Quote Originally Posted by Marooned View Post
"No kidding, all this chicken little the sky is falling in talk is getting real old. 14 teams, in 9 contiguous states from Boston to Miami. The ACC's best days are ahead of us, long live the ACC."

Look, I'm open minded to staying in the ACC, but it is not, by any stretch of the imagination, an ideal atheletic conference for VT.

1) ACC MBB - is no longer the preeminent conference, the latest expansion is an acknowledgement to that.
2) ACC FB - No champion game winner or opponent since FSU beat VT.
3) Markets - small private schools and pro-league towns drive down interest; that is why getting a competitive TV deal will always be a problem (excluding, possibly, full participation by ND - I'm not holding my breath).
4) Academic elitism - there are some associations among institutions, but nowhere near the B1G. Recent NCAA violations have also gone beyond the usual suspects to touch programs such as UNC and Duke.

The ACC may be the best conference for VT, under the present circumstances, but there is ample cause for dissatisfaction. Don't dismiss people that point these issues out.

I disagree, the ACC is our ideal conference. It requires no imagination what so ever. We reside in or near the very heart of the conference and something like 70% of our grads reside in the current footprint, throw in Pennsylvania and New York and it probably jumps to 80%. An ideal conference by definition has to have regional rivalries and familiarity. The headquarters and heart of the SEC is Birmingham, Alabama. With the addition of Texas A&M and Mizzou, the SEC is now a central time zone dominant league.

The ACC has plenty of opportunity and potential , they just have to perform and produce to that potential.

The ACC has a lucrative contract now , no it isn't as much as the SEC or Big 10 but it is sufficient. Those conferences have always had an advantage economically. So why doesn't a Minnesota, Indiana , Illinois , Mississippi, MSU, or Kentucky ever field a National contender or in the case of most of them a simple winning season ? Resources are important but there are still some intangibles that some teams never seem to have.

Recent NCAA violations pfft, dude look at Ohio St, Michigan,and Penn St was just dealt one of the harshest penalties ever. My SEC buddies deflect criticism by joking that in the SEC if you're not cheating you're not trying. Sure the ACC has some current embarrassments but historically has been pretty clean.