Locked On ACC - Daily College Football & Basketball Podcast - The ACC's Public Perception Has Never Been LOWER | Can The League Bounce Back?

Starting point is 00:00:00 Outside perception of the ACC has literally never been worse than it is right now. Can this PR problem get fixed? You are Locked on ACC, your daily podcast on the Atlantic Coast Conference. Part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. Shout out to the everydayers for making Locked on ACC your first listen and your first watch today. We're available free wherever you get your podcasts. We're free on YouTube and we're part of the Locked on podcast network. your team every day.

Starting point is 00:00:37 Today's episode is brought to you by GameTime. Download the GameTime app, create an account, and use code Lockdown College for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. I am Alex Dono from Locked on Keynes. He is Kenton Gibbs from Lockdown Wolfpack.

Starting point is 00:00:51 On this episode, we will talk about what has been just a weird game of musical chairs among North Carolina's board of trustees. Are they going to discuss athletics? Are they not? When will they discuss athletics? Will it be streaming or not?

Starting point is 00:01:07 Are they going to leave the ACC? It's been one of the wild subplots in all this conference realignment talk. We will talk about some of the key messages delivered by ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips during the ACC spring meetings, which wrapped up earlier this week. But a big part of that agenda, Kenton, let's start with this. And I know this was discussed by multiple ACC coaches. It was discussed by the commission. how do we stop from seeing the ACC get quote unquote

Starting point is 00:01:39 disrespected so much. That was the word used by Pat Narduzi. And I think a big reason why this gets brought up is what happened with Florida State in the college football playoff, where clearly they deserved to be one of the top four teams. You know, they were left out, you know, the kind of the real reason, which I don't think is a fair one, is that their quarterback had a broken leg.

Starting point is 00:02:01 So, you know, the committee just didn't feel like they had any chance to win. A lot of folks thought even despite that, if they were in the SEC or the Big Ten, they still would have gotten into the playoff regardless. They didn't. And, I mean, would you, first off, Kenton, would you agree with me that PR on the ACC has never been worse than it is right now? Because I'm on X. I'm on social media every day. And, like, everyone just assumes, oh, it's like a matter of weeks before the conference implodes. it's a complete joke.

Starting point is 00:02:31 Like, you have to dig pretty deep to find anything positive being said about the ACC. Yeah. So I do agree that the perception is as low as it's ever been. And that is because, well, it's a multitude of reasons. There are multiple reasons why. But the biggest one I would probably say is our chair, our president, commissioner, is not vocal enough. You need to be out there beating on every table.

Starting point is 00:02:58 Sanky is on ESPN. almost every college game day. To say something, even if it's nothing important. Hey, Ole Miss just got a new sponsor in Coca-Cola. He's on there saying something. We don't have that same type of guy. Get your ass from behind your seat and do something. Be visible.

Starting point is 00:03:19 People should know your voice, know your face and know, hey, when you see me, you know the ACC is coming. We're doing something. I can't tell you exactly what. it may not be the same thing every time, but you got to know, because I'm here, there's a defendant of presence and voice for the ACC. The next thing behind that, let's just be honest. Let's just be very honest about this. There is no incentive to push the ACC from our media partner in ESPN. Let's be really real about that. Let's be really real. You have seen the difference

Starting point is 00:03:52 in coverage between how all of these different teams are talked about based on conference. We saw before Jordan Travis got hurt, when Florida State was undefeated, they were considering leaving an undefeated Florida State out of the playoff on college game day. This stuff does not happen by accident. It simply does not. So, you know, those types of things, and don't even get me started on bracketology and how could those books are despite the ACCC continually putting out teams

Starting point is 00:04:23 into the elite eight and final four. Oh, the ACC is just so top heavy. The 10th seeded team in the ACC just made the final four, buddy. I'm sorry to tell you. Sorry to tell you. Yes, what NC State did was phenomenal, but it's not just one team. It's not just North Carolina carrying the water in basketball,

Starting point is 00:04:43 Clemson carrying into football. So I think that there is, again, a very concerted effort on a lot of fronts to kind of ice the ACC out. And the ACC as the administration and all that, if you're that serious about your job that you don't want to merge, If you're that serious about I need to maintain the my seat so we can't merge with the Big 12. Good. Get your behind out there and campaign for your conference, period.

