractions of ACC affiliation from Virginia Tech's perspective, and one of the main reasons Tech has been trying to get into the ACC since it formed in 1953. According to John Rocovich, Virginia Tech's rector of the board of visitors, more than half of Tech's alumni live in "the heart of traditional ACC country," Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina.

"We recruit in the two Carolinas and Virginia primarily, but we've been going out of the geographic area to play our [road games], whether we were in the Atlantic 10 or the Big East," Weaver said. "Having an opportunity to recruit young people from these respective states and stay in those areas to play we think is going to make a significant impact."

Also, Weaver said that money saved in travel "will be reinvested in our operation budgets. . . . We're going to continue the upgrading we started five or six years ago and try to become very competitive in all 21 [Hokies] sports."

Clearly, men's basketball is the one sport that concerns Tech supporters. The ACC probably features the finest Division I men's basketball collection in the land. The Hokies have qualified for the NCAA tournament once (1996) since 1986, in March fired a coach (Ricky Stokes) who was 45-70 in four years, and are coming off a season in which they fell to Wofford and William and Mary.

But ACC affiliation can perk up a program fairly quickly, noted Virginia Athletic Director Craig Littlepage, who recalls Georgia Tech's situation. The Yellow Jackets joined the ACC for 1979-80 and won only four of their first 42 league games (three seasons).

"Within about five or six years, they became not only one of the ACC's top programs, but one of the country's top programs," Littlepage recalled.

By 1985, Georgia Tech tied for the best regular-season record in the ACC, won the league championship and was ranked among the nation's top 10 for much of the season.

 

For $200, Virginia became ACC's first expansion school
July 04, 2003

Fifty years ago, Virginia was the ACC's first expansion school.

The ACC formed in the spring of 1953 with a group of seven schools that seceded from the Southern Conference: Clemson, Duke, Maryland, North Carolina, N.C. State, South Carolina and Wake Forest.

Virginia Athletic Director Gus Tebell was expected at the meeting that launched the ACC, but according to a newspaper report, was unable to make the trip to North Carolina to attend because his son was departing for military service in Korea.

A June 15, 1953 Associated Press story read "In [Tebell's] absence, there was little the conference could do regarding the eighth team."

Virginia became part of the ACC in December 1953, missing the first season of league football competition, but joining in time to be included in the'53-54 ACC basketball schedule.

At the same league meeting in late'53 at which Virginia gained admission to the ACC, Virginia Tech and West Virginia asked to be admitted. They were rejected.

Virginia's joining fee in'53? Two hundred dollars. Virginia Tech, recently admitted, will pay $2 million. - John O'Connor

 

INSIDE THE ACC | GREGG DOYEL
League's official unveiling offered a few surprises


GREENSBORO - For the expanding ACC, two strange months were capped Tuesday night by one strange news conference.

Here are nine bizarre tidbits that came from the official introduction of Miami and Virginia Tech:

The Missing Majors

Eight speakers took turns behind a microphone Tuesday night, but nowhere to be found were the four biggest players in this expansion saga, after Commissioner John Swofford: presidents Donna Shalala of Miami, John Casteen of Virginia, Nan Keohane of Duke and Chancellor James Moeser of North Carolina. Shalala was the prize, while Keohane, Moeser and Casteen were the power brokers.

That trio blocked the original expansion proposal that would have included Boston College and Syracuse over Virginia Tech.

Speaking of Virginia Tech, Chancellor Charles Steger wasn't in Greensboro, either. He was stranded by plane and weather issues at an Atlanta airport.

The Unlikely Union

Imagine N.C. State Chancellor Marye Anne Fox putting her career on the line in an attempt to save the athletics programs at North Carolina.

That's basically what happened with Casteen, who bullied the ACC into substituting Virginia Tech for Boston College and Syracuse.

"We're deeply grateful to John Casteen, who has worked tremendously for us, seeking the best outcome for Virginia Tech," said John Rocovich, rector of the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors.

A Different Number

According to Georgia Tech President Wayne Clough, until last week, the ACC's expansion talks centered on five results: staying at nine schools, or growing to 10, 12, 13 or 14 schools. Not 11.

The Punching Bag

Miami athletics director Paul Dee wasn't exactly given the grapes-and-wine treatment. In his opening remarks, Swofford poked fun at Dee's rotundity by joking about Dee's vertical leap. A variation of that joke was repeated by at least two other speakers, ultimately causing Dee to roll his eyes.

