Greg McElroy believes ACC is on 'solid footing' with Clemson, Florida State after ESPN option

ESPN picked up its option to maintain its television rights for the ACC through the 2036 season last week. It is a move that ESPN college football analyst Greg McElroy believes will benefit the conference and the network.

McElroy recently explained on the Always College Football podcast why he expects Clemson and Florida State to remain in the league moving forward. The two schools had been suing the ACC to get out of the conference.

“This now allows things to calm down a little bit with Clemson and Florida State. I look at the ACC Grant of Rights and Clemson and Florida State have been publicly challenging that. I think now, at this point, they’re at least on solid footing until 2031 at the very earliest,” McElroy said.

“I don’t anticipate any immediate exits. I don’t anticipate Florida State or Clemson continuing this on. I don’t think North Carolina’s going anywhere. I look at all of this, I think everything’s going to be just fine. So this is really good.”

The ACC is moving to a new revenue distribution model that will benefit teams that perform the best. That would help Clemson and Florida State if they continue to perform well after they won the past two ACC football titles.

It could also provide an incentive for those schools to want to remain in the ACC.

“What I’m also excited about is the possibility of a new revenue distribution model that will kind of alleviate some of the problems for the financial disparities that the ACC has relative to the Big Ten and SEC,” McElroy said.

“They are proposing a brand fund, which is going to allocate a percentage of the television revenue. And they’re going to give it to the programs that are generating the most value. So last year it would have been Clemson. The year before it would’ve been Florida State. Miami will always be in the mix there, North Carolina would be in the mix there. Those are the programs you would expect to benefit most from this success-driven initiative, which I think that makes sense. Hey, you win you get a bigger piece of the pie. It makes sense to me.”

Finally, the ACC and Notre Dame could look to play more high-profile games as part of the TV extension. Notre Dame plays five games against ACC teams annually in football, in addition to being in the league in other sports.

ESPN could provide the ACC more money by having the Fighting Irish play Clemson, Florida State or Miami more often moving forward.

“I think the ACC is exploring more ways to create matchups for Notre Dame. They might play against ACC teams at the top more frequently,” McElroy said. “So we could see more Notre Dame at Clemson, Notre Dame at Miami, Miami at Notre Dame, North Carolina at Notre Dame. We could see more games like that, which is beneficial to not just the ACC but Notre Dame as well.

“So I like where this is heading. I think it’s the right move for ESPN. I think it’s a good move for the ACC, too, to kind of calm down some of the chaos that has been felt, at least publicly the last couple of years.”