Oct. 1, 2003
The Atlantic Coast Conference announced formats for its football and men’s and women’s basketball schedules Wednesday.
The football schedule, approved in meetings that included athletics directors, senior women’s administrators and faculty representatives, maintains eight conference games against the same eight schools in the next two years.
In 2004, Georgia Tech will host new ACC members Miami and Virginia Tech, as well as Duke and Virginia, while travelling to North Carolina, NC State, Maryland and Clemson. The Yellow Jackets will not play Florida State or Wake Forest in 2004 or 2005.
The schedule announced by ACC commissioner John Swofford is flexible enough to work in one division or two, if the NCAA allows the conference to stage a championship game despite not having the mandatory 12 teams.
The decision to have a championship, if it becomes available, will be made at the ACC meeting in Greensboro, N.C., in December, Swofford said.
If needed, one division would include Georgia Tech, Virginia, Virginia Tech, Miami, North Carolina and Duke, and the other will include Maryland, Clemson, North Carolina State, Wake Forest and Florida State.
The conference did not discuss adding a 12th team during its two-day meetings, and Swofford declined to discuss further expansion afterward.
The formula maintains the home and away rotation in place now and will be evaluated for fairness and balance after two years, Swofford said.
The league also announced that its men’s basketball teams will play a 16-game conference schedule in 2004 and 2005, and its women’s teams will play 14-game conference schedules, meeting each team at least once.
All 11 league teams will play in the conference basketball tournaments, with the top five schools earning a first-round bye.
For the men, the schedule will include annual home-and-home series against two “primary partner” schools, home-and-home series against four other schools and single games against the league’s other four schools.
The following year, men’s teams will play home-and-home series against the four teams they played once the previous year, home-and-home series against their partner schools and single games against the other four.
Georgia Tech’s primary partners for men’s basketball are Clemson and Wake Forest.
The women will play home-and-home series against four primary partner schools and single games against the other six teams in both seasons.
In women’s basketball, Tech is partnered with Clemson, Florida State, Maryland and Wake Forest.
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