The Golf Course

Swofford sweated out part of the weekend on the links, as did Shalala. Swofford actually offered to fly to Miami for the weekend to hammer out any details with Miami, but Shalala declined. "John," Shalala told him, "I have a golf game scheduled on Saturday and on Sunday, and if you come down here and mess either one of those up, I'm going to be very upset with you."

Said Swofford: "I took that to mean I probably shouldn't come down to Miami."

The Vote

When ACC presidents and chancellors voted to invite Miami and Virginia Tech, they voted on each school separately, not as an all-or-nothing block. Neither Swofford nor Clough would divulge the results of that vote.

The Miscalculation

One reason ACC expansion lurched from the Northeast to the South, ultimately forcing Boston College and Syracuse to return to a conference they wanted to leave, was because ACC leaders misjudged the importance of geography. "Geography in the (ACC's existing) footprint came to mean more at the end of the process than it appeared to mean at the beginning," Swofford said.

Said Clough: "In the early days, we might not have thought about it perhaps as much as we did later."

The Disclaimer

After citing richer television contracts as an enticement for ACC presidents to add Miami and ultimately Virginia Tech, Swofford indicated that, well, there are no guarantees.

"A lot of things go into contract negotiations, some of which you have no control over," Swofford said, "such as the timing and the state of the economy and the state of the marketplace when you go there. And that could be a considerable difference during a six- to 12-month period.

"Those are the uncontrollables."

The Favor

Asked if the other Bowl Championship Series leagues might "owe the Big East one" and decide to keep the weakened Big East in the BCS mix, Swofford almost agreed.

"I think (that) could enter into it," he said. "My guess is, and quite frankly my hope would be, that the Big East when that's all said and done would remain a BCS partner."

This is the Big East that is suing the ACC and Miami for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages.

 

Tech coaches say ACC move sure to boost competition
By Dave Johnson
Daily Press
Published July 4, 2003

You'll excuse Virginia Tech women's basketball coach Bonnie Henrickson if her emotions are a little mixed. She's excited about the Hokies' move from the Big East to the ACC, a league that offers better TV exposure and no members in New England. But it's not like Tech plays in some run-down conference that hasn't won the last four national championships.

Of the athletic department's 21 head coaches, Henrickson is one of the very few who isn't clearly upgrading. True, the ACC had a slightly better RPI in 2002-03, but the Big East won the head-to-head competition 7-4. While the ACC has national powers Duke and North Carolina, the Big East has Connecticut and ... well, do you even need a second?

"We're in a unique situation because we're going from a great conference to a great conference," Henrickson said. "This past season's freshman class was a top-10 recruiting class, and for that group it was all about competing in the Big East. A number of those kids chose us, believe it or not, over some schools from the ACC for the opportunity to compete in the Big East.

"But the level of exposure is one of many plusses for us to make the move. The television package for the ACC is fantastic, both regionally and nationally, and that helps us with recruiting. A lot of kids say, 'I want to play in the ACC because that's the conference I know and I like.' So it's been very positive. It's been fantastic."

Wrestling coach Keith Mourlam also faces an interesting move. Since the Big East does not sponsor wrestling, the Hokies compete in the Eastern Wrestling League, which includes some of the top programs in the Northeast. The EWL had 37 bids to the NCAA meet last year to the ACC's 17. Though it will get fewer chances to send wrestlers to the nationals, Tech figures to be more competitive in the ACC.

"The league is getting better," coach Keith Mourlam said of the ACC. "Competition-wise, this isn't going to hurt me. We're excited about it."

Yet most of Tech's Olympic programs face a stiff challenge in switching conferences. Take Oliver Weiss' men's soccer team, for instance. The Hokies went 10-7-1 last season - decent, but not good enough to make the eight-team Big East tournament. Since 1984, Tech is 1-16 vs. ACC competition.

Weiss believes the upper echelon of the Big East compares favorably to the ACC, and he might be right: Boston College, St. John's, Connecticut and Notre Dame won a combined six games in last fall's NCAA tournament.

"The leagues are different," said Weiss, an assistant at North Carolina from 1999-2001.

"One has seven (soccer-playing members), the other has 13. The Big East is as strong, if not stronger, in the top half of the league. But the bottom half of the Big East is not as well funded, and that's the reason why the ACC has a higher RPI."

