The perfect naming rights sponsor for every college football conference
By Justin Perez
In today's world of NCAA intercollegiate athletics, the corporate and money-making world has taken over. In 2024, players in major college football, basketball, and other programs are earning money from NIL deals. Also in late May, it was announced that the NCAA and Power Four conferences would share up to $20 million per year with their athletes.
Now things are starting to get even more wild in NCAA athletics. Recently, it became known that the Big 12 is currently in discussions with Allstate on a potential naming rights deal. With this recent news, I've decided to think of the perfect sponsor for every other conference in college football.
I'll be going be alphabetical order and I picked the best possible company for each conference based on location.
ACC: Bank of America (Charlotte, N.C.)
This is just too easy to not think about. Bank of America has been involved with sports sponsorships for many years. sponsorships. The company is headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., which is one of the biggest cities in the Southern US, making it a major market. It also just so happens that Charlotte has some major sports as well.
The NFL's Carolina Panthers and MLS's Charlotte FC play in a stadium named and sponsored by the company. According to Forbes, it's the second-largest bank in the US It just so happens that Bank of America Stadium also hosts the ACC Championship Game. The venue first started hosting the ACC title game in 2010. It's been the site for every title game since 2017 and also from 2010 to 2015.
This makes too much sense for this to not be a perfect sponsor for the ACC. There is nothing to be lost at all. The bank has always had a strong presence in the city with the stadium for this to not work. The bank is one of the most profitable in America. Despite its uncertain future, the ACC has enough prestige for Bank of America to be the main sponsor of the conference.
The conference gets tons of television time and media attention, especially when programs like Clemson and Florida State have been major National Championship contenders for years. There are major universities in notable markets that give the conference notoriety such as Miami, Georgia Tech, Pittsburgh, and North Carolina State. The conference title game is in the stadium.