Report: ESPN, ACC agree to TV extension, potential resolution for Clemson, FSU
The ACC will have their media rights remain right where they are according to the latest on their negotiations with ESPN.
Per David Hale and Andrea Adelson at ESPN, the Atlantic Coast Conference will be ratifying an extension from ESPN for the next decade through 2036 with their current deal currently set to expire in 2027. With that, they also noted the impact this would have on the issues between the league and two of their biggest brands in Clemson and Florida State.
“Sources tell me & @aadelsonESPN that ESPN has picked up its option on the ACC TV deal thru 2036,” Hale tweeted on Thursday. “Additionally the league is working toward a new rev distribution model to reward biggest brands that would keep Clemson & FSU in the fold.”
“ESPN had until Feb. 1 to pick up the option on a 20-year contract signed in 2016 that helped launch the ACC Network,” Hale wrote in his story. “Had ESPN declined, the partnership would have ended after the 2027 season.”
Again, this comes after the media rights deal between the ACC and ESPN was of much discussion last offseason, specifically regarding the Tigers and Seminoles. With this extension, the deal is only around halfway through its span. However, some programs, namely those two, had begun to look for ways out of it due to how the structure of it did not share the revenue of the league to their liking or at least compared to others like the SEC and the Big Ten. That went as far as both sides filing lawsuits amongst and against one another.
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Per sources, though, ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips got this option through “value adds” in the form of future matchups in football and basketball. That includes potentially continuing their connection in ways with Notre Dame in the future.
Hale also broke down what the new proposed revenue model could look like alongside their success initiatives. While it’s nothing official yet, it could now be something that, with this deal continuing for the next decade, be what makes all the courtroom problems eventually go away. It would do so by shrinking the difference to only “a few million (dollars) annually” in revenue for the teams in the ACC to ones in the SEC or Big Ten.
“Under the proposed plan, a percentage of the ACC’s television revenue would be included in a “brand” fund, and that money would then be distributed to schools that annually generate the most revenue for the conference in football and men’s and women’s basketball — with Clemson, Florida State, Miami and North Carolina likely at the top of the pyramid, sources told ESPN,” wrote Hale. “Should that agreement be finalized — something sources said is not imminent but was closely tied to the ESPN option — Clemson and Florida State would be expected to drop their lawsuits.”
The ACC was mostly accepted to remain under contract with their rights at ESPN into the 2030s. Even so, this deal, with much to still make official, could better set the conference up on a better foundation for the future with what this could mean for its schools moving forward.