Jay Hardwick's golf program has won the last three Big East championships, but Tech's new conference will be a different world. Five ACC teams, including national champion Clemson, finished in the top 15 last spring.

"They're known as the best golf conference in the country," Hardwick said. "We have played in the south region for the past 20 years, so our schedule pits us against many of the ACC teams. We feel it's a natural fit."

Chuck Hartman, Tech's baseball coach the past 25 years, enters a league that sent five teams to the NCAA field. And when you throw in Miami, which was ranked fifth in the final poll, that's another killer league.

"You're talking about a conference that over the last five years has had the highest or second-highest RPI in the country," Hartman said. "We've got to raise it a level."

They all do.

On the whole, Virginia Tech athletics had a weak year. Of the 268 Division I teams competing for the NACDA Directors' Cup, which computes a department's success in all sports, the Hokies finished 112th. Only two of the Big East's 14 full-time members did worse. Georgia Tech finished last in the ACC - nearly 60 spots ahead of Virginia Tech.

But Tech hopes membership in the ACC will be a huge boost. In addition to a recruiting boost, each coach expects the switch to ease travel budget concerns. Weiss points out that in Big East soccer, his shortest busride is five hours. In the ACC, his longest busride will be five hours.

This just might be the fountain of youth for Hartman, who just completed his 44th season as a college head coach.

"I think I may go about 10 more years now," he said.
 

Master of the obvious
By FRANK DASCENZO : The Herald-Sun
fdascenzo@heraldsun.com
Jul 4, 2003 : 12:45 am ET

Assuming all the presidents of ACC schools are enjoying Independence Day and not throwing verbal jabs at one another, or even John Swofford for that matter, the latest to come from the illustrious world of higher education should bring a frown to your face.

It comes from Florida State's president, T.K. Wetherell, who undoubtedly never took a lesson in how to keep a secret. Wetherell, if you will recall, leaked the ACC's desire to expand -- and raid the Big East with an original plan that included Miami, Boston College and Syracuse and not Virginia Tech -- which led the league into a two-month turmoil of teleconferences and rumors and backstabbing. Oh yes, and of basketball people wondering if this was turning into a football conference.

Now Wetherell is offering his advice to the ACC to go and get Notre Dame. Right, go and get the Fighting Irish as if it were as easy as buying a candy bar in your nearest grocery store. Go and get the Irish and tell them they can share football revenue with the ACC, play against the mighty Hurricanes and Seminoles every year and be the 12th team in the conference.

Wetherell told The Tallahassee Democrat, "I don't know about the rest [of the ACC presidents], but that's who we should be going after -- Notre Dame. We ought to be sending Coach [Bobby] Bowden, and anyone else who wants to go, to talk to them."

Oh sure, T.K. Take Chuck Amato and Ralph Friedgen along for the heck of it. Fly them on a private jet, into South Bend, drive right up under the Golden Dome and get Kevin White, the Notre Dame athletics director, and convince him the ACC is where the Irish belonged all along.

And just think, the folks in the Big 10 will just be sitting there doing nothing and watching your every move. Same as the bloodied Big East, where the Irish are members in basketball.

The problem with people like Wetherell is that they are masters of the obvious. Perhaps it comes from daydreaming too long, or spending too much time wondering about student-athletes who take part in gambling or shopping at Tallahassee malls. What league wouldn't want the Fighting Irish?

Now understand where Wetherell is coming from and where, oh, say, UNC president James Moeser and Duke president Nan Keohane are coming from. Same conference maybe, but different worlds. FSU is football. In case you haven't noticed, Duke and North Carolina are basketball.

The moment Swofford ended his media conference to officially introduce Miami and Virginia Tech as the 10th and 11th members of the ACC on Tuesday night at Greensboro, it was made abundantly clear that the league is in no rush to get a 12th team.

White is not returning telephone calls from media types curious to know if the Irish will go fishing for a conference after all these years of being the strongest independent football power in the history of the college world.

But John Heisler, the Notre Dame sports information director, said, "Can anyone sit here and say this will fly forever? Probably not. But we prefer to enable our football program to remain independent because that's been an important part of our institutional profile."

But Wetherell is anxious.

"We need to go after Notre Dame and quickly," he said. "In my mind, the recruiting has already started."

For the moment, let us all consider Wetherell is right. After all, he was right before when the ACC launched its expansion attack. The speculation already has begun over potential members for the 12th slot. South Carolina. They left once before, remember? Kentucky. A basketball school -- honestly. Central Florida. Nickname is Golden Knights. Minnesota Vikings quarterback Dante Culpepper played there.