Starting point is 00:05:08 Yeah, and what you just brought up at the end there, I know this is way more complicated than I could ever make it out to be. But in this landscape, a merger between the ACC and Big 12, it would make a lot of sense to me. Like, I don't know why there's not more serious discussions regarding that because, you know, whether who anyone thinks you, a lot of people just, just assume the Big 12 is a lot more stable right now because of the questions about the ACC's TV deal. But there's still, I believe there still could be a stronger together mentality. But obviously there are, I'm sure, political forces fighting against that. And first things first, Kenton, I totally understand not all the reasons, but I think a big reason why the PR is so bad on the ACC right now is Florida State. I'm not blaming anybody for this because I understand why

Starting point is 00:05:56 Florida State and Clemson are doing the ACC. Like I understand. I'm not saying shame on you, but the reality is that's happening. And it's hard for a conference to avoid being disrespected when at least two of your members are very vocal and they're taking actions in the court because they don't want to be there. So the way that I look at it, I don't think the ACC is going to be able to do very much to shed these narratives until we actually get on the field and start playing football again, until they get on the court and start playing basketball again and hope that, you know, you can put out some really good teams this year.

Starting point is 00:06:31 You know, and there are some opportunities early in the season, Kenton. I mean, this is international showcase. I don't think it's going to be a very close game. Florida State probably wins somewhat easily. But, you know, the college football classic in Dublin, Ireland, that's going to be a showcase for the ACC, Florida State versus Georgia Tech. Week one, both nationally televised on ABC. You've got Clemson versus Georgia Tech at noon, Miami at Florida at 3.30.

Starting point is 00:07:00 You know, Clemson's probably going to get waxed. We'll see what Miami can do in Gainesville. And NC State's going to be taken on Tennessee week two. So these are opportunities. And the ACC did. They were above 500 head to head against the SEC last year in football. The ACC had a winning record against the SEC. So opportunities like that on the first.

Starting point is 00:07:19 field, you're not going to be able to shake the narrative, which is for real that two of your members at least want to get the hell out. Like, you're not going to be able to shake that, but maybe you can see success on the football field early in the season and take some of those narratives down a notch. Oh, absolutely. I mean, think about this way, right? If you and I were beefing and there was back and forth jabs being sent by both of us and your son is like, oh, I love it here. The Donald household is great. There has never been another household like ours. And my son is sitting here saying, he's not feeding.

Starting point is 00:07:49 me, I'm outnourished. I need to get in the house like Donno's. You know, I need to, they eating good over there. That's absolutely going to play into it. But with that being said, I, again, perception becomes reality. However, perception has not, or reality has not reached that point yet for the ACC. So I want to point out something. A lot of people say, well, your champion got absolutely drubbed in the, in their bowl game against Georgia.

Starting point is 00:08:19 Yeah. how many players out of Florida States too deep are sitting out that game. Oh. And even beyond how many, and even beyond how many players out of Florida State's too deep were sitting out that game, that Georgia team worked the wheels off a lot of people. I'm sorry to tell you, in terms of the amount of ranked games that they played last year, let me make sure I got this information correct here, okay?

Starting point is 00:08:42 So it appears to me that they played about four or five ranked games last year. Of those four to five ranked games, literally only two were within one score. They lost Alabama, and I'm sorry, we're within single digits, not one score. They lost Alabama, beat Missouri by nine. Let's look at the rest of their scores against ranked team, shall we? 3810 against Tennessee. 5217 against Ole Miss. What are we doing here?

