n 1953, Duke was one of the key players in the creation of the Atlantic Coast Conference, and big-time football was one of the driving forces.

Fifty years later, the ACC appears on the verge of the biggest change since its inception, poised to bring in at least two, and perhaps as many as four, new members. Once again, big-time football is playing an important role.

This time, Duke is decidedly less enthusiastic. When the ACC decided to pursue the possibility of expansion, the vote was 7-2, with Duke and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill casting the only “no” votes. Later, when a vote to extend invitations to Boston College, Syracuse University, and the University of Miami seemed imminent, Duke president Nannerl O. Keohane sent out an e-mail message—subsequently leaked to the Associated Press—to the other presidents and chancellors in the league, urging caution. She expressed concerns about student-athlete welfare, about how universities would be aligned in divisions, and about the lawsuit that the Big East Conference—where Miami and Syracuse and Boston College were members—was filing against the Atlantic Coast Conference.

“ We are being charged with acting in bad faith by colleagues at other Big East universities,” Keohane wrote. “In order to feel even minimally comfortable with voting for an action that will have serious consequences for these peer institutions, I would have to be considerably more positive than I am now that the decision is actually the best one for our student athletes and for our conference.”

In a statement released on June 10 by the executive committee of the Academic Council, the faculty echoed Keohane’s sentiments: “The trend toward ‘super-conferences’…

threatens to create athletic programs that cannot be effectively governed by a reasonable coalition of faculty, administrators, and athletic department representatives, and thereby puts the educational experience of students at risk.” Despite Duke’s strong reservations, the ACC voted in late June to invite Miami and Virginia Tech to join the league, again by a 7-2 vote. After the two universities accepted, swelling the conference ranks to eleven institutions, Keohane issued another statement, welcoming the new league members but reiterating the reasons that Duke opposed expanding the conference.

“ Our issues have always focused on student-athlete welfare, including travel time and complex scheduling logistics, and on the preservation of traditional rivalries and competitive equity within the conference,” Keohane said. “We have not been convinced that the financial arguments in favor of expansion are based on sound predictions; but financial arguments were never our main issue.”

In truth, financial issues—the big-time money of big-time football—played a central role in bringing Miami and Virginia Tech into the league. Expansion proponents pointed out that if Miami joined the ACC, the conference would instantly gain more national credibility in football. If at least one more school joins the ACC in the future—the University of Notre Dame and Pennsylvania State University have been mentioned as possibilities—the league could split into divisions and hold a potentially lucrative conference championship in football.

As a conference member, Duke would share equally in any television contracts or bowl-game payouts derived from ACC expansion. But the expansion makes the football program’s bid to return to a competitive state that much harder. Miami is a national power, on the order of Florida State. Virginia Tech has also become a successful program in recent years, even playing in the national championship game in January 2000.

Duke coach Carl Franks ’83 pointed out that part of the Blue Devils’ recent football troubles can be traced to Florida State’s entrance into the ACC and the accompanying race to catch up to the Seminoles. Miami’s entry could create a similar effect. Both the Big 12 and the Southeastern Conferences have experienced great success among their top teams since they expanded, in 1994 and 1991, respectively. But in each conference, one university has been left far behind—Baylor in the Big 12 and Vanderbilt in the SEC. The Blue Devils’ improvement plan would have to start yielding significant results soon in order to avoid a similar fate in a newer, bigger, more competitive world of ACC football.

ACC expansion proponents appear to be intent on increasing membership to twelve teams, the number required by the NCAA in order to hold a conference championship game in football. If that comes to fruition, any hypothetical discussion of Duke’s dropping out of the ACC in football would become academic: Duke’s membership would be a necessity.

— Jim Young