Analysis: Hard work, tough choices lie ahead, but ACC, Pitt still have strong legs to stand on
Share this post:
Flipping through the pages of the history of the past 12 years of Pitt football – so long ago that Todd Graham was still relevant and Pat Narduzzi was a mere Big Ten coordinator – you’ll run across how the Big East crumbled and Mark Nordenberg and Steve Pederson, former chancellor and athletic director, found Pitt a safe haven in the ACC.
The move was obvious, but those men still deserve credit for making it happen.
But now, seven ACC schools this week made noise about breaking a TV contract that lags far behind most of the other Power 5 conferences in terms of revenue.
Is the ACC on its last legs? Or does commissioner Jim Phillips possess the power, vision and resourcefulness to keep the conference together?
There was some hope Wednesday at the end of the ACC spring meetings in Amelia Island, Fla., when ESPN reported that the conference’s ADs told their commissioner “we’re all in this together.”
That doesn’t necessarily mean all is well. If a school such as Florida State wants on-field success — such as a berth in the ACC Championship game — tied to bigger payouts, what will be Boston College’s answer?
Months of negotiations lie ahead while members try to bridge a gap that is more like the Grand Canyon. The Big Ten splits up $1 billion worth of TV money among its 14 member schools every year; the ACC’s revenue streams generate less than one-fourth of that total ($240 million).
But is the ACC really going to break up? Or are we just hearing threats that the so-called Magnificent 7 — Clemson, Florida State, Miami, Virginia, Virginia Tech, North Carolina and N.C. State — can’t back up as a group?
If they don’t like being tied to the ACC and its TV partners through 2036, perhaps they shouldn’t have agreed to that 20-year deal in 2016. Didn’t anyone see this coming?
The median salary for FBS head football coaches is $3.5 million. Facility improvements are important inducements in recruiting, but they cost millions. Even before covid-19, the median athletic program in the FBS in 2019 had an operating deficit of $18.8 million. Some donors are now funneling their dollars toward name, image and likeness deals as a means to recruit individual athletes when the department as a whole needs the money.
Florida State athletic director Michael Alford complained his department can’t afford to be $30 million behind “compared to our peers.”
Another matter to consider is this: If those schools want to bolt, where will they go? The Big Ten and SEC are expanding by two – UCLA and USC to the midwest; Texas and Oklahoma to the south – bringing their memberships to 16.
Do those conferences want further expansion and, thus, a smaller cut of the pie of TV riches?
Clemson, by virtue of its two national championships, probably could find a new home. But where are Virginia and N.C. State, for example, going to go, if they turn their backs on the ACC? Florida State and Miami don’t carry the same reputations they did when Jimbo Fisher and Jimmy Johnson were their football coaches.
It’s hard to imagine all seven schools leaving the ACC at the same time. But even if a few leave, where does that put a program such as Pitt?
Pitt can compete and flourish in the ACC, a fact proven by the success football, men’s basketball, men’s and women’s soccer, women’s volleyball and wrestling have enjoyed in recent months.
The ACC remains an appropriate home for Pitt’s 19 sports, many of which are gaining an increasing amount of respect across the conference’s footprint and coast to coast. Football, women’s volleyball, soccer (men’s and women’s), wrestling and even men’s basketball made headlines during the 2022-2023 academic year. Pitt can compete and — in some cases – dominate in those sports.
• The volleyball team has been to the past two NCAA Final Fours.
• Men’s soccer has been to two College Cups in three years.
• Football defeated UCLA in the Sun Bowl and won the ACC in 2021.
• Men’s basketball took down SEC and Big 12 teams in the NCAA Tournament.
It’s often difficult to determine what is happening behind closed doors at Petersen Events Center, but it’s a good bet athletic director Heather Lyke has been preparing for the worst, probably as far back as when UCLA, USC, Texas and Oklahoma announced plans to defect from their conferences. If it can happen there, it can happen anywhere, right?
Pitt will be fine, but Lyke is well aware that there’s still plenty of work to be done — both at home within her programs and side by side with her colleagues in the ACC.