Starting point is 00:09:13 What are we doing here? What are we, what is even this? for those of you who are not good at math, 52 to 17 means they won by 35 points. That's five touchdowns. They beat a ranked SEC team by five touchdowns with all the horses in the state. Right. All of them that were available at least not due to injury or whatever the case may be with that. But again, that's not, I believe it was something along the lines of nearly 50% of Florida

Starting point is 00:09:44 States too deep was out in that game. come on dog come on what are we doing here what are we doing stuff like that that's that's not looking at this thing objectively that's looking at something that confirms it's confirmation bias you found something that fits the narrative you want to push and you run with it and i'll tell you what at the end of the day if the acc has the one-up on the cc again this year i don't want to hear it i don't want to hear it and if the c c gets the one up on the ac c the ACC should do the same thing that SEC did last year. Oh, you just didn't play our best.

Starting point is 00:10:18 That's all. Oh, you all just didn't. Oh, you all I didn't play the best team. NC State ain't won an ACC championship since before I was born. Oh, you know, Florida, you know, that Clemson team ain't won a championship in quite some time in the Aces. Oh, they're not relevant anymore. That's what the ACC should do if they lose. Just like the SEC was piled the table, you beat nobody to the SEC.

Starting point is 00:10:42 where they were a body in the SEC, where there were they not? Do they not? Does it not mean more? I thought it just meant more over there. Did it stop meaning more? What happened? Well, what can be done off the field is a question?

Starting point is 00:10:56 Because I think we all agree. If you win, that's a powerful narrative. But what is the commission, Jim Phillips? What are ACC coaches saying about what can be done off the field to improve that perception? And is any of this stuff realistic? Is any of it going to work? We're not done yet, my friends. It's a Friday.

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Starting point is 00:13:12 covering the top sports stories of the day with the local experts of Lockdown, plus our national shows covering every league. Find locked on sports today now available on the free fire TV channels app. All right. So Kenton, first things first, Jim Phillips. And again, a lot of these quotes that I hear from him, it's like, this guy's just saying stuff. So he talked about improving the league's marketing. So he says, quote, we're going to get some outside help on that too from a communication standpoint, he said of strengthening the ACC football brand. When you look at the coaches, the teams, the student athletes, the student athletes that are now playing in the NFL,

Starting point is 00:13:53 it's a really good conference, and we performed at good levels as well. So apparently one of the grievances from coaches around the ACC have been, they don't feel like the league has been marketed well enough. And honestly, I would also ask Kenton, like, how much of that is the ACC's fault, right? because when I watch, and obviously the ACC Network is a thing, but you know, you're only real ACC hardcors are going to seek out eight to watch, you know, some of their program is really good, by the way.

Starting point is 00:14:25 I was watching ACC PM the other day. Like they have some good programming. But, you know, you're not watching ACC Network unless you're like a hardcore fan of one of the teams within the conference. But I see what's happened with the National College football coverage, you know, from places like ESPN and Fox Sports. it's really diminishing to a bare bones level. And when they do talk about it,

Starting point is 00:14:46 they're really only talking about the SEC and Big Ten. And so how much of that is the ACC's fault, right? I mean, outside of college game day for those three hours on Saturdays where they do a pretty good job like doing equal coverage. Like I don't see a whole lot of ACC coverage on first take. In fact, I don't see a whole lot of college football coverage, period. They're usually just talking about LeBron James and the Dallas Cowboys is all you get from the national shows. Well, if you're talking about the national shows, that's become a race to the bottom for ratings at all cost.

Starting point is 00:15:16 And, you know, mentioning LeBron is much more important than mentioning, hey, Miami just got two of the best transfer players to hit the Portland quite some time. Like that, their backfield just went from a tight end being the best ball carrier to potentially having one of the best, I'd say 10 to 15 at worst running backs in the nation. So, you know, that's not the national shows. You kind of just got to end one there and out the other because it's it's WWE just for sports. But in terms of is it the ACC's fault? Here's what I will say. College football as a whole is having a branding problem right now because what people

Starting point is 00:15:57 are talking about about college football more than anything else is the college football game that's coming out. That's the biggest thing that people are talking about with college football. That's the biggest story. Nobody likes hearing about college football during the off season because not top of 10. It's not fun. It's not exciting. It's not good things.

