Locked On ACC - Daily College Football & Basketball Podcast - SNUBBED: Duce Robinson and Malachi Toney HEADLINE Phil Steele’s All-America Teams—ACC REACTS

Episode Date: June 30, 2026

ACC football’s star power shifts as only two players—Malachi Toney (Miami) and Duce Robinson (Florida State)—crack Phil Steele’s Preseason All-America First Team. Are the days of the “Conference of Quarterbacks” over, with running backs and wide receivers now stealing the spotlight? Alex Donno and Kenton Gibbs debate whether ACC’s limited national recognition signals a talent gap or just a perception problem. Key topics include Oregon and Texas’ championship prospects, Notre Dame’s playoff mentality, and the rise of powerhouse ACC tailbacks like Mark Fletcher (Miami), Isaac Brown (Louisville), Justice Haynes (Georgia Tech), and Nate Shepard (Duke). Can any team claim a legitimate path to a national title? Don’t miss the deep dive into roster turnover, explosive offenses, and whether the ACC can finally reclaim its reputation on college football’s biggest stage. Everydayer ClubIf you never miss an episode, it’s time to make it official. Join the Locked On Everydayer Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord, and more — all built for our most loyal fans. Click here to learn more and join your team’s community: https://lockedonpodcasts.com/everydayerclub   Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! FanDuel Today's episode is brought to you by FanDuel. From the opening whistle to the final kick, Let There Be Goals on FanDuel.Visithttps://FANDUEL.COMto get started now.   FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You're looking for preseason All-American love? You've come to the wrong place. You are Locked-on ACCC, your daily podcast on the Atlantic Coast Conference. Part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. He is Kenton Gibbs from Locked-on Wolfpack. I'm Alex Dono from Locked on Cain's. And on this episode of Locked on ACC, you know, they used to call the ACC the conference of quarterbacks.

but I've noticed this year, Kenton, it might be the conference of running backs, and we shall explain. Or maybe it's the conference of wide receivers once we get to what we're about to talk about. And that's the Phil Steele preseason All-America teams, Kenton. I was going down these today. I've got the Phil Steel magazine, which is very exciting. I've been reading it for like 20 years or however long it's been. And I'm looking at preseason All-America, Kenton. And Phil only has two ACC players on the first team offense, defense combined.

They're both on the offensive side of the football. You want to venture a guess as to one of those who may be on that first team All-America. Give me, you said this isn't a quarterback league, so that takes out Mintsa. Give me your boy, Malachi, Tony. Bingo, you got one. And I think you probably wouldn't guess the other one, but maybe if you really really, thought about it, you would, but we don't have all day. So I'll help you with it. And also, like, I noticed that, because I was like, you know, reading online some of this stuff,

but I have the actual Phil Steel magazine. And for some reason, the internet claims that this other guy didn't make first team, but it's like, I've got the magazine and he's in there. So I'm going to assume the internet is wrong. Duce, Deuce Robinson, wide receiver from Florida State is the only other first team All-American, which, you know what? I told you probably wouldn't have guessed it, but after hearing it, you're like, okay, that tracks. Duce is a phenomenal player. Absolutely.

I mean, Duce Robinson, it's rare to say this. He was a wide receiver that carried that offense last year. But there were good times in games where it was like, if Duce don't get it done, it won't get done. Okay. That's just what we're looking at right now. So to see Deuce Robinson named a first team All-American, that's a heck of a shout-out. You know, you can make your arguments one way or another, but what you cannot argue is his impact when he's on the field, the gravity that he has.

The way defenses adjust to that's a big fellow, tall, light-skinned, go get him. Safety, roll over the top, corner, stay underneath. We need him all more brackets than March Madness when you're talking. about Deuce Robinson and how you cover. So the reality is you're looking at an excellent player in his own right. And I'm going to tell you, you know, when you look at the totality, the whole body of work that he put up, it was phenomenal. Was there a game or two here and there that was down?

Sure. But the majority of the season was spent with him taking it off the top of cornerbacks heads. Yeah. So the ACC actually has two of the three first team preseason All-America receivers. I'm sure you can probably figure out who the third is. Is he from Ohio State, perhaps? Yeah, a fellow who wears the number four. Perhaps you and him may have gotten into a spat on Twitter, perhaps, me think?

Yeah, man. I still haven't forgiven him for disrespecting the disrespectful post that I made about him. How dare he come back of me? Absolutely. How dare you clap back at the Alex Dono of Dono's donuts? Don't you ever, okay? Oh, man. So let me give you Phil's first team offense. Dante Moore, quarterback of Oregon, is the one that he went with. Which, man, I'm not going to argue it. I'm just glad he didn't go with Arch. I'll say that.

