PITTSBURGH — Atlantic Coast Conference commissioner Jim Phillips knows his league is on uncertain footing when it comes to getting multiple bids to the College Football Playoff, particularly after several league teams that are ranked stumbled in recent games.
He’s also quick to point out there’s still time for the ACC to hit that goal all the same.
“I’m not dejected. I’m not despondent or any of those types of things,” Phillips said in an interview with The Associated Press on Saturday after he watched No. 23 Pittsburgh, an ACC member, lose in lopsided fashion at home to No. 9 Notre Dame, a independent in football but an ACC member for other sports.
“You always want to win more games and the rest of it,” Phillips added. “But we still have games to be played against really good opponents.”
The AP shadowed him during his trip to watch the Panthers host the Fighting Irish, an example of the type of mid-November contest carrying CFP implications for a league with five AP Top 25 teams — yet no clear headliner. That means the league has multiple candidates for the playoff after entering the weekend with five teams with just one loss league play, yet no one locked into the playoff without reaching the ACC title game and taking the trophy.
The top five conference champions in the CFP rankings have a guaranteed berth in the 12-team bracket.
The Notre Dame-Pitt matchup was also the kind of game that illustrates why Phillips maintains optimism considering there are so many moving parts in play.
For example: While the Panthers, who were No. 22 in the CFP selection committee’s most recent rankings, lost ground with the loss while falling to 7-3 overall, that only strengthens the case for the Fighting Irish (8-2), who were also ninth in the CFP rankings. Which in turn would aid ACC member Miami (8-2), which is 16th in the AP rankings and 15th in the CFP rankings, by keeping the Hurricanes’ season-opening home win against the Irish as a standout victory.
Phillips, who watched Saturday from the sideline sporting a gold-and-blue tie in tribute to Pitt’s colors, can only point to what’s ahead. The message is as simple: Multiple ACC teams still control their own destiny.
“I haven’t seen a week go by in college football that if you don’t win, you don’t move up,” Phillips said. “Maybe not drastically, but the idea is you have to continue to win. And if you continue to win, you have a strong possibility that you are going to move up within the rankings.”
Still, it has been a strange year for the ACC with unexpected highs and high-profile flops.
Preseason favorite Clemson opened the year ranked No. 4 nationally but has been working in recent weeks just to become bowl eligible. Florida State looked to have regrouped from last year’s two-win disaster with a season-opening statement win against traditional national and Southeastern Conference power Alabama, only to start 0-4 in the ACC on the way to extending the 2024 misery.
In the meantime, Miami peaked at No. 2, Georgia Tech reached No. 8 while starting 8-0, and Virginia hit No. 12 after starting 5-0 in ACC play despite being picked to finish 14th in the 17-team football league.
And yet, the Hurricanes and Yellow Jackets both stumbled on Nov. 1, with Miami suffering its second loss at SMU and Georgia Tech falling at North Carolina State. Virginia lost at home to Wake Forest last weekend before regrouping to win at Duke on Saturday. And No. 20 Louisville has lost consecutive home games to California and then Friday against Clemson after a 7-1 start that put the Cardinals in the chase.
It very nearly got worse, too. Georgia Tech survived Saturday on a last-minute field goal against one-win Boston College.
“The league itself has played good football all year,” Phillips said. “We’ve suffered some from maybe not being as consistent from week to week. But we’ve also cannibalized ourselves some as well within the league. I think every league goes through that. It just seems like that’s happened more to us recently, over the last three weeks.”
Phillips has ACC staff gather weekly notes and details on team resumes to share with the CFP committee and make the league’s case. There will be more to track, too. Notably, Miami — which rolled past N.C. State on Saturday — still visits Pitt. The Panthers visit Georgia Tech next weekend. And the Yellow Jackets have their nonconference rivalry game against fifth-ranked Georgia from the SEC, too.
And Phillips can look back to last year’s results for hope. Clemson sneaked into the ACC title game when Miami blew a 21-0 loss at Syracuse in a loss that ultimately kept the Hurricanes out of the CFP. The Tigers edged SMU for the ACC title to reach the play, while the Mustangs made the ACC a two-bid league.
“I’m still hopeful that we’ll be a multiple-bid league,” Phillips said. “There’s nothing that says that we’re eliminated from that. There’s football not only to be played in the ACC, but throughout the country.”