Clemson-Notre Dame ACC football title game now possible with Irish joining conference this season
Notre Dame will play as an ACC member in this very unique college football season.
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If there is a 2020 college football season, Notre Dame, which has played as an independent every season in its history, will join the ACC for this year only (in theory) in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic and the Irish already having lost three other games against Power 5 opponents. All ACC teams will play 11 games this year, 10 of them in conference and a "plus-one" against a non-conference school.
The non-conference game will be against an opponent that is located in the same state as the ACC school. That preserves notable ACC-SEC rivalries such as Florida State-Florida, Georgia Tech-Georgia, Louisville-Kentucky and Clemson-South Carolina that usually conclude the regular season.
In addition, the ACC will not have divisions this year and the schedule will begin the week of Sept. 7, which originally was Week 2 of the 2020 college football season.
The Irish will be eligible to play in the ACC Championship Game – that will be played either Dec. 12 or 19 in Charlotte. The top two teams based on conference-game winning percentage would meet in that. All ACC television revenue for 2020 season, including Notre Dame home games (which are a separate contract with NBC), will be shared equally by all 15 schools.
It's not clear as of this writing what this means for Notre Dame's scheduled opener at Navy, but it seems very likely that will stay the Irish's non-conference game as the schools have played every year since 1927. The Irish already lost rivalry games with USC and Stanford. The SportsLine Projection Model ranks Notre Dame easily as the ACC's second-best team this season behind Clemson.
This will be Notre Dame's ACC schedule with dates TBA (click here for all ACC games):
There had been a handful of Week 1 ACC matchups scheduled: NC State-Louisville (Sept. 2); Clemson-Georgia Tech (Sept. 3) and Syracuse-Boston College (Sept. 4). Not clear where those will move. This would mean marquee Week 1 non-conference games like North Carolina-UCF; Florida State-West Virginia (Atlanta); and Georgia-Virginia (also in Atlanta) are off.
The full ACC schedule and dates will be released later. The updated William Hill moneyline odds to win the ACC title will be released no later than Thursday. Clemson will remain the clear favorite but the Irish will be second despite the teams meeting in the regular season.
No question that conference officials are hoping this leads to Notre Dame joining full time in football as the school is a member in nearly every other major sport. The Irish are currently contractually obligated to ONLY join the ACC if they decide to leave full-time independence in football at any time over the next 15 years or so.
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