Big Ten Courting North Carolina? Forget It, Tar Heels Are Staying Put

North Carolina is not Maryland. Its athletics department is operating in the black, its basketball program is one of the two hottest tickets in the conference and the school shares a stable, everlasting and mutual rivalry with a fellow blueblood. If Maryland’s circumstances were similar, the Terps would be sprawled out on an ACC sofa, in no mood to skip leagues, either.

Consider the source here: a Maryland reporter, likely gleaning info through the filter of Maryland informants, dropping bombshells in the best interest of Maryland athletics. If you’re a Terp official trying to justify the Big Ten move to donors and alumni leery about leaving the ACC, doesn’t news, factual or speculative, of North Carolina tagging along bolster your case?

Maryland is in full-fledged panic-mongering mode, feeding any bits of information that may validate the school’s decision to jump conferences. What better way to do so than provoking trollish conversation about the ACC’s demise?

More than anything, regard Ermann’s report as wishful thinking initiated by school reps facing major PR blowback if their new league home doesn’t pan out.

North Carolina is passing up the financial carrots of the Big Ten for the legacy restoration of the ACC, no matter how badly activists from College Park are pulling for a change of heart.