Arch made second team quarterback. The running backs are Ahmad Hardy, Mizzou, Kiwan Lacey, Ole Miss. I already told you the receivers, tight end, Terrence Carter from Texas Tech, center, Drew Bobo, out of George. Georgia, the guards, Greg Johnson, Minnesota, Cade, Piper, Iowa. Offensive tackles are Trevor Goosby, Texas, Carter Smith, Indiana. First team defense where nobody from the ACC got onto this list. Defensive ends, Anthony Smith from Minnesota, Colin Simmons from Texas, defensive tackles, David Stone from Oklahoma, Amari, Washington, Oregon, linebackers, Kip Lewis, Oklahoma, Raylan Wilson, Georgia, Rashim Biles.

Texas, Isaiah Jones, Indiana, cornerbacks, Zabian Brown, Bama, Leonard Moore, Notre Dame, safeties, KJ Bolden, now at Georgia, and Coy Perich of Oregon. So, you know, again, I don't know, you know, only having two guys on first team, all ACC. Is that more a reflection of the conference itself or the way the conference itself is perceived, I think is the big question? The conference itself in this instance, because a lot of the guys that you just, named are former ACC players. Or let me not say a lot.

The few of the guys you just named are former ACC. Yeah, yeah. Biles was not developed in Austin. Nope. He was not a five star going in the pit. He was not thought of as like, hey, he's going to be first team All-American in a couple years coming in to pit. Now leaving our dudes in company, he goes and gets himself a bigger check, you know,

because Sark said that they're a team of substance and not about to flash, even though we've all seen their recruiting visits and the line of Maseratis that you see coming in or the line of supercars coming in. But, hey, at the end of the day, in the words of young Miami, spend that stuff, okay? They do the money? Spend it.

Spend it. You got to spend, spend. Spend. Obviously, Pitt couldn't keep up with the spending over Texas, and you live with that. You live with that. You go on from there. But, I mean, you know, you talk about what is the ACC

is it perception, is it reality? The reality is we lose more of our all-conference players every year than virtually in the other conference. It's us in Texas or us and the Big 12. Right. Whenever our guys are all-conference, here comes the SEC and the Big Ten. Say, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.

I know you're tired of crying in that Honda over there. Come on over here. Come on over here. Crying this bends. Crying this bent, okay? You know, let's make it so that you get a bigger check if you got to deal with two a days and weighted sled pushes and whatnot. Come on.

And by the way, I heard they got rid of two of days recently, which blew my mind. I said, you didn't know that? Yeah, I, very,

very recent development for me. I said, wait, what do they do during camp if they don't have two of days? And, you know, it's a very different camp schedule, apparently.

And I was shocked and appalled. But so they still had those when you played because I wasn't sure when they, I wasn't sure when they got rid of those, but it's been a minute. So yeah, it's a little behind on that one. It's been a while. I'm the old guy screaming at the cloud back in my day.

But in all seriousness, you know, I look at this and I say, this is one of the few times I won't say it's perception as the reality of the ACC. And the reality is we can't afford to keep our best players right now. So what do you do? What do you do? Do you reallocate the resources? Do you find a way to work it out? I mean, Miami seems to be doing just fine.

NC State is bad luck, Brian, over here. The richest guy in the state of North Carolina is an NC state guy. he's just like not spending on sports. Not going to do it. Not going to do it. Meanwhile, the mega boosts from every other state are, you're not spending on sports? Oh, no.

How unfortunate. Hello, young child from North Carolina who runs a 4-4. We've got money for you that they don't. So, you know, it's just one of those things where if you can't afford to keep the top guys, it's going to read on their byline, Rishin Biles, Texas, even though we all know he came in as a three-star guy and developed into that or four-star, I believe it was a three-star and developed into that. Yeah, yeah, that's right.

Well, when we come back, I want to get your take Kenton on legitimate contenders, whether it's ACC or not, legitimate contenders to win a national title this year, because I feel like there maybe are some that get a lot of love that might be pretenders. And then, of course, we got to talk about the running back situation in the ACC, because whatever this conference may lack in certain other areas, this is going to be a great year for ACC tailbacks. You want to keep it locked right here. only getting started on this brand new episode. My friends, we're only getting started with Fanduil because the biggest stage in world soccer

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You can join the club and make your status official. Whether it's the Everydayer Club for us here on Lockedon, ACC for Locked on Wolfpack with Kenton and Grayson for Locked on Cains with me and any of the other literally hundreds of shows on this network go to Lockdown Podcast.com slash Everydayer sign up for the Everydayer Club try it free for a week you get ad free versions of these episodes discord chat access and a lot of other great features go to locked on podcast.com slash every day or today thank you for making locked on acc your first listen all right so kenton i'm going to need you to arbitrate on this because, you know, as a Miami guy, we go back and forth with Oregon people a lot, right?

