Possible Troubles for Cal and Stanford’s ACC Lifeboat

Anyone with a basic understanding of United States geography would tell you that California is most certainly not on the Atlantic coast. Yet, that seems to be where the latest available lifeboat sits for the two Bay Area schools trying to get off the sinking ship that is the four-member Pac-12 conference.

The Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) is looking into potentially adding Cal and Stanford as league members, according to multiple reports.

This news comes in the wake of the Pac-12 exodus that took place on Friday with Washington and Oregon officially leaving for the Big Ten after the conference was unable to put together a satisfactory television rights deal. It was later reported that Arizona, Arizona State and Utah would also leave, but those three schools would land in the Big 12.

The only schools that remained ahead of last weekend were the two aforementioned Bay Area schools, Washington State and Oregon State. Stanford and Cal each put out their own canned statement where they mentioned exploring potential options to do what’s best for their student athletes. Whether that means competing against schools an entire width of the country away remains to be seen.

Things are hardly official. ESPN described what’s happening as “exploratory discussions on the potential additions,” while The Athletic said it was “the early stages of exploring the idea” of bringing in the two schools. Neither sentence is close to an ironclad decision, but it’s information that required confirmation from anonymous sources, so take that for what it’s worth.

Perhaps Cal and Stanford are also only in a position to take what they can get at this point. This news appears to be the only lead that the two schools currently have. At 18 schools, the Big Ten is getting overcrowded and broadcasters apparently don’t see value in adding the two Bay Area schools. Brett McMurphy of Action Network reported that the Big 12 “has ‘no appetite’” to add any of the four remaining Pac schools.