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AMELIA ISLAND, Florida — Seven ACC schools have done their homework but none are confident they could break the league’s grant of rights to join other conferences — and subsequently spark the next wave of conference realignment.

Their secret out, the conference’s athletic directors and commissioner Jim Phillips exited the first day of their annual spring meetings at the posh Ritz-Carlton resort here Monday evening in silence.

Murmurs of conference realignment are at the forefront for the third straight summer, and for the first time the ACC is at the center. But it’s nothing new. The sports world was reminded of this months-long soap opera Monday. Realignment and uneasiness among the top dogs, particularly Florida State and Clemson, was nothing new, but more clarity was provided when Action Network’s Brett McMurphy revealed the Secret Seven universities who have examined the league’s grant of rights agreement, which provides the conference all TV broadcast rights for those schools through 2036. More importantly, it makes it seemingly impossible to break the contract and join a rival conference as realignment stirs in the background across the other four Power Five conferences this year.

Those schools are led by Clemson, Florida State and Miami, which worked together in recent months to develop and introduce a new revenue distribution model for the league that would reward teams for their postseason success. Joining those bluebloods are North Carolina, North Carolina State, Virginia and Virginia Tech.

The question is whether their great exploration will lead to a great migration out of the conference.

MORE ACC COVERAGE: What’s on the docket at spring meetings (VIP)

For now, we wait to hear if the unified silence transforms into a unified message. All 14 athletic directors and commissioner Jim Phillips emerged at 7:06 p.m. from the double doors of a conference room and walked briskly past a contingent of media. Their meeting extended 66 minutes beyond their scheduled time. Phillips exited the meeting and re-entered an hour later, just minutes before its conclusion. The athletic directors were directed not to speak to reporters. Clemson athletics director Graham Neff smiled as he declined to comment and said he was “starving.” With head down, NC State athletics director Boo Corrigan sighed as he sped past reporters.

Behind the scenes, lawyers and administrators representing those schools have explored possibilities for several months, and many trekked to the conference’s home office in Greensboro, N.C., to examine the perceived ironclad language in the grant of rights.

Leaving the conference is not as simple as paying a $120 million buyout and phoning the SEC and Big Ten for a new home. Legal challenges and more payments through the life of the contract could total nearly $500 million, according to industry sources, making it nearly impossible for even the richest of universities to depart.

However, the identification Monday of those seven schools was yet another shot across the ACC’s bow. It’s possible — though not yet assured — if more than 50 percent of the conference’s membership leaves en masse, the grant of rights dissolves and financial penalties disappear. The ACC would certainly fight that argument in court rather than shrink into obscurity if eight schools depart, and FSU and Clemson form their own conference or apply for membership in the SEC.

For now, the threat of ACC departures looms in the background as a hypothetical built on top of a rocky hill of hypotheticals. The first step on the path of appeasing those seven schools is the push for a new revenue distribution model in the ACC. FSU, Clemson and Miami have explored several variations of a weighted distribution model that would reward schools a more significant percentage of the ACC’s revenue based on postseason success.

In other words, a playoff-bound FSU would receive more money than Duke in the Mayo Bowl.
The component that has yet to be discussed is how television revenue would be included in the unequal sharing model. An additional few million dollars each year via postseason revenue (bowls, playoff and NCAA Tournament appearances) would not significantly offset the disparity between the top ACC school and, say, Vanderbilt in the SEC (potentially as much as $30 million per year). The big money lies within the ESPN deal, which pays $36.1 million annually to each ACC school. More than others in the conference, Florida State desires a larger piece of that pie.

Why? Clemson and FSU are by far the ACC’s most attractive brands on network television. FSU’s regular-season games between 2014 and 2021 attracted more viewers than any ACC school at an average of 3.1 million viewers.

Eighteen ACC football games pulled more than 3 million viewers in 2022, but only one conference game did not involve Clemson or Florida State, according to data compiled by Sports Media Watch. North Carolina-NC State averaged 3.61 million viewers, ranking as the fourth-most watched conference matchup and 10th overall among games involving an ACC team.
There’s also another issue: the ACC did not carve out a large chunk of time at its spring meetings to discuss what seems to be the No. 1 issue. A window of 30 minutes was included in the schedule Wednesday to discuss revenue distribution, a source told 247Sports.

The call for a change in the ACC’s revenue model emerged last spring, as conference realignment again rumbled across the country with USC and UCLA preparing to exit the Pac-12 for the Big Ten and Oklahoma and Texas bolting the Big 12 for the SEC in 2024. Florida State has aggressively pursued a new model within the ACC as rumors of discontent — and flirtatious eyes for a more advantageous spot in the SEC — floated in the industry.

FSU estimates it contributes up to 15% of the ACC’s media-rights value but only receives 7% of revenues. Alford cited the stark numbers during a meeting of FSU’s board in February, prompting a trustee to ask if the university could leave the ACC despite the grant of rights.

For now, the ACC is the only Power Five conference not directly affected by the latest wave of realignment. The Big 12 expands and shrinks in 2023 and 2024. The Pac-12 shrinks — and may expand again — in 2024. The SEC is expanding. The Big Ten has leapfrogged the SEC as the top money generator with USC and UCLA joining the league.

The ACC’s neighborhood has remained quiet and safe thanks to its lengthy grant of rights, but not every house as built on even ground. The ACC will change, by force, as money takes center stage. Whether that’s with or without the likes of Clemson and Florida State is the $120 million question.

Brandon Marcello is a national college football reporter for 247Sports. You can follow him on Twitter (@bmarcello).