Starting point is 00:16:13 That's a great point. And there also, it's like topics like, which are big topics, NIL, anti-trust lawsuits, transfer rules. So it's like they're talking about all the extracurricular stuff. Exactly. Exactly. And it's the same way with college basketball, but even worse. Nobody touches college basketball with a 10-foot pole when they're out of season. So when you talk about the ACC and saying how do they restore the brand, how do they bring the brand back?

Starting point is 00:16:39 Basically, it is you have to make such a concerted effort to get ACC football out there. You have to make it so that it is so ubiquitous, so hard to escape that it is just the thing that people have to be aware of at some point. And then there's only so much off the field that you can do. That's just the reality. There's only so much off the field. You can have the best marketing team in the world. If you get in the wheels whooped off you on the field, it doesn't matter. But when the ACC does something like last year, when they beat the SEC,

Starting point is 00:17:09 when they had a better record and I believe a better bowl record as well, you've got to shout that from the mountaintop. You've got to scream it. You've got to everywhere. Piss them all. Piss them all. I don't give a darn about, oh, man, you know, you don't want to upset big old mighty Georgia when they got to play Clemson next year.

Starting point is 00:17:28 They put on their pants one leg at a time, just like you. I'm sorry to tell you. That's how this thing goes. So you have got to, got to, got to. Every time you get a major conference win, shout it from the mountaintops. Don't quietly say it in the library. Nobody you'll hear.

Starting point is 00:17:45 Nobody will hear. Well, and the one part of Phillips's quote that I do agree with is there should definitely be more promotion and celebration of players who got drafted. The ACC just had 41 players drafted in the NFL. That's a big deal. And I don't really hear a whole lot of hype about that, right? The way that, you know, when the SEC, you know, routinely leads the NFL and drafted players,

Starting point is 00:18:10 I feel like there's a lot more of a concerted effort to promote that stuff. I feel like the Big Ten is probably pretty good with that. Because, listen, bottom line, when you're talking about all the opportunities that come through your 17 football coaches when it comes to recruiting players out of high school and your 17 coaches and recruiting players out of the transfer portal, if you can show. The ACC is a path, a legitimate path to going professional. That does, to me, speak volumes for conference perceptions. That is probably something they should promote more.

Starting point is 00:18:39 Yeah, and there's no if-ins or bust about that. And, you know, when you talk about the ACC and how they pretty much do their thing by who had players drafted and all that good stuff, the ACC finished third in terms of players drafted last year. third it was the SEC big 10 then ACC I'm going to tell you this again there is no way in the world that I would not be screaming that from the mountaintops hey we had the third most players drafted but even better when one of your players is doing well in the league when it's time for that pro bowl vote when this time for those all pro votes pour it all lay it on thick it does not matter where these guys get drafted it matters what they do when they get there So yes, you talk about, hey, we did great things. We did all these great things. To me, there's no way.

Starting point is 00:19:33 There's no way that when Russell Wilson was winning Super Bowls, it wasn't NC State quarterback, Russell Wilson, he won his own super. I don't care where he played his last ball. That's your boy. He was in your conference for four years and you stayed quiet. What are we doing there? That needs to be for all these guys. If your guys are doing well, I don't care what school they went to.

