Notre Dame to the ACC: A Perfect Marriage for Irish and New League

Although Notre Dame has agreed to schedule five football games per season against ACC opponents as part of the conference transition, the Fighting Irish will not be shedding their independent label—at least not yet—on the gridiron. That means the ACC will still sit at 14 teams in football. Adding an all-sports school like UConn would bump the ACC to an uneven 15 schools in football, while bringing the basketball quotient up to 16.

To compensate, the ACC may instead court a major basketball school devoid of a D-1 football program, like Georgetown, St. John’s or Villanova. Adding a school that brings a strong basketball program to the table minus a complementary football program would allow the ACC to attain 16 schools in hoops without reaching an odd-number in football.

A super-conference seems likely, even imminent, but it’s not as simple as it ostensibly seems.

The right fit for Notre Dame

The ACC is a much better fit for Notre Dame across the board.

Although the Big East is certainly a strong academic conference itself, the ACC is a cut above, wielding Duke, Wake Forest, Boston College, Virginia, Maryland and North Carolina. Few national conferences offer a better academic six-pack than that. Notre Dame fits right in.

The Fighting Irish also offer one of the nation’s premiere college lacrosse programs over the last decade. No better fit then for Notre Dame lacrosse than the league that sports the best collection of lacrosse talent in the country—Virginia, Duke, North Carolina and Maryland, consistently Top 10 teams. The SEC doesn’t dominate football the way the ACC figures to rule lacrosse upon the additions of Syracuse and Notre Dame.

On the hardwood, Mike Brey’s bunch will fit right in. With stifling man-to-man defense, a slew of 3-point shooters and a highly structured system that spreads the floor and incorporates lots of ball movement, Notre Dame should serve as the perfect little brother to Duke, which doesn’t have an equal in terms of style of play under the current ACC landscape. Playing in a league (the Big East) that embraces a rough-and-tumble brand of basketball, Notre Dame always seemed like a fish out of water with its finesse-oriented system.

The Big East rivalries never quite fit for Notre Dame. They were patently forced. Sure, Notre Dame and Louisville have played some legendary games over the years (five of their last seven meetings were decided in overtime). But that was a contrived “rivalry.” Connecticut-Notre Dame and Syracuse-Notre Dame made for compelling TV too, primarily because UConn and Cuse have sat near the top of the Big East for the better part of the last 20 years. But the Huskies and Orange weren’t natural-borne rivals. Their meetings lacked compelling history, storylines and geographical context.

With Notre Dame diving into the ACC, new rivalries—unforced rivalries minus the ballyhoo—should prosper.

Homecoming for Mike Brey

Mike Brey returns to the ACC, where he spent the first chapter of his college coaching career as assistant at Duke. Brey spent eight seasons under Mike Krzyzewski, serving on the staff during Duke’s back-to-back title teams in ’91 and ’92.

Now the pupil will get to face off with his mentor each year. And who knows? This could be a yearly audition for the off-putting job of replacing Coach K in Durham sometime down the line. Brey signed a 10-year  deal in June to stay in South Bend, but you better believe he’d weigh leaving early if that opportunity presented itself.

ACC teams capitalize

With Notre Dame now in tow, you better believe ACC teams are itching to renegotiate their television rights deal. Once Syracuse and Pitt officially join, bumping conference membership up to 14, the ACC will become eligible to reopen negotiations over its current media deal.

The ACC has also increased its exit fee to $50 million per school—three times the annual operation budget each member is allotted.

Don’t expect current ACC schools to get jumpy any time soon. Especially not after negotiations for a revised television contract heat up.