DALLAS — ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips boarded the first flight out of Los Angeles on Friday morning and arrived here in good spirits, belying his lack of sleep.
It's not a great time for Phillips in the realm of politics, which seems to be a big part of the conversation in college sports right now. In recent College Football Playoff expansion negotiations, his conference has been relegated to second-tier status, with intense pressure from the SEC and Big Ten to accept a lower share of revenue that was previously split evenly among the Power Five. It became so.
Meanwhile, the ACC is being sued by Florida State University and Clemson University over the language of a document binding the league through 2036, suggesting the ACC's departure is a matter of time and legality.
And whether it was the CFP ignoring the Seminoles in December or Phillips' league earning only five berths to the NCAA men's basketball tournament, there is an air of frustration and vulnerability hanging over the entire operation. Ta.
But the ACC's roots are here in this tournament, and in a sport that seems to transcend whatever ugliness swirls around the conference. And on Friday night, as the ACC secured the third spot in the Elite Eight (two of which are here at South Regional), Phillips said that March has made many of those big questions seem a little smaller. acknowledged.
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“This is a great conference with a 71-year history that stands for what's right and has been incredibly successful competitively, in all sports, including football, basketball, and Olympic sports against world-class universities. “I've been aiming for national championship caliber,” Phillips told USA TODAY. Sports. “So some of the stories for me are completely distorted from the reality of what's actually happening at our conference. There's a sense of tension in some parts, and I understand that. But for me… , but that doesn’t stop me from continuing to perform.”
And their performance is undeniably good.
The ACC will have at least one Final Four team in the net when No. 4 seed Duke and No. 11 seed North Carolina State meet for the third time this month on Sunday at American Airlines Center. And if No. 6 seed Clemson can defeat No. 4 seed Alabama in Saturday's West Regional tournament, there will be a second one.
By the way, these are the teams that finished 2nd in the ACC regular season standings, tied for 5th and 10th. And if Clemson reaches the Final Four for the first time in program history, it will be the second time in three years that the ACC will have multiple representatives on the final weekend.
Dysfunctional meetings? Not in this tournament.
“I'm not surprised,” Duke coach John Scheier said. “We've been fighting them all year.”
Of course, there are bigger-picture realities that Coach Phillips must consider that have nothing to do with the ACC's postseason basketball performance.
The truth is that the ACC has been left behind and to some extent marginalized from a revenue standpoint due to a bad television contract signed before he became commissioner. Fearing possible departure, the ACC was forced to invite California, Stanford and SMU last fall. Although these schools fit the league's philosophy academically, they are a disaster geographically and contribute little to the competitiveness of football and men's basketball.
If college sports continues its current march toward further consolidation of superconferences and major brands, the ACC could very well be the big loser, though it's not Phillips' fault. That's the reality and everyone knows it.
But at this point, even that is beside the point. Not only does the ACC have a lot to celebrate this weekend, it also has a right to puff its head against critics who thought the league had lost a step in its signature sport all season.
“We're not the only ones who took this game with disdain,” North Carolina State big man DJ Burns said. “That's why we're all fighting together now.”
This is reality. He has only been shut out of the Final Four by the ACC twice in the past decade. During this time he helped three different programs win national titles. This weekend could feature multiple Final Four teams for the third time. Since 2021, the league's conference record is 36 wins and 19 losses, and that record continues.
This level of success makes you wonder why the ACC only received five tournament bids this year, five last year and five the year before.
“If you look at the long history and the short sample size, we need more access than what we're currently receiving, so we have to do something about that,” Phillips said. “Our league is too good to continue like this.”
what will you do? Phillips wonders if the league's 20-game conference schedule worked against the ACC. Before that, the league would routinely get him seven, eight or nine bids. But it's also true that the ACC needs some of its traditional powers like Louisville and Syracuse to perform better.
There are no easy answers.
But beyond the stalemate and awkwardness, the league is doing something right. I don't think our success in this tournament every year is a fluke.
“(ACC) prepared us 100 percent from a physical fitness standpoint,” North Carolina State guard Casey Morsell said. “We've been preparing ourselves for a lot of different things that teams are going to throw at us, whether it's super fast or super slow. That was a big key to adapting.”
It's hard to know what the future holds, so for now at least, Phillips is living in the moment. If you doubt that, just turn on the TV on Saturday and see him sitting behind Los Angeles' scorer's table wearing an orange and white striped tie. This is the color of the school that is currently appealing for withdrawal from the league. . And on any day other than Sunday, he flies back and wears a neutral green tie.
There are no favorites in the current ACC. Ugly politics will eventually have to be sorted out, but for now this is a conference with its back against the wall. Every victory is cause for celebration.
In the ACC, that has never been more important or needed than it is now.