But anyone who knows the difference between a first down and a free throw knows that Notre Dame is the giant in the sky any major conference would covet immensely.

In gutting the Big East of its two best football programs, the ACC opened a wound -- and a serious concern -- around the nation that if it could happen in one part of America, who's to say it can't happen somewhere else. While Notre Dame might be the symbol of college football heritage -- they did put the College Football Hall of Fame in South Bend, by the way -- it must also be pondering the thought of changing its independent status.

Wetherell's idea of sending a scout team to parade in front of statues and photos of Rockne and Gipp and the seven Heisman Trophy winners that the Irish are proud of is an interesting one. But is it a realistic one?

If the ACC thought it had even a slim chance of catching the Irish as a 12th member, there would be no need to send Bobby Bowden. Every league president should agree to go.

 

Hokies, Canes face bumpy path on Tobacco Road
BRYAN STRICKLAND : The Herald-Sun
bstrickland@heraldsun.com
Jul 4, 2003 : 12:44 am ET

Anthony King grew up in a Carolina-crazy household, fervently following the fortunes of Tar Heels basketball in between his games for Southern High School.

King hoped to someday play at UNC. Now, thanks to ACC expansion, King will get his wish -- sort of.

King, a 6-9 forward, committed in March to play for the University of Miami. Now the Hurricanes, along with Virginia Tech, are headed from the Big East to the ACC, beginning with the 2004-2005 season.

That means that King is headed for the Smith Center.

"I had some interest in the ACC. Who wouldn't?" King said. "My whole household was Carolina fans.

"I'll get to see my mom more, so that will be great. ... To tell you the truth, I really can't wait to play against Carolina."

But King's excitement about taking on the Tar Heels has more to do with recruiting than it does expansion. King said he was looking forward to playing in the Big East and considered the conference to be the ACC's equal. He turned down a scholarship offer from Clemson and had UConn at the top of his wish list with UNC.

UNC showed some interest in him, but King said the Tar Heels strung him along.

"I thought something was going to happen; I was talking to them on an every-day basis," said King, whose Hurricanes will travel to the Smith Center for a nonconference game this season. "They kept saying that I needed to do this or I needed to do that during my season, and I was doing those things.

"So I was like, `What's the hold-up?' So I finally said, `If you're going to sit around and play around, then I'm going to go somewhere else.' "

Now, King will be a frequent traveler to Tobacco Road and a conference that just tripled its supply of Southern High products. UNC's David Noel played with King at Southern, as did Virginia Tech forward Fabian Davis, a freshman for the Hokies last season.

Miami and Virginia Tech's invitation to the ACC was a football-driven decision, but players like King and Davis will be among the driving forces trying to bring their basketball programs some not-easily-earned respect along Tobacco Road.

The road could be a bumpy one.

While Virginia Tech and Miami football will bring a big boost to the ACC, the Hokies and Hurricanes are hoping the ACC can provide a similar boost to their basketball programs.

"It's a huge shot in the arm for us," first-year Virginia Tech coach Seth Greenberg said. "It's a win-win for us.

"It's time to get to work and upgrade the level of our players so we can be successful."

The Hokies didn't find success in their three seasons of Big East basketball, finishing in the cellar each season with a combined conference record of 10-38. Over the last seven seasons, the Hokies have finished with a losing record six times.

But Greenberg believes that the Hokies' new conference could usher in a new era.

"We're not in this thing to say, `Oh, man, we're happy to be in the ACC ... come on and whip our tail.' That's not what it's about," said Greenberg, who spent the last seven seasons at South Florida. "It's about using the ACC as a vehicle or springboard to put us in position to recruit the kind of players we need to be successful.

"Obviously, we're going into a league that has as rich a tradition of any league that's ever bounced the basketball. The key for us is that we're joining a league that's in the geographic footprint of where we need to be successful recruiting -- that's in Virginia and North Carolina. I think we have the ability now to recruit head-to-head with schools in our state and be able to go out of the state and communicate to these kids that they will get a chance to play in front of family and friends and play at the very, very highest levels."

Miami is in a better position to help feed the ACC rather than feed off the league, but the Hurricanes have their own hurdles. Before last season's 11-17 record, Miami had recorded eight straight winning records and had made six straight postseason appearances. But also before last season, the Hurricanes didn't have a home.

