How Travel Will Work In The Newly Expanded ACC

The discussions unfortunately run on parallel tracks. On the one hand we have sober, heartfelt discussion and analysis of athletes’ welfare, from mental health to enduring bodily harm to compromised academic opportunity. On the other we have the competitions themselves and the financial and strategic decisions that shape participation.

Surely no one will argue that a flight lasting at least five and a half hours within pinched quarters is physically optimal for a young athlete, especially the larger ones who tend to play college basketball. But that’s what university decisionmakers in the ACC decreed in adding Cal, Southern Methodist and Stanford, schools located west of the Mississippi River sharing little in the way of history or tradition with the existing base of conference universities.

Of course no plebiscite was held to see what fans or even athletes thought of the idea. Money decided, and here we are in the first year of transcontinental league play. As the season unfolds, look for advantages and handicaps among those who make the flights and those who host them.

To their credit, those who crafted ACC men’s schedules, led by Senior Associate Commissioner Paul Brazeau in concert with the league’s TV partners, built in down time upon arrival for teams traveling cross-country.

Most of the time, although we’re assured separate squads don’t share a single charter flight, Bay Area schools Cal and Stanford do travel east more or less in tandem. They host Eastern visitors in a similar manner.

For instance, Cal starts the 2025 calendar year at Pitt and plays at Clemson three games later, while Stanford mirrors that itinerary at Clemson and then Pitt.

Among the fledglings, Cal undertakes a pair of three-game road trips, the second starting on Feb.12 at Duke. As January bleeds into February, Stanford plays five of six ACC games at home at Maples Pavilion. SMU undertakes no road trips, in or beyond the ACC, that last more than two games.

SMU has 18 games at Dallas’ Moody Coliseum, reputedly an especially tough venue to visit. Duke stops by on Jan. 4. North Carolina doesn’t play at Moody at all this season. The Mustangs don’t visit Cameron in 2025 but do go to Chapel Hill.

Among the other top third (six of 18) in the notorious hit-and-miss preseason poll of ACC media members, Wake plays Stanford home-and-home and Virginia similarly shares visits with SMU.

All three new schools play home and home.