Why ACC commissioner Jim Phillips feels ‘really good’ about Notre Dame football joining ACC

ACC commissioner Jim Phillips is not giving up on Notre Dame. He spoke glowingly, once again, of the Fighting Irish at ACC Kickoff Wednesday morning.

He made his stance on Notre Dame’s future as it relates to conference realignment very clear.

“If there comes a time that Notre Dame would consider moving to a conference away from independence, I feel really good about it being the ACC,” Phillips said.

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The recent move of USC and UCLA from the Pac-12 to the Big Ten has opened conversations about how much Big Ten member schools will make monetarily from an upcoming TV rights deal. The answer? Much more than the ACC doles out to its institutions.

Reports have ballparked the Big Ten’s upcoming deal to be worth $70 to $80 million per school. During the 2020-21 academic year, ACC members made just a smidge under $40 million. Notre Dame, meanwhile, reportedly brings in $15 million per year from NBC and $10 million annually as a partial member of the ACC.

The Irish would stand to make more than they’re earning now if they joined the ACC full-time. But they’d make even more in the Big Ten — potentially even twice as much. So if it’s about the money (and even in Notre Dame’s case, it is, according to a recent CBS Sports report indicating the Irish are asking NBC for $75 million in a renegotiated TV rights deal) then why would it make any sense for Notre Dame to join the ACC instead of the Big Ten?

Per Phillips, it’s because the ACC isn’t done making moves of its own.

Phillips understands that if his conference is to remain powerful in an ever-changing college athletics landscape, it has to adapt. He said “all options are on the table” in making sure the ACC does not lose status as one of the nation’s premier conferences. Expansion? Maybe. But more importantly, evolution. The ACC has to hold onto its current members first. Then it has to think about what it can do with them to be more profitable than before.

“We are one of the leaders in the country in all areas except the revenue piece of it,” Phillips said. “That’s been brought to light with the recent move of USC and UCLA to the Big Ten. A year ago, we were talking about the same thing. So, truly, over the last 18 months it’s been my primary focus.”

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Phillips said the ACC engages with ESPN daily on the topic of the conference’s TV rights deal, which at the moment strings through June 30, 2036. That’s a long way off, especially considering how rapidly change takes place in the market.

ACC member schools’ hands are tied; any revenue an ACC program is due from the current contract belongs to the conference through 2036, even if that program departs for another league. That might have much to do with why Phillips said multiple times Wednesday he’s confident all current members of the ACC will be around for the foreseeable future.

He said they’re bought in on the ACC’s agenda, too.

Is Notre Dame bought in on the ACC’s future, and would the Irish ever want to be a part of it? Phillips, Notre Dame’s senior associate director of athletics for external affairs from 2000-04 and the father of a Notre Dame track and field athlete, isn’t ever going to rule it out.

“We continue to remain close with Notre Dame,” Phillips said. “They know how we feel. They know that we would love to have them as a football member in the conference. But I also respect their independence having worked there and having two children there going to school right now, one a student-athlete. I know what independence means to Notre Dame, so you respect it.”

Read between the lines. If the ACC can’t have Notre Dame, Phillips doesn’t want any other conference to have the Irish either. He’ll respect independence so long as it means Notre Dame is not in the Big Ten. College athletics is a chess board at the moment. Some programs are pawns, while others have the maneuverability of a queen.

There are plenty of pawns in the ACC. Phillips is actively courting a queen. Her name is Notre Dame.