That changed on Jan. 4, when the Canes opened the $48 million Convocation Center -- a 7,000-seat, on-campus facility -- with a 64-61 overtime victory over UNC.

"One of the areas where our program had not been fully funded and fully taken care of was our basketball program," Miami athletics director Paul Dee said. "From 1971 to 1985, we dropped basketball because we didn't have a place to play. We had different places to play, but we were like the Miami Nomads. In the history of the university, we've played in 16 different venues in the city, the largest of which seated about 10.

"So it had always been important to us, as a university, to have our own facility. And through the help of a number of people and our fans, we were able to construct a brand-new facility."

So while Miami appears to be on the right track, the Hurricanes are less than two decades removed from not even having a basketball team and mere months removed from having no homecourt advantage.

None of that bothers King, who found out a couple of weeks ago that he had qualified academically. King is now in Miami, taking a couple of summer-school classes and preparing himself for his homecoming.

"I guess I've got to get my kinks out this year because I'm going to be going back home," King said. "And I know I'm going to hear about it when I get home if I don't play well."

Miami and Virginia Tech know they'll hear about it as well.

NOTES -- ACC commissioner John Swofford said that the addition of Miami and Virginia Tech obviously signals the end of double round-robin play, but he said that every effort would be made to keep the top rivalries as home-and-home series. ... Swofford said the ACC would look at the 11-team Big Ten model for scheduling purposes. Big Ten basketball teams played 16 conference games last season, facing six teams twice and four teams once. ... Swofford also said the ACC would likely adopt the Big Ten Tournament model, meaning the Thursday of the ACC Tournament would increase to three games (No. 6 seed vs. No. 11; No. 7 vs. No. 10; No. 8 vs. No. 9). The top five seeds would receive byes into Friday's quarterfinals, and beginning Friday the tournament would follow its familiar format.


 

Hokies have arrived
'You couldn't dream up this script. You could put all the people involved in a think tank and you don't come out with this.' Jim Weaver, Virginia Tech athletics director
By LUCIANA CHAVEZ, Staff Writer

BLACKSBURG, VA.--Place-kicker Shayne Graham calls Virginia Tech's 2000 national title game appearance against Florida State in the Sugar Bowl the biggest game in the school's history -- even though the Hokies lost 46-29. "We had never been there before," said Graham, who is now with the Carolina Panthers. "It was something we were not used to at all. It's hard to explain what it was like except that a lot of people wanted to make it like we didn't have a chance."
The Hokies went out and immediately started to prove everyone right when they trailed 28-14 at the half against the Seminoles that evening in New Orleans.

Then they began to prove everyone wrong when they rallied to take a 29-28 lead at the end of the third quarter behind a stunning performance from redshirt freshman quarterback Michael Vick.

Although Florida State outscored Virginia Tech 18-0 in the final quarter, notice had been served: The Hokies were about to enter that small fraternity of perennially fawned-over football teams.

"Before, we knew we were going to be good but it wasn't expected of us," Graham said. "Now that starts early every year."

The Hokies' convoluted journey into the ACC followed a story line similar to that biggest game in Hokies' football history.

A week and a half ago, Virginia Tech's chances for receiving an invitation into the ACC were all but dead. The school lobbied for inclusion, and was turned down.

Virginia politicians rallied behind the cause, then Tech joined in a lawsuit against the conference it now will happily join. Last week, Tech was dropped as a plaintiff in the suit after being invited to become an ACC member.

"I don't know how to even characterize [this situation with the ACC]," Virginia Tech athletics director Jim Weaver said last week. "You couldn't dream up this script. You could put all the people involved in a think tank and you don't come out with this."

But Virginia Tech believed throughout the saga that it was right for the ACC. And in the end, the ACC was forced to agree.

"We exist in the current footprint of the ACC," Weaver said, noting that Blacksburg is located within a four-hour drive of five ACC schools -- Virginia, North Carolina, Duke, N.C. State and Wake Forest.

"Travel-wise, that is much more palatable for us than the Big East," Weaver said. "And we have a preexisting relationship in football and most sports with almost every institution in the ACC."

Sitting on a plateau between the Alleghany and Blue Ridge mountains, Tech will welcome ACC crowds to a campus that echoes the lush green and leafy beauty of the southwest Virginia foothills.

Chartered in 1872 as Virginia Mechanical and Agricultural College, the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University ranked 36th among all public universities in the most recent rankings from U.S. News & World Report.