Starting point is 00:19:55 I believe the Drake May is going to go on and have a. phenomenal career. When Drake is doing what he's doing, when he's got it rolling, he better be all over the ACC's page in terms of, look what our guys doing. Look what he's out here doing. Same for all those Miami guys. Same for all those Florida State guys. If you don't have a post up about Jared Burson-Braden-Fiske reuniting in L.A. Not one post, multiple posts, one where you get a quote from, one where it's just a post box. You've got to milk this thing. Because if you don't, you're already starting behind the eight ball. The big dogs can relax. They can rest on their laurels. You have to be scrappy. You have to be innovative. You have to put foot to pavement

Starting point is 00:20:38 and make things happen that might not happen otherwise if you just, oh, we're going to let everything happen a natural course of how it's going to go and we'll be all right, because you're not going to be all right, as we can very clearly see from the teams that are suing your behind to get up. And the reason why I know that a lot of the stuff that we're talking about when it comes to marketing campaigns. People will hear that and they'll say like, that seems so insignificant. But here's the thing. You have to be impeccably good at that stuff when you have the disadvantages that the ACC now has when it comes to revenue, right? Which unfortunately, they can't seem to fix that anytime soon. They can't seem to fix that. So when you are, and this was the estimate from

Starting point is 00:21:18 Michael Alford, the athletic director of Florida State, and it's probably correct about this, that ACC members are in the whole at least $40 million less compared to what members of the SEC and the Big Ten are going to be making annually from the TV deals, right? And part of that, and Phillips talked about this. Now, you know, there were not cameras at these meetings. So I don't know how hard or he did or didn't negotiate for this. But the college football playoff revenue with the new ESPN deal, the numbers have been reported as members of the SEC and B. Big 10, 29% of the ESPN payout go to SCC and the Big 10, which is over 21 million per school. 17% goes to the ACC, which is approximately 13 million per school.

Starting point is 00:22:06 So just right there, there's an $8 million gap per school with the revenue. 15% goes to the Big 12. They make about $12 million per school. And then there's a share for the group of five conferences in the independence. And, you know, there was a negotiation. and, you know, I understand the ACC has less leverage in these negotiations because of the teams that are in the big two conferences within the power for. But Jim Phillips talks about how that revenue split, which doesn't look good for the ACC, how that went down. He said, quote, I felt like I negotiated hard, just like every conference did.

Starting point is 00:22:39 And we got to a place that at the end of the day, do you love it? You don't love it. But it certainly was better than where we started. And it's more than we've ever had relative to CFP dollars. but I again, I understand it causes an even greater gap. He says, we have continued to try to close the gap. If we're chasing money, then we're chasing money, he said. But I believe we're also trying to chase success.

Starting point is 00:23:00 And so if it's just a money issue, which no one can show me that money equates success, you can maybe show me some examples, but I can show you some examples also where schools have done really well on the national scene with some less revenue. So translation, hey, we can't really fix the revenue problem. So let's try to do really good despite the fact that we're making less. So here's the thing. He's absolutely right. And he's hitting on something that I've touched on in terms of there's a ceiling.

Starting point is 00:23:27 Whether people want to realize or not, whether everybody wants to admit it, everybody can say, oh, my university needs more. We need more. There's a ceiling for everybody. There's a ceiling where it doesn't matter how much money you put in, your returns are not going to get greater because you put in more money. Again, if the money, if there was a direct one-to-one, money to wins, the national championship every year would be Texas Oregon every single year. That would be it. That would be it.

Starting point is 00:23:55 Nobody's beating Phil Knight out. Nobody. Nobody's beating out a school who objectively started all this foolishness in Texas with the Longhorn Network. Nobody's beating them out. Nobody. And yet, they don't seem to be in the national championship every year. So I do agree with that. The problem is we have not reached that ceiling yet.

Starting point is 00:24:15 We're close. Don't get me wrong. We are close to that point where every team has the type of facilities and the type of training staff and the type of nutrition staff and the type of, you know, sleep doctor, physiology, all that stuff to where it's like, hey, there's nothing else you can do here. For those of you who don't know, for example, if you look at a young man worthy from Texas who got drafted to the Kansas City Chiefs, and everybody talked about how he looked disappointed by seeing their locker room and all that. and what everybody said was it's a deep downgrade from Texas to the NFL, but that goes to prove my point. There is a point where it doesn't matter anymore. It just doesn't.

