Mack Brown addresses rumors, meetings surrounding ACC

Revenue was a big topic of discussion at ACC meetings this year, as some of the conference’s top teams attempted to receive more revenue compared to others in order to bridge the gap between themselves and teams of the Big Ten and ACC conference. A success incentive initiative was put in place that will reward teams with more revenue based on their performance, but the conference’s TV terms will remain same.

North Carolina head coach Mack Brown was asked about these discussions at ACC meetings, specifically detailing the impact of ACC scheduling on revenue.

“They didn’t get into ‘don’t play schools from certain leagues’, but absolutely for us to get more money, more TV money, we all need to play a tougher schedule to be able to draw interest from the network to pay more money for it,” Brown said. “I think we’re playing a Big Ten team, and an SEC team, and a huge game in this state with Appalachian our first three games. So we’re doing that.”

It’s no secret that more exciting matchups generate larger audiences which generate more money, an issue that the ACC has been struggling with for a while. The conference has lacked parity for quite some time, with only three teams winning the conference title in the last decade (Clemson leading the way with 7 ACC titles), but Brown and the Tar Heels are doing their best to generate attention for his team in the conference with games versus South Carolina, Appalachian State, and Minnesota to start off the 2023 season.

“And I do think that matters to everybody, and everybody in there was told, you want more money pick it up. And we’ve all been told we’ve got to do a better job of selling our league with football. I mean some other leagues sell theirs better than we do, so we’ve got to constantly push football and how important it is,” Brown said.

The balance of scheduling big-name, revenue-generating, non-conference opponents versus avoiding those opponents in order to ensure a good record is one that every program deals with. But as the ACC attempts to keep pace with the SEC and Big Ten in the revenue space, scheduling and winning those box office games is more important than ever for the conference.

“And then also, we need to win these out-of-conference games,” Brown said. “It matters because it’s important to all of us and that’s why it’s foolish when ACC schools fight with each other because we’re all trying to make this thing work, and that was a big part of our discussion.”