Known for its engineering programs, Virginia Tech also consistently ranks among the top 50 research universities in the country, putting into practice the university motto Ut Prosim: That I may serve.

Virginia Tech is one of three public institutions in the United States with both an active military cadet corps and a civilian student population.

Participation in the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets, which has about 700 members, is no longer mandatory, but it remains a tradition at the university.

More than 25,600 students pursue degrees on a campus that stretches across 2,600 acres and includes an airport; a golf course; Smithfield Plantation, one of the state's oldest historical landmarks; and buildings constructed from rock taken from a local quarry and appropriately called "Hokie Stone."

At the heart of the 300 acres on which most of the university's academic buildings are located, sits the Drillfield, a large oval field cut into sections by lighted paths. War Memorial Chapel sits at the eastern end.

On the Drillfield, you'll find students playing sports or studying and the Corps of Cadets' official band -- a.k.a. the Highty Tighties -- practicing.

Obviously the school's beauty and football frenzy lure students. But its practicality, history and solid reputation as an academic institution assure them they made the right choice.

"I like the region and love the campus; it's beautiful," said Kate May, a junior horticulture and English major from Sperryville, Va. "And I like the school spirit. I went to a small high school and we didn't really have school spirit. So it's really cool to come to a college where everyone is all about the Hokies."

Like many small towns with big universities, life in Blacksburg (pop. around 39,700 including students) revolves around the university.

"All of the commerce is based on Tech's academic calendar," said Bill Ellenbogen, a former Tech player and owner of Bogen's restaurant in Blacksburg.

But locals and visitors alike feel the connection most strongly on weekends when the Hokies host a football game and the town's population nearly doubles in size with the influx of fans.

"The community does tend to hold its breath every Saturday [during football season]." Ellenbogen said. "We live and die with Tech."

Over the past decade, Blacksburg has undergone an economic boom coinciding with the Hokies' rise as a football power.

A recent economic impact study completed by Virginia Tech estimated that home football games attract as much as $2 million per game to Montgomery County.

New hotels and restaurants have cropped up in Blacksburg and nearby towns such as Christiansburg to handle the large crowds. And a new highway bypass to the Tech campus was recently completed to cut out a long, tedious trip into campus from the freeway through more than a dozen stoplights.

Hotel rooms within a 45- to 50-mile radius of Blacksburg, from Roanoke to the east and Wytheville to the south, are filled and often booked a year in advance for football weekends.

Restaurants, like Bogen's and the Hokie House on Main Street in Blacksburg, reap the benefits.

"Like any bar in town, it will be packed to the point that you can't move," said Bogen's bartender and 2002 Tech grad Rory Reynolds.

And locals believe joining the ACC can only enhance the fervor.

"It's been the sense in Blacksburg for a long time that the ACC would be a good place for Tech to be because its academic standards are compatible with the ACC, because it's geographically close to most of the schools and the ACC is a known commodity," Ellenbogen said.

Tech wasn't always such a popular, successful football school. Head coach Frank Beamer's early teams struggled and "it used to be the stands wouldn't even be half full," said Linda Seawell, who has worked at Tech for 24 years and been a Hokie fan just as long.

But 10 straight bowl appearances does great things for a program. "Now you can't even get a ticket," Seawell said.

Virginia Tech sold out all its home football games from the last game of 1998 season through the last game of 2001 season. In August 2002, a new 11,120-seat addition to the stadium brought its capacity to 65,115.

The ACC is eager to tap into the Hokies' football fanaticism. "I think that's what would make Tech attractive to any league," said Bill Roth, the Hokies' radio play-by-play man. "They're very successful on the field and very good at the gate."

Unlike former ACC targets Syracuse and Boston College, Tech should be able to slide right into the ACC culture. And following the chaotic process that ACC expansion became, that's no small thing.

Just like joining the Big East in 1991 boosted Virginia Tech's football program, joining the ACC could boost the men's basketball program, as well as give improving non-revenue sports a solid place to grow.

Men's basketball had not been out of the Big East cellar under former head coach Ricky Stokes. His teams went 45-70 in four seasons and never won more than four Big East games in any of Tech's three conference seasons. Seth Greenberg was hired this spring to replace him.

Basketball attendance has lagged for years but hosting the Dukes, North Carolinas, Marylands and Wake Forests of the college basketball world could begin to fill the newly refurbished 10,052-seat Cassell Coliseum as well as give Greenberg entree to the homes of better recruits.

