ACC Championship: No. 9 SMU to face No. 12 Clemson after Syracuse upsets No. 6 Miami
The 2024 ACC Championship is set and in dramatic fashion with No. 6 Miami falling at Syracuse on Saturday. Meanwhile, the SMU Mustangs now know their foe as the Clemson Tigers will head to Charlotte on Dec. 7 to face the Top 10 Mustangs.
Ninth-ranked SMU took care of business against Cal at home Saturday, winning 38-6. The Miami Hurricanes saw their 21-point lead vanish and the Orange come away with the 42-38 victory, crushing dreams of a first-ever ACC Championship game win for Mario Cristobal’s team.
SMU clinched their spot following Week 13, when they 33-7 win at Virginia. They had to wait a bit to find out who their opponent would be, underscoring what an impressive first season in the ACC it was for Rhett Lashlee and SMU. Now, they can cap it off with a conference title.
All the Mustangs have done all year is win every league game. With quarterback Kevin Jennings at the helm, SMU’s undefeated. Clemson has three losses on the year, losing to Top 10 Georgia, Louisville at home and this weekend, South Carolina in heartbreaking fashion.
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SMU senior wideout Roderick Daniels, Jr. likes the Mustangs sitting as an underdog this year. The Mustangs emerged as a College Football Playoff favorite with a run of wins after losing to BYU back in September.
“It’s kind of better when you’re the underdog,” he said after SMU’s win at Virginia. “Like, you’re not expected to play perfect or have good games. Since we was ranked like real low, we didn’t have like nothing to show for. We just came out and played every week cuz we weren’t supposed to be there anyways. Like in neither game they thought we was gonna win. So we came out, we played good, and we just pulled people along every week. And as the season started going, they started seeing what was a threat, and now they see what’s going on.”
This season’s iteration of ACC Championship will mark No. 20 for the ACC Football Championship Game. The event will kick off at 8 p.m. ET on ABC. It’ll be broadcasted from Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina.
