In the age where content is king, the Atlantic Coast Conference will make a TV spectacle of announcing its new 17-team scheduling model for football.
The league has planned an hour-long “football schedule model release” for Monday night from 6-7 p.m. on the ACC Network. Mark Packer and Taylor Tannebaum will host the show.
The ACC had just started using a new scheduling system this season, scrapping the Atlantic and Coastal divisions and giving each school three permanent partners. The format seemed well-received and allowed every school to play everyone else in the conference at least twice every four years (and the permanent partners four times).
ACC officials said the new model will be for the next seven years, from 2024-30, and will accommodate the league’s three newest members – Stanford, Cal and SMU.
There have been no hints so far what the model will look like. ACC commissioner Jim Phillips said earlier this week at the ACC Tip Off that putting the schedule together has been “the ultimate jigsaw puzzle.”
The assumption by most is that the league will follow the Big Ten’s “flex schedule” idea of protecting a certain number of rivalry games each year as opposed to assigning every team one or more permanent rivals.
The ACC currently plays an eight-game conference schedule, with the top two teams in the standings meeting in Charlotte for the ACC title game.
More ACC football-related content