Oregon people seem to think that, you know, Mario Cristobal was this, you know, terrible thing that happened to them. And Dan Lanning is some kind of a savior when they haven't won anything more with Lanning than they did with Christobal. And Christobal just got farther with Miami than Lanning has with Oregon. So a lot of times we have this quarrel, like Oregon fans and Miami fans are all. always going back and forth about each other's coaches. It's just a thing. So I need your independent arbitration on this. For sure. Because, you know, the Oregon Ducks are getting

a lot of love. I mean, a lot of those names I mentioned, first team preseason All America or Oregon Ducks, including their quarterback. You look at every preseason poll and Oregon is prominently featured in most of them, top five, if not number one, in some of them, right? although usually when they face like a legitimate opponent in the playoffs, it tends to not be close in the Dan Lanning era. So, I mean, what's your take on this season? Where do you rank Oregon among legit contenders to win a title? Here's the thing.

I've made the criticism of Mario Cristobal multiple times that, you know, I view him as a guy that by and large have been born on third base in terms of the jobs that he's got. I can't view him as a guy who's been born on third base. And then say of Dan Lanning, he got it out the mud. going from being Georgia's defensive coordinator. We know the lowly Georgia Bulldogs, Donald. They ain't never pissed a drop before Dan Lannning was there,

up to being Oregon's head coach, which, I mean, let's be honest. You or I could coach Oregon to eight wins a year. Eight. Easily. And you and I have a combined zero minutes of college football coaching experience, you know, let alone somebody who's coached in a much lesser capacity who just knows how to operate in things,

they can do that. So do I view Oregon as a real contender. Real contender to win a national championship? No. Real contender to win the Big Ten, maybe make a little noise in the playoffs. Yeah, sure, sure. I can see that for them.

I will say the pickup, or should I say the theft of Corey Parrish from Minnesota, I mean, that guy, he can do everything. He's a safety. that you can line up at the slot corner. You can line them up at outside corner if need be. You can play him on offense as well because he's just that dominant of a guy with the ball in his hands. We saw what he did as a returner last year.

So he's the type of guy. You just put him on the field and he can be that X factor that takes your team over the next, over to the next level. But the question is, when is Oregon finally going to kick the door down? We've been talking about them knocking on the door since Chip Kelly was there. Come on now. at some point, you're not knocking on the door. You play a ding, don't dung bitch, brother. You just knock and run, knock and run,

because you don't actually intend on getting in the house. Yeah. Now, you and I both think that Arch is a little overhyped. In fact, like his grandpa, who he's named after, thinks he was overhyped. I know I miss quoting him a little bit, but Archie did say something recently that he didn't really like the fact that there was so much of a spotlight on his grandson last year.

but I will admit, Kenton, Texas is freaking loaded with talent. And, like, Arch, like, Arch could win there. I don't think he's the best quarterback in the country, but I think they can win with Arch. I think they're a legit contender. What do you think? Here's the thing. I think that it's the fact that Steve Sarkeesian is stuck with the quarterback

that he has to win in spite of. They will not win the whole thing. I love Hollywood Smothers, love Bob. Love that wide receiver court. They got a bunch of guys. They got a bunch of guys that are 4-4 or faster. I want you to think about that. A college football team with multiple 4-4 guys.

They can do it. And I haven't even talked about the fact that in the trenches, they got some big hog mugs up front that are excellent on both sides of the ball. The problem is Steve Sarkeesian is going to want to put the ball in his quarterback's hands. And here's the reality. You saw those throws for the man in camp just like I did. you saw it and the irony of the manning camp being the wake-up moment for a lot of people to finally look and say hold on this kid can't throw it come back against air what's going on here i am telling you right now

so long as that young man is the quarterback they can they could go as far as the semifinals but it's the same thing that i said about penn state it does not matter how much talent you surrounded drew Aller with. He was still going to be Drew Aller at some point in time. And I told everybody when it was them against Notre Dame, I said if it's between, if it comes down to quarterback play, Notre Dame's going to win the game. Everybody said I was crazy. They said, there's no way Drew Allen's going on. And what did we see in the game? Who lost that game despite a penalty bringing back one of their interceptions? I'm telling you right now, if it ends up being a similar a situation for Texas where you finally need your quarterback to be outstanding.

