Report: ACC Mulling Move to Play 10 P4 Games

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - While it remains to be seen how many league games that the Atlantic Coast Conference will play every season moving forward, it appears that they are starting to hone in on specific scheduling shift.

According to both ESPN's Andrea Adelson and David Hale, the ACC is "closing in on a change to its scheduling format that will require all league teams to play at least 10 games against Power 4 competition."

Per Adelson and Hale, league athletic directors are scheduled to meet in Charlotte this upcoming Monday. Here, they will discuss potentially moving to either a nine-game conference slate, or adopting an "8+2" model - where the ACC would stick to their current eight-game conference schedule, but require teams to schedule two additional P4 opponents.

This potential move comes on the heels of the SEC finally announcing last month that they will move to a nine-game schedule, and require league members to have at least one additional P4 team on their schedule. Just hours before the announcement, Yahoo! Sports' Ross Dellenger reported that the ACC "would likely follow suit" if the SEC did wind up pulling the trigger on a nine-game schedule. As it currently stands, the ACC is the only power conference left to make the switch.

While the move to a nine-game slate for the ACC is difficult from a mathematical standpoint, considering the league has 17 members, commissioner Jim Phillips want to try and move forward with this proposal. Per Adelson and Hale, Phillips "wants to see the conference play nine league games annually and require each school to schedule one out-of-conference game against another Power 4 school."

Some coaches and administrators are weary of the potential shift in scheduling dynamic, but Louisville head coach Jeff Brohm is not one of them. Last month, he said that he was "100 percent in favor of moving to nine games, and have been for a while."

"I think college football, in my opinion, should, for the good of the game, try to go to where you're scheduling the best opponents every week," Brohm said. "However many games that is, of course, I've for as many as we possibly can.

"I think it's important to play good competition every week for a lot of reasons. I think it's better for your team, and I think it's more enjoyable for the fans, and I think it's better for the game of football. I hope that that continues to happen. The strength of schedule is something people look at, and we hope to do the same thing, but I'm sure probably we'll get the nine games here soon, as far as in the conference."

In Adelson and Hale's report, Louisville athletic Josh Heird backed up Brohm's sentiment, saying that he's also in favor of playing as many quality opponents as you can.

"Play good teams," Heird said. "We'll play Kentucky every year, and we'll have Notre Dame every once in a while. And we absolutely want to still play the home-and-homes with Georgia and Texas A&M. I think the kids want to play those games, too."

As it currently stands, Louisville's annual rivalry series with Kentucky is on the books until 2030. The Cardinals also have home-and-home series with Georgia (2026, 2027) and Texas A&M (2028, 2029), and have four more meetings with Notre Dame (2030, 2032, 2033, 2035) planned.

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