Starting point is 00:24:54 So, yes, teams do have to figure it out with what they have, but Jim, it's your job to get them more of what they have, get them more than what they have. And I'm going to say this, and I'm going to kick it back to you, Donna. If they don't want to give you what you want, if the deal ain't good enough at ESPN, why stay? Go to Fox. Go to shop around.

Starting point is 00:25:16 What do you mean we're not chasing money? We're chasing it. Chase the damn money. Go get the money. Brother, what are we talking about here? Go chase the money. I don't think there's a deal to be had at Fox, at least not a mega. You know, unfortunately, I think that the slippery slope you could go down is you try to chase some kind of like a hybrid streaming deal, which is maybe getting less and less risky with the landscape.

Starting point is 00:25:42 because obviously streaming numbers continue to increase, but I just don't think we're quite there yet. I don't think we're quite there yet where a streaming deal is really viable, right? I mean, it wasn't the PAC 12 was trying to do something with Apple TV, and the whole thing ended up completely blowing up, and the conference blew up. So I don't know. I feel like Fox.

Starting point is 00:26:01 Fox is pretty content with what they have right now. But I don't know. I don't claim to have all the answers. I can tell you the North Carolina Board of Trustees don't have all the answers right now. There's some weird stuff going. And there are some external forces as well. I can't blame this all on UNC. But they were supposed to have a Thursday closed session to discuss athletics, revenue, perhaps their future in the ACC. That meeting got blown up. We'll tell you why when we come back. You want to keep it locked right here. We're not done yet on this brand new episode of locked on ACC. And you know I'm not done on Fandual. Playoff season. Get your game faces on, my friends, because there is money out there to be won. It's winner take all time in the NBA and NHL, and Fanduels giving you a shot to bring home a big win of your own. Right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets with any winning $5 bet.

Starting point is 00:26:56 That's $150 to bet on spreads, money lines, player props, and so much more. So visit Fandual.com slash Locked On and make every playoff shot count. Fandual, America's number one sports book. Thank you so much for making this episode of Lockdown, ACC, your first listen and your first watch today. You know, North Carolina, if they ever decide to sue the ACC or to declare they want to leave, they've got to get a lot of internal stuff sorted out first. This process is not playing out very quickly. So Kenton, they had that open board of trustees meeting on Monday that I went back and watched because there was video of it and it was very uncomfortable and awkward. They're trying to explain the athletic revenue and the budget.

Starting point is 00:27:47 So they were supposed to reconvened. And I think they did reconvene. They just couldn't talk athletics in a closed session on Thursday. And then that session is not happening. And here is why. And by the way, shout out to Brian Murphy from WRAL News, because he has been working nonstop to cover all this stuff going on in Chapel Hill. He said the chairman of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hills,

Starting point is 00:28:14 board of trustees said it would not discuss the schools. athletic budget in a closed Thursday session, despite saying it would do just that during a special meeting on Monday. The about face came after a complaint was filed Wednesday afternoon in Orange County alleging that the board was in violation of the state's Open Meetings and Public Records Act. The complaint was filed by attorney David McKenzie, who focuses on intellectual property litigation. And I, that name was familiar to McKin. And I realized because McKenzie, he's, he's among a number of lawyers who have been very vocal about what's happening with the ACC lawsuits, except he's maybe the only one that I've seen who's very publicly on the ACC's side of it.

Starting point is 00:28:58 So he seems to be biased in that direction. Some of the lawyers who tweet about it are biased in the other direction. The report does mention, now this McKenzie, he went to Duke, but apparently he's got a son who's enrolled at UNC right now. I know there's a lot of conspiracy theories about how this guy is like intentionally trying to delay any decision. I don't know if that's the case or not, but bottom line, they did not discuss athletics on Thursday in a closed session. Apparently they're going to have an open session on the 20th. So I'm looking forward to watching that because it's going to be another one of those televised shouting matches maybe.