Oh, Archmanning will be outstanding all right, as in the gap band will be playing in the background. You'll hear Charlie Wilson, girl, you knock me out. For those of you who know what that mean means, you know what it means. All right. I want to bring up one more. And actually, Phil Steele has Notre Dame number one in his power rankings. Like they've got the hype, of course.

they also have the talent. You know, they went on a great run last year, final 10 games of the regular season, even if it wasn't enough to get them into the CFP. So you've brought it up before Kenton, like the mentality that it took to kind of throw the tantrum and opt out of the bowl game. Like, I mean, does that carry over into the upcoming season? Because you've brought that up with Florida State as well after the 2023 season. Like, I mean, how legitimate do you view Notre Dame as a championship contender this year?

So here's the thing. Notre Dame will have a regular season that will put them in the playoffs. I have a regular season that will put them in the playoffs. I don't believe that you'll see the manifestations of the Loserville behavior until the playoffs. When you've got to face other teams that have faced that adversity, that have faced things that they didn't like, that have faced what they would view as unfairness. And they just stood up to it and said, hey, we got to buck up and do what we do. we don't have time to say,

oh, man, you know, if you look at the Georgia Florida State game a few years ago, people forget that Georgia team had a very good claim to say we belong in the playoff. That Georgia team was undefeated all year to the SEC championship, I believe, or something along those lines, they only had one.

Yeah, they lost to Bama. And they were the number one team for most of the year. Most of the year, they were the number one team. And then all of a sudden, that loss puts them out. And you know what that team did? They showed up like champions do. They said, all right, that's fine. That's fine.

We're going to show up with our best sales, bringing our best shot, and we'll let the chips fall where they may, as opposed to saying, you know, it's the bulldog way that between the hedges, we let our seniors make the decision. Kirby said, y'all going to get y'all tail in there. Whoever want to opt out, go ahead, opt out, stay away from the team. But anybody who's going to be wearing that G on their helmet

next year, get your tail ready because we got some nold on. And so I don't think that they'll look bad throughout the regular season. I don't believe that at all. I think so much of C.J. Carr, actually, the more film I watch on him, the higher I get on him. And I think so highly of him, if they have a run game, that's 75% of what it was last year, which included two first round picks, one of whom was top 10. So that is a tall task there. But if they are that, I think that they'll easily run the table in the regular season, but it's the playoff that matters. It's the playoff and another impediment to them running the table.

When do they play Miami this year? November 7th. That may be problematic. If it was like it was before where this is one of the first games of the year, you could hope to say, ah, they don't have their footing under it. Our guys know, their timing, they've done this. We've been doing this for years with some of these guys as opposed to Miami where, yeah, Barcayton and Mintz are familiar.

Tony and Mintz are not as familiar, you know, all the other. And also, and we talk a lot about. Miami's offensive line, Benson, with, they're going to have what, eight games played together before that one. By November, you're, you're chiseled veterans. Doesn't matter if you're a freshman, doesn't matter if it's your first game playing. By November, you have been through some stuff. You've seen some stuff.

You've been in the trenches with real live action flying by you. So I would say Notre Dame most likely runs the table in the regular season. But that playoff presents them with a very serious playoff. problem of again, when you felt like you were slighted, you took your ball and went home, and you have to hope that there are no remnants of that left over. I don't know how you can scope that out in one offseason. Yeah. Well, when we come back, we might have to run this by Jim Phillips in a couple weeks. Is the ACC now the conference of running backs? You want to keep it locked right here. We're not done yet on this brand new episode of Locked on ACC.

Thank you so much for making Locked on ACC your first listen. So Kenton Gibbs, something that I did notice that's good for the Atlantic Coast conferences, top 10 running backs in the country put out there by ESPN. Four out of the top 10 play in the Atlantic Coast Conference. And the top two, you've got Mark Fletcher of Miami at number four, Isaac Brown of Louisville at number five. So two of the top five who I think we project excellent seasons for both of them coming up. Yeah, I think that, you know, when you look at the conference and how it shifted, these things have and flow.

