College Football Online - 9/13/12

Random bits from the interwebs...

#1: 
Notre Dame joins the ACC, except in football. This Ivan Maisel piece summarizes the deal and the history pretty well.  Both sides say it doesn't mean ND eventually joins for football, but no one is really buying that.

There are many pieces to this puzzle to keep in mind:
-the NBC tv deal.  NBC needs every decent sports property they can get, for both the main network (lagging in 4th place), and it's sports channel.  The deal is up for renewal in 2015, which is the same year that Notre Dame can leave the Big East if they abide by the full 27 month notice.
-a 16th team.  The ACC is at a size where it needs an even number of teams in football.  This gives them time to look for one other team.  Plus, this is the first time the ACC has allowed someone to join but not be all in.
-5 ND vs. ACC games per year.  Could this affect the ACC's 9 game conference schedule proposal?  Meanwhile, ND is one school that seems to care about it's long rivalries - which includes USC, Navy, Michigan, and Michigan State.  If ND joins the conference, it won't be able to schedule any other games, and might have to lose one of those.
-playoffs.  2014 changes everything.

#2:
Florida Atlantic will be the Savannah State of the next two weeks.  Or not quite.  FAU is not an FCS school.  Instead, they are a poor Sun Belt school.  In fact, I'm not really sure if there should be an outrage, since the primary reason for the Sun Belt's existence is for the SEC to schedule a second cupcake without resorting to a second FCS school.  And in this case, they are playing Georgia and Alabama back to back.

#3:
The Pac-12 Commissioner has the exact same opinion I have about the Coaches Poll.  I've long said that Frank Beamer (for example) only cares about 13 teams a year (and usually one of them is an FCS team).  Sometimes 14 or 15, depending on how the postseason goes.  Yet, this is one of the polls that still counts for the BCS.