"I think Virginia Tech has everything in place to be very successful in men's basketball," Roth said.

Tech's non-revenue sports have seen steady improvement under Weaver's watch. His goal has always been for Tech teams to consistently rank in the upper third of the conference.

"You're not going to win a conference championship if you're not in upper echelon of the conference," Weaver said. "And once you start winning conference championships, then you can start talking about being a national program and competing for national titles. If look you back at football, that exactly what happened."

Led by coach Bonnie Henrickson , the Tech women's basketball team has consistently finished in the upper third of the Big East standings.

The baseball, softball and tennis teams can claim the same. Men's golf has dominated the Big East since joining and the school will host the 2004 NCAA championships at the Homestead course.

The athletics department supports other non-revenue sports that are still trying to gain ground with an aggressive plan to refurbish nearly all of the school's facilities.

"I think joining the ACC is going to give the other sports in our system a chance to break out," said Graham, the former Tech place-kicker. "I think it'll be good for everybody but it's a sticky situation having to leave a conference that has done so much for us."

Weaver said the school's plan for its athletics programs likely wouldn't change because the goal will never change.

"We're not there yet," Weaver said, referring to consistently being successful on the national level. "But we've made great strides in last six years. We've been on the move."

Mike Bianchi
Florida belongs in ACC with FSU and Miami
Published July 4, 2003
 

Go Gators.

To the ACC, that is.

OK, you orange-and-blue babies, it's time to stop whining about how Florida State and Miami have had it easy all these years and put your team on a level playing field. If you dare.

The University of Florida should split the SouthLeastern Conference right now and do the right thing for its academic reputation and athletic program -- join the Atlantic Coast Conference.

Before all you UF fans lose your minds and send one of your football players to permanently disfigure me, I remind you of some memorable words uttered by the man who made you what you are:

"We're the only state where the three big schools are all in different conferences. It's ridiculous. Florida, Florida State and Miami all ought to be in the same conference. That would make everything equal."

Steve Spurrier uttered those wishful words during his final year at UF. Of course, Spurrier was shooting from the lip as he often did in those days. Everybody just sort of rolled their eyes because such a concept seemed impossible back then.

Not anymore. Suddenly, it's possible for all three state schools to be in the same league. Possible -- and plausible.

Nobody likes how the back-stabbing, money-grubbing ACC went about adding Miami and Virginia Tech, but what's done is done. The new rules of etiquette have been established -- and there are no rules.

Everybody is out for No. 1. The ACC did what it felt it had to do for the betterment of its league. Now the Gators should do what they need to do, too. The ACC needs another team so it can get to 12 members and play a conference championship game. Florida should be that 12th man.

The landscape has changed, and so has the balance of power. There was a time not so long ago when I thought FSU belonged in the SEC -- geographically, philosophically, socially and sentimentally. The Seminoles were a football school hopelessly misplaced in a basketball league.

Now, with Miami and FSU in the ACC, the Gators are the ones who are misplaced. Florida officials and old-time fans will tell you there is too much history and heritage to ever leave the SEC. That's just pride and pigheadedness.

Most Florida fans compare themselves to FSU and Miami, not Auburn and Georgia. And most Florida fans would rather play Miami every year than Tennessee. With FSU and UM in the mix, an ACC title suddenly becomes more meaningful to Florida fans than an SEC championship.

Besides, the SEC-rivalry argument is overblown. The Gators don't even play Auburn on an annual basis anymore, and the annual series with Tennessee is barely a decade old. The only rivalry worth preserving is Florida-Georgia, and those teams still could play even if UF did leave the SEC.

The more you think about the Gators in the ACC, the more it makes sense. Florida now fancies itself as a basketball school, and what better place for a basketball school than the ACC?

Florida also likes to think of itself as one of the nation's finest public institutions of higher learning. The ACC has an exemplary academic reputation. You hang around with Duke, Virginia and North Carolina, and people talk about your number of graduates. You hang around with Alabama, Mississippi State and Kentucky, and people talk about your number of sanctions.

It used to be UF fans lampooned the caliber of football in the ACC (Almost Competitive Conference), but those days are over. In fact, with Miami, FSU, Virginia Tech, North Carolina State, Maryland and Virginia, the new ACC has six legitimate Top 25 programs this year.

On second thought, maybe the Gators better stay in the SEC for a few more years. They're not quite ready yet to compete with the big boys of the ACC.