ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips said the conference wanted to be "very transparent about what we were doing" and "inclusive" as it related to their move from Greensboro to Charlotte. Phillips, speaking yesterday during SBJ’s Intercollegiate Athletics Forum, presented by LEARFIELD, said to do that they had to "talk to all the schools, talk to every member of the staff of the ACC, talk to presidents." They then formulated a "group that would go along and visit cities," with 15 or 16 that they considered, "including staying in Greensboro.” Phillips said Charlotte has "done a great job of hosting a lot of championships" for the ACC. Though Greensboro had been the home of the ACC since its inception, the conference has "grown from the initial seven ... to today and now 15 institutions that go up and down the Eastern Sea line," meaning the conference "needed to do an assessment." As for the ACC keeping a presence in Greensboro, Phillips said they will "still have some tournaments there, swimming and diving." Phillips: "They have one of the nicest natatoriums in the country, the host national championships, not only ACC championships, golf, tennis, so we will still have a presence in the city of Greensboro.”
MEDIA MATTERS: Phillips said the "first order of business" when he took the role was around the conference's network. He said, "I heard great angst about our network in the sense that we had the network, but they couldn't get it in their market. They couldn't get it on their campus." Phillips noted there were millions of home the ACC Network was not in, but other conference networks were. So the conference last December was struck a deal with Comcast to carry the ACC Network. Phillips said the carriage deal brings in "significant revenue" which "will be a really good boost." He added they are "trending in the right direction" and "closing that gap" with other conference's media deals.
Quick Hits:
- On CFP expansion: “I'm excited mostly for student athletes. When you think about all the championships that we host in the NCAA, it's about access and opportunity to those championships. And no sport had fewer access and opportunities than the sport of, of college football.”
- On possible further expansion by the ACC: “We're always looking, we're always assessing our institutions and assessing if there are moves that would benefit the ACC long term. And I think what we all understand bigger does not necessarily mean better.”