They come and go, right? When we looked at the conference of quarterbacks, we had a bunch of guys who had been at their spots and been starters for years. I remember one year we had Devin Leary, Kenny Pickett, Sam Hartman, you know, a ton of quarterbacks everywhere, everywhere you look up. And I believe that was at the same time as Clemson, I want to say, was that Trevor Lawrence's time at Clemson? I want to say it was. Yeah. It might have been a little after him, but either way you cut or slice it,

everybody had some excellent quarterbacks and starters who had come back, starters who had multiple years as the guy at their school. So what's the importance of that? When you don't have that going, somebody has to drive your job. offenses. Haynes King was the quarterback at Georgia Tech for forever in the day. Now that he's gone, somebody has to be the engine of your offense. Now it's another Haynes, Justice Haynes. There you go. There you go. You look around at these backs. I mean, Louisville for quite some time, quiet's kept, they always had pretty good quarterback play. And now that they're doing the one-year

rental deal and every year, it seems like there's a new guy in that seat there. Some, somebody else has to pick up that slack. And it so happens to be that they had not one but two starting running backs in their backfield last year because we all know Duke Watson is going to be 1A at UCF. There's no if, ins or buts about that in anybody's mind. So this is a situation where these running backs, Fletcher, he's phenomenal. He is the most, I would say in terms of powerbacks in the nation, he's primo. Can't find a better one. You cannot find a better guy than him.

Isaac Brown, we all know what he brings. He's the flash. He is. You blink and it's like, oh, did they just score six points? Okay, all right. I guess that's happened. Justice Haynes, he's a combination of the two, very powerful runner, but also very fast. It's interesting to see that you stole Michigan's top running back.

That is a heck of a deal from Coach Key. That is, that's a way to go there. And again, you keep looking up and you keep seeing these top backs all around the conference. So realistically, does the ACC have in four out of the conference? the top 10 backs of the nation surprised me. No, because the quarterbacks are all new. How many new quarterbacks are we going to have next year? Both of the Virginia teams will have new quarterbacks next year.

Miami will have a new quarterback next year. Duke will have a new quarterback next year. UNC will have a new quarterback next year. Wake Forest will have a new quarterback next year. I mean, in Florida State, new quarterback next year. Clemson. Syracuse will technically be back with them, Jelly. But it's kind of a new.

You know, and like you said, Vazina with Clemson, he was not the starter last year. So you're looking at a conference where we just named over half of the teams and we have all brand new quarterbacks of those places. And I feel like we're still leaving some off the list who are going to be replacing their quarterbacks. The only guys like a big up that are coming back are C.J. Bailey, J.K.S. Jennings and who else we got coming back? I want to say that's that's just about it. That might be it. I can't think of too many other guys that are coming back. So again, you're looking at a situation where all in all in this conference,

we're seeing massive turnover at the quarterback position, but we're seeing a lot of continuity. Mason Heinzel, Pittsburgh. That's the only other one, all the other ones you hit him. And that's my point. You've got every single thing going against you to be the conference of quarterback, but it ebbs and flows because realistically, even if you can pay more money.

Some of these quarterbacks have seen what happens. When you transfer to these schools, oh, it's bigger. I'm going to make more money. Yeah, it's going to be great over here. And then all of a sudden, you end up stinking up to join. Because you thought, oh, yeah,

the grass is greener over there because I can get more money right away instead of I can stay at a place that loves me, that values me, that I'm 1A, and I know everybody here. I know how he runs his D-DRA. I know how he runs his B-Gaid. I know how he runs this comeback.

I know how he runs this girl. And we're going to be in this thing together. Yeah. So we mentioned three out of the four that made the top 10. Mark Fletcher, Miami at number four, Isaac Brown, Louisville at number five. Justin Haynes, Georgia Tech at number eight. And 10th, you've got Nate Shepard of Duke. And you talk about running backs who need to step up this year after Duke lost there.

Their quarterback and their top wide receiver. It's going to be the Nate Shepard show there in Durham. And I'm going to tell you, of all. the running backs that are in that top 10, I would say Nate Shepard is the most balance. He has the most ways to beat you. He obviously has more wiggle than Fletcher and Haynes, but he also has a little bit more power and contact balance. I would say Isaac Brown has. So he has a combination of everything working for him and he's a better catch. He's a better receiver out of the back foot, the people give him credit for. So you look at this, you look at Shepard and all that he did for Duke's offense last year, I could see. see a much bigger role. And if you're talking about Duke being half decent, if you're talking about Duke pissing a drop this year, he's going to have to.

He's going to have to. It's not a matter of can he? It's a matter of if Duke is going to be good. Mr. Shepherd, you must shepherd the sheep of Duke into the end zone. Time and time again. Conference of running backs. Huge thank you.

And shout out to Kenton Gibbs. You could check him out on X at TGIF underscore Kenton. And of course, he does a great job along alongside Grayson Boone on Lockdown Wolfpack. You can check me out on Lockdown Canes and at Alex Dono on X. And we'll talk to you next time on another episode of Lockdown ACC. We are part of the number one sports podcast network turning 10 years old this summer, the Lockdown podcast network, your team every day.