The 2025 college football season has been anything but forgiving to the ACC Conference, but the conference may face its biggest nightmare yet if Duke finds a way to win Saturday night in the conference championship game.
The ACC has already seen it's preseason favorite Clemson fall on their face, Florida State implode after beating Alabama, and Cal upsetting SMU which of course allowed the Blue Devils a spot in Charlotte. If Virginia handles business on Saturday than the conference can breathe easily as there is little to no chance the playoff committee would not put them into this year's playoff field.
However, if Manny Diaz's team pulls off the upset than we might very well see the ACC Conference Champion being left out of this year's playoff field. You might be asking how would that even be possible? The answer is the top five conference are guaranteed a playoff spot, and I would not be shocked if the committee ranked the American Champion higher than Duke even as champions of a power four conference.
The reason being is the Blue Devils enter the championship game with a 7-5 record and having already lost to Tulane this season. I would think if the Green Wave beat North Texas on Friday night that there is no way the committee would rank Duke higher.
Also, if James Madison who currently has an 11-1 record beats Troy in The Sunbelt Conference championship game it would not shock me if next Sunday, they are ranked higher than Duke even as conference champions. The committee is looking for compelling stories and two G6 programs getting in over the ACC Champion definitely falls into that category.
Of course, we have a lot of football to play before Sunday's final selection but wouldn't it be wild to see the ACC Champion get left out of the field. It was bad enough when the Florida State was left out, but that was during the four-team model. This would be an even bigger black eye for the conference and if that wasn't enough it is unlikely Miami will crack the field despite ending the season 10-2 including of course the win over Notre Dame.