Starting point is 00:29:32 After watching the Florida State Board of Trustees meeting in back in, I believe it was January or so, or maybe it was before that, I'm willing and ready to do it all over again. These board of trustees meeting, anybody who tells you, men don't like gossip, men don't like a little bit of mess, they're lying, or maybe I'm not a man. Who knows? But either way this thing goes, I'm going to enjoy watching this. You know, it is always a good time to watch your enemy's struggle. It's always a good time to watch that happen. But in all seriousness, this is a very clear moment where as much as we're talking about the

Starting point is 00:30:10 money of this thing, the money, the money, who gets paid what? Where's the money? who's getting what, who's getting the most, who's behind, who's in front, money, money, money, we're forgetting these athletic entities are tied into public institutions. We are forgetting that. We are losing sight of that. And this lawsuit that has placed a restraining order or a stop on having these closed door meetings reminds us, hey, all of this is public information.

Starting point is 00:30:38 All of this, both Florida State and Clemson can be foyer if they're talking to, to a different conference, not to say that they are, but I'm just saying that's an example of how this thing works in terms of these are all public universities for the most part. So there is very much so a public interest in this, which means that these universities cannot act with impunity without being at risk of some negative repercussions, both publicly and civically lawsuit-wise, if they're doing something incorrectly. So I'm very interested to see exactly what the situation is in Chapel Hill, what's going right, what's going wrong, and kind of why we're here, how we got here is something else I'm looking into or that I'm excited to see later on down the road. And reading up on UNC's situation, it's also a reminder that there's a good reason why universities in certain cases, maybe North Carolina joins the PAC, but why Clemson and Florida State.

Starting point is 00:31:38 or trying to seek a conference with higher revenue. Why everyone's trying to squeeze out every possible dollar? I mean, there's the obvious part of it. Everyone wants to make as much money as they can. But I think a big reason why North Carolina's UNC's athletic budget is a little bit upside down right now is, you know, during or after COVID, there was some push to drop some of their non-revenue sports. And that push was unsuccessful. So people have to remember that football.

Starting point is 00:32:08 and in some cases basketball, but mostly football is the driving force for athletic revenue, and football has to carry all the non-revenue sports. One of the reasons why these TV deals and this revenue is so important, which football is the driver of, is because you've got to fund all those other sports. You've got to fund your diving teams and your tennis teams and your badminton teams, like the stuff that doesn't necessarily make money, maybe some schools have successfully cut some of those sports out. you also have to keep Title IX in mind. So you can only have to be very careful with the way you cut sports

Starting point is 00:32:42 because you have to keep the men's and women scholarships equal. But non-revenue sports, it's another complication. And that's something UNC is dealing with. Yeah, for sure. And this is, you know, the non-revenue sport angle of this is very important because anybody who knows the history that show Candace Cooper, not only attended UNC, she was a non-revenue sport athlete, and that she was a swimmer.

Starting point is 00:33:05 So, you know, this is, is something that hits close to home for locked on ACC and that that's having those programs and all that that's very important that's very that's that's still something that needs to happen here and so the question becomes again jimmy when you're talking about hey there's a certain ceiling that hit in terms of money this is why i specifically said there is a ceiling there is a point where it doesn't equal more wins but also that money while it may not equal more wins for your football team may be the difference between being able to keep on and having to drop your swimming team, track team, field hockey, whatever the case may be, that team.

Starting point is 00:33:46 Yeah, no, well, well, folks, we will talk to you again on Monday. We'll see if there's any more madness to discuss or if we can talk about some actual sports. But this is the glory of the offseason. And this is why college football has become a year-round sport, because from lawsuits, anti-trust cases, NIL transfers. There's always something to talk about when it comes to college sports. He is Kenton Gibbs from Lockdown Wolfpack. Make sure you follow him on X at TGIF underscore Kenton.

Starting point is 00:34:17 I am Alex Dono from Lockdown-Kane. You can follow me at Alex Dono, and we'll talk to you guys on Monday on another episode of Lockdown ACC, part of the awesome Lockdown Podcast Network. Your team every day.

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