It’s hard to imagine karma hitting the ACC this quickly isn’t it.
I mean, less than 2 weeks ago Miami and Virginia Tech were quietly welcomed into the ACC. No big press conferences, no huge announcements. Just a little press release to make it official.
Matt Hayes at the Sporting News tells the ACC it can say hello to being a football conference:
It took Miami and Virginia Tech less than one week after they became official members on July 1 to show why. The one-time basketball league now is a football factory, for better or for worse. The ACC will get its million-dollar championship game in 2005, and it could get as many as two BCS slots per year. But it also gets this:
Miami recruit Willie Williams, arrested 11 times since 1999, was given three years of probation last week, stemming from his latest incident. Now he’ll start the process of enrolling at the university.
Virginia Tech quarterback Marcus Vick, less than two months removed from being sentenced to 30 days in jail for contributing to the delinquency of a minor — he was one of three Tech players who gave alcohol to underage girls — was arrested last week and charged with marijuana possession.
“It’s certainly not the best way to start a marriage,” says one ACC official.
But the ACC knew what it was getting into by inviting Miami and Virginia Tech to the party. These are football schools, pure and simple. They bring nothing to the table other than their ability to recruit, win games and shovel potential bowl money into league coffers.
An ACC official told me weeks ago that the league office was watching both cases closely to see how the respective administrations would deal with the off-field issues. The last thing the publicity-conscious ACC wants is to be linked with the SEC and Big 12 as football factories. But after the events of last week, the first step already has been taken.
Of course you can also add the indefinite suspension of Miami CB, Antrel Rolle, after he was charged with (felony) battery on a police officer and misdemeanor offenses of disorderly conduct and resisting an officer without violence.
Oh, and then there is always squeaky clean Florida State to jump into the fun. Bobby Meeks, the starting guard, is facing felony charges from this past weekend — battery against law-enforcement officers and resisting arrest with violence.
You will know it’s all over for the ACC when Duke football players get arrested.
