Florida State and Miami
Since reports came out in the spring that Florida State was not happy with the Atlantic Coast Conference and is contemplating a departure from the league, many assumed Miami was going to tag along with the Seminoles.
It makes sense considering the two have been longtime rivals. However, that does not appear to be the case. Miami was one of the 12 schools that voted "yes" to the additions of Cal, Stanford and SMU to the ACC on Friday.
"I have to give great credit to Commissioner [Jim] Phillips to deal with all the presidents and the presidents' wisdom to be able to move forward with this," Miami Athletic Director Dan Radakovich said during the Hurricanes' win over Miami of Ohio on the ACCN Friday night. "I think this is going to help solidify the conference financially, academically and athletically. I think those all are going to be really good things for the ACC now and into the future as well."
Clemson, FSU and North Carolina were the three institutions that voted "no" to expansion, which Radakovich spined as not an unusual set of circumstances.
"There are so many things that happen within the league that are not unanimous votes," Radakovich said. "It is not unusual for that to happen. Everybody had their thought process. Everybody had an opportunity to say their peace and the way it ended up we were able to bring three quality institutions into the league."
The ACC is expected to make an extra $50 or $60 million annually with the additions of the three new schools. However, how the conference plans to distribute the money has not been completely resolved.
"The performance base is based on success initiative that athletic directors talked a lot about," said Clemson's former athletic director. "The presidents looked at it and said, 'You know what, that is a good idea. Let's look at what those parameters are going to be to have through success initiatives.' We think we are at a point, right now, where we are in a good spot to roll these out very shortly, probably the next time we are going to be together."
The next time the athletic directors in the conference will meet will come in the league's fall meetings.