The ACC has gotten the short end of the stick in college football over the past few years. In each of the last three seasons, the conference has been completely left out of the College Football Playoff. That was particularly rough last year, when Florida State went 13-0 and were the ACC Champions, yet got left out of the CFP.
This offseason, a lot has changed in the landscape of college football. The Pac-12 collapsed, with just Oregon State and Washington State left in what’s barely even a real conference anymore. The best of the Pac-12 got scooped up by the Big Ten, while other teams flocked to the Big 12 and the ACC. With all those changes, and just four power conferences left, the hierarchy has certainly changed.
The SEC has long been the best football conference, and that’s still true. That’s backed up by CBS’s recent rankings. It’s also proven by the numbers. Four of the last five national champions have been SEC teams. Plus, four of the top six teams in the preseason AP poll. That includes one of the SEC’s additions this offseason, Texas. The conference also added powerhouse Oklahoma.
The only other conference in the same echelon as the SEC is the Big Ten. The conference features last year’s national champion, Michigan, plus last year’s national runner up, Washington. The Big Ten also scooped up the best pieces from the Pac-12: Washington, Oregon, UCLA, and USC. The conference has four of the top ten teams in the preseason AP poll. That says it all.
Now it comes down to the ACC and the Big 12. There are a lot of numbers that indicate that these two conferences are neck and neck. Both have seven CFP appearances in the last decade. The ACC has four teams in the AP Top 25, the Big 12 has five teams. Both conferences have three teams inside the top 20. However, the ACC is just a bit better historically and right now. The ACC owns two championships in the last decade, compared to none from the Big 12. The ACC also has the highest-ranked team out of the two conferences, #10 Florida State. In terms of depth, the ACC also wins. In The Athletic’s recent ranking of all 134 DI teams, there are two Big 12 teams (Cincinnati and Arizona State) ranked below the ACC’s worst team (Stanford).
The shakeup of college conferences has been good for the ACC. It’s clear that it’s the third-best football conference in the nation.
