Perception vs Reality: ACC Championship Game

 I'm starting a new series of posts that look at common arguments across college football and weigh in on how accurate they truly are. And in many cases, we'll see that perception does not always equal reality!

I'll start out with the conference that's closes to me: the ACC. It's been thrown around that Divisions ought to be scrapped because the Atlantic Division is too strong, while the Coastal Division is so weak.

Now, there are plenty of good arguments to scrap Divisions and just use a "Top 2" like we saw during the special circumstances of 2020. But is the "weak Coastal" really the lynchpin of the argument?  Let's see.

Division Head-to-Head

There are several ways to take this argument. First, let's look at the Head-to-Head between the two Divisions each year from 2010-2019 (an even 10-year number).

These come straight from the 2020 ACC Media Guide. Since the 2020 season didn't feature Divisions, these numbers should still be accurate. 

2010: Atlantic wins 10-8 (12 teams playing 3 crossover games)
2011: tied 9-9
2012: tied 9-9
2013: tied 7-7 (14 teams playing 2 crossover games)
2014: tied 7-7
2015: Coastal wins 10-4
2016: Atlantic wins 8-6
2017: Atlantic wins 9-5
2018: Atlantic wins 8-6
2019: tied 7-7 

Note that these do NOT include the result of the ACC Championship Game, nor does it include the 2019 non-conference game between UNC and Wake.

During this run, the Atlantic won 4 times, the Coastal once, and the two divisions tied 5 times. 

So if this is someone's argument they like to use to justify "weak Coastal Division", then this may help. Alternatively, this may be more of a justification to reconfigure divisions than it is to scrap them.

Second Best Team

Another argument is that we've been denied a number of quality matchups due to the Coastal Champ being deemed as "weak".  The question is: what IS that number?

Using the standings from each of the past 10 Divisional seasons (again 2010-19), here are the Top 2 teams according to conference record, ignoring divisions.

2010: 1 Virginia Tech (8-0); 2 Florida State (6-2). No change to ACC CG.
2011: 1 Virginia Tech (7-1); 2 Clemson (6-2). No change to  ACC CG.
2012: 1 Florida State (7-1); 2 Clemson (7-1). The only eligible Coastal tri-champ was Georgia Tech at 5-3.
2013: 1 Florida State (8-0); 2 Clemson (7-1). The Coastal Champ was Duke at 6-2.
2014: 1 Florida State (8-0); 2 Georgia Tech (6-2). No change to ACC CG. Clemson was also 6-2 but with a H2H loss to GA Tech.
2015: 1 Clemson (8-0); 2 UNC (8-0). No change to ACC CG.
2016: 1 Clemson (7-1); 2 Louisville (7-1). The Coastal Champ was Virginia Tech at 5-3.
2017: 1 Clemson (7-1); 2 Miami (7-1). No change to ACC CG.
2018: 1 Clemson (8-0); 2 Pittsburgh (6-2). No change to ACC CG. Syracuse was also 6-2 but with a H2H loss to Pitt.
2019: 1 Clemson (8-0); 2 Virginia (6-2). No change to ACC CG.

While a "top 2 to the ACC CG" format would include different schedules - rather than adhering to the division-based schedule - it's actually a 7-3 lean toward the Top 2 teams representing in the ACC CG even with divisions based on the schedules that were played during that time. 

This was probably a bigger concern around 2013, when this happened for the 2nd year in a row. But now, the bigger problem seems to be getting a strong 2nd-best team regardless of Division.  The mid-2010s gave us a nice run, while Clemson was nearing its peak and FSU was experiencing great heights. Surprise seasons by 2015 UNC and 2017 Miami also helped the cause. The key is getting a return to those days, and away from "Clemson and the Dwarves."

Of the three years where there was a discrepancy, one of them (2013) featured a 1-win difference between the two teams, making it somewhat forgivable. And yes, Duke got blown out by FSU, while Clemson's next game ended up being a terrific win against Ohio State in the Orange Bowl. But then again, everyone besides Auburn got blown out by FSU! 

And of the two years (2012, 2016) that featured more than a 1-win difference between the Coastal Champ and the 2nd-place Atlantic team, only in the former was it a clear-cut case of a superior Atlantic Division runner-up (in actuality, a co-champ that was on the losing end of a H2H). Call me biased, but in 2016, I'm just not seeing a down-trending Louisville team that just lost to Houston and Kentucky performing better in a rematch against Clemson than VT did in their 7-point loss. So even though the Cardinals were 2 games better in conference play than the Hokies, I'm just not seeing that as "egregious" as the 2012 situation.

ACC CG Winner

As alluded to earlier, Clemson has had a monopoly on winning the the ACC CG (6 in a row, including the last 5 matchups of Division Champs). And before that, FSU won 3. And before that, Clemson won another one! Without a Coastal Champ winning the ACC CG since 2010, it's easy to call the Coastal weak. But is this really a reason to remove Divisions? 

The Coastal Champ won 4 in a row from 2007-10, and was favored in the 2005, 2006 and 2011 matchups. So it's not like they "didn't belong."  And while the winner has been a bit streaky, let's also consider that the Atlantic Champs since 2013 have all been national title contenders. 

Conclusion

As I mentioned at the top, there are certainly reasons to consider a Divisionless "Top 2" scheduling format:

• Greater scheduling flexibility,
• Opportunities to play other conference teams sooner, and
• Opportunities for more teams to stay in the ACC CG chase longer

And yes, it does increase the chance of seeing a quality matchup. But if that's the entirety of the argument to make such a switch, then the facts certainly leave enough room open for debate. What's not debatable, however, is that for any future Championship Game to be of greater quality, the ACC ultimately needs to STEP UP!