ACC’s Phillips touts financial gains, intent to fight lawsuits in assertive stance for future. Florida State and Clemson aren’t going anywhere yet…

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — Commissioner Jim Phillips is adamant about the future of the Atlantic Coast Conference amid the uncertainty of realignment and the overall changes to the model of college athletics itself.

He was also prepared to tell everyone why when the league opened its media days for the football season on Monday.

Phillips traded his typically reserved remarks for a more assertive message, touting the gains made by years of work to improve the ACC’s financial position. He promised that the league would fight lawsuits against Florida State and Clemson “for as long as it takes,” as those member schools challenge the league’s ability to charge hundreds of millions of dollars to leave the conference. And he offered details, from dollar amounts to recent national title counts.

“This competition is better than the narrative that’s going around now, because people want to talk about what could happen instead of what’s happening,” Phillips said in an interview with The Associated Press.

The league opened its four-day “ACC Kickoff” event Monday in an expanded format after adding California and Stanford from the Pac-12 and SMU from the American Athletic Conference. Phillips, who is preparing for his fourth full season as ACC leader, pulled back the curtain a bit on a league he described as “aggressive” in addressing a growing revenue gap with its Big Ten and Southeastern Conference peers.

“Our MO is not to do this publicly,” Phillips told the AP. “Our MO is to do it internally, be aggressive and pursue every avenue possible to grow revenue. … That will continue, not just what we’ve done and what we’re going to do in the future.”

For example, Phillips said the addition of the three new schools to the league will generate $600 million in additional incremental revenue through the ACC’s current ESPN deal that runs through 2036. Moreover, a league that has long relied on fair share distributions has seen Cal and Stanford take reduced payouts (about 30%) for their first seven seasons before gradually increasing those amounts to a full share in the 10th season, while SMU misses out on nine years of TV money.

Additionally, this season marks the launch of a success-driven incentive model that allows schools to keep more of the money based on their own postseason success, rather than sending it to conference coffers to be split evenly. Phillips said that could amount to $20 million to $25 million in additional payouts to schools based on success in the College Football Playoff, bowl games and the NCAA men’s basketball tournament.

Add to that corporate partnerships and sponsorships of major events like the high-profile men’s basketball tournament earlier this year, and Phillips points to multiple revenue streams that could boost profits.

“I think we’ve done a really good job in a challenging situation of generating the revenue that we’ve generated, new revenue,” Phillips said. “To also be able to unanimously accept disproportionate revenue for the first time with the success initiative and (expansion), that takes alignment. That’s not an easy thing to do.

“The idea is that we have to continue this kind of forward momentum into the future. So we have to be creative.”

The good news is that these measures come at a time when revenues are at record highs, even as the ACC lags behind what many now consider a Power Two, along with the Big Ten and the SEC.

According to tax documents, the ACC distributed an average of $44.8 million among its 14 football members (Notre Dame gets a partial share as a football independent) and $706.6 million in total revenue for the 2022-23 season. That marked a 13.6% increase in payouts from the previous year, with Phillips saying increases in the league’s TV contract accounted for about two-thirds of that increase.

Additionally, TV revenues have increased from approximately $288.6 million in fiscal 2018-2019 before the launch of the ACC Network to $481.7 million for 2022-2023, an increase of 66.9%.

Overall, the ACC ranked third behind the Big Ten ($879.9 million in revenue, $60.3 million average payout) and SEC ($852.6 million, $51.3 million) in the most recent filings, and ahead of the smaller Big 12 ($510.7 million, $44.2 million). Of that quartet, the SEC (six), Big Ten (two) and ACC (two) have combined to win all 10 CFP championships, leading to the expansion to a 12-team field for this season.

“All the data points to it being a top-three conference,” SMU coach Rhett Lashlee said of the Mustangs’ new home.

And those revenue numbers don’t take into account the recent wave of restructuring that tore the Pac-12 apart and scattered its components across the ACC, Big Ten and Big 12, and also sent the Big 12’s two biggest football brands (Texas and Oklahoma) to the SEC.

Still, Phillips knows the league faces more challenges than just money.

He called the lawsuits filed by FSU and Clemson “extremely damaging, disruptive and prejudicial” during his annual forum. Most notably, those schools are challenging the league’s media agreement that gives the ACC control over media rights for any school that tries to leave for the duration of the ESPN deal. League schools signed that agreement in the lead-up to the launch of the ACC Network in 2019.

The league has also sued those schools to enforce the agreement in a legal dispute that appears to be going on forever and likely leaves everyone in their positions.

“I can say that we will fight to protect the ACC and our members for as long as it takes,” Phillips said emphatically during the forum.

When asked later about his comments, Phillips told the AP: “It’s important that our members, and indeed the country, know where we stand.”

Still, there were the uncomfortable optics that came with Florida State being among the schools mentioned after Phillips’ forum. For Seminoles coach Mike Norvell, there was little to say other than try to win a second straight title in a league that FSU is also trying to leave.

“Life is full of distractions,” Norvell said. “Ultimately, you stay focused on the things that are in front of you and ultimately the things that you can control. I’m fortunate to have the responsibility of leading this team and that’s where my focus will be.”

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