ACC Realignment Rumblings: 7 schools are examining the grant of rights. But can they leave?
by Nicole Auerbach, The Athletic

The ACC's annual spring meetings are underway in Amelia Island, Florida, and are expected to end by midday Wednesday. It's the first time the league's top administrators will gather in person since Florida State athletic director Michael Alford publicly lambasted the ACC's current equal revenue sharing model and said "something has to change," because FSU could not compete nationally if it falls $30 million behind its peers in the SEC and Big Ten on an annual basis.

Those comments, made in front of his board of trustees back in February, made waves nationally and were followed up by similar calls for consideration of uneven revenue sharing from his counterparts at Clemson, Miami, and North Carolina.

ACC commissioner Jim Phillips has acknowledged the league's position relative to the SEC and the Big Ten and has hired outside help to find new revenue streams for a conference locked in to its media rights deal through 2036. What it would cost to try to get out of the ACC before that time is unclear; the exit fee alone is $120 million and there is also the issue of breaking the ACC's grant of rights, which has not been challenged to date and is presumed to be airtight by most.

Lawyers for a subset of schools have been thoroughly examining the document. One industry source said he was told that seven ACC schools are interested in exploring ways to leave the ACC.

"If it were simple, everybody would have done it already," an ACC source pointed out.

The GOR piece is important because the ACC would continue to own the broadcast rights of all of its teams' home games, even if that team were to pay the exit fee and leave. Is there a dollar figure that a school could pay to get its rights back? Even if it is exorbitant, it could be worth paying to get to a league that will bring in $30 million more per member annually.

The ACC source said his expectation for this week's meetings was to "advance the ball on revenue distribution changes," though he acknowledged it wouldn't close the gap for schools like Clemson and Florida State compared to schools in the Big Ten and SEC. It's about incremental change and moving toward a system that rewards on-field (or on-court) success, he said. Some of the schools' presidents are expected to be in Florida in person for their portion of the meetings; others will video conference in.

Tension among ACC schools has been a hot topic both inside and out of the league this offseason. The question has come up in nearly every conversation with any administrator in any league for weeks: When is one or more ACC schools going to challenge the ACC's grant of rights? Could it be this summer? Next year? Or much closer to the end of the contract that runs through 2036? Everyone knows there are disgruntled members, led by Florida State and Clemson, but it's not quite clear what would be required, legally and financially, to attempt to exit the ACC prior to 2036.

"There's a big difference between saying you want to do something like that and actually executing it," one league source said.

What was perhaps most interesting was the amount of attention paid to the ACC at another set of spring meetings -- those that took place earlier this month in Scottsdale, Arizona. The Big 12 and Pac-12 formally met there, as they always do, and a good amount of Big Ten football coaches and athletic directors came out for a few days for the Fiesta Bowl-sponsored events (and vacation). There were agents, search firm representatives, and other industry leaders networking there as well as reporters.

There was much speculation about the future of the ACC and what it could mean for the rest of major college athletics. Most of the administrators who spoke to The Athletic in Scottsdale were much more interested in in the possibility of ACC floodgates being open -- and what that could mean for the Big Ten and SEC, which will be both at 16 members as of 2024 -- than they were about discussing the current standoff between the Pac-12 and Big 12 over schools such as Colorado and Arizona.

If Florida State, Clemson, Virginia, North Carolina and Miami were to become available, that's a real and major domino to fall in conference realignment. As one Big Ten source put it, "Those schools are where the real value is."

That person was particularly interested in Virginia and North Carolina as new states and/or markets for the Big Ten to extend down the East Coast. This Big Ten source believes expansion out East makes far more sense than expanding into the Pacific Northwest, which has not had nearly enough support internally or among the league's media partners since the idea was first broached. University of Illinois chancellor Robert J. Jones told The Athletic last month that "there was no sense of urgency" for the league to expand beyond USC and UCLA.

"Are we thinking about (realignment)? Of course," said Jones, chair of the Big Ten's Council of Presidents and Chancellors. "We're doing analysis, the cost, the benefits of staying at 16 or moving up. It’s not something we’re going to do just to react to what other conferences may choose to do. We’re only going to do what’s best for our current membership, and there has to be some value added for expanding beyond.”

The SEC does not appear interested in going beyond 16 members anytime soon (though that could change if certain ACC schools became available), and the Big Ten, with new commissioner Tony Petitti, has said its main priority right now is determining how to integrate its two Los Angeles schools into the league. The Big Ten’s new media rights deals expire at the end of the decade, so perhaps the topic is tabled for a few years as the dust settles out west and the industry watches what happens with the ACC.

But someone (or someones) will have to challenge the ACC grant of rights to get out, and they wouldn’t want to do that unless they knew they had a landing spot in one of the two richest leagues. But they also can’t commit to one of those leagues without knowing for sure they can get out of the GOR.

It’s a chicken-or-the-egg situation. As of now, the ACC schools are not available. Will it stay that way?