While the Florida State Seminoles and the Clemson Tigers will fight for a College Football Playoff spot and a New Year’s Six bowl in the coming weeks, the Miami Hurricanes and Duke Blue Devils figure to author the larger story of the ACC in 2015.
You’re familiar by now with the notion of a “season shaper,” the kind of team(s) we’ve profiled the past few days here at The Student Section. The season is half over; only now will final verdicts on conferences begin to be written. A lot of pencil notes will be jotted down in the next two to three weeks, but erasers might be needed for all the plot twists which might occur. On Nov. 7 and beyond, you’ll get to see the story of the 2015 season written in ink. Final edits will occur around Thanksgiving, and the final draft will be ready for publication on the afternoon of the football version of Selection Sunday, which is Dec. 6 this year.
The season shaper is that team (or teams) which fall anywhere from third to sixth or seventh place. They’re better than most in the conference, but not in the highest tier. These are the teams which determine whether a league possesses quality depth, or diminished depth. They indicate whether a league has a deep bench or a thin one. Teams in this range help us to ascertain how rough a journey the top two teams truly endured on their paths to the playoff or an NY6 bowl. These teams therefore shape how a conference’s story is written in a given season.
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In the ACC, arriving at a season shaper or two is a tougher call than in other leagues. The Big 12 is simply not that deep right now, so the pool of candidates is small. The Pac-12 has a broad middle, but its upper reaches (below divisional kings Utah and Stanford) are not as intimidating as one might have expected before the season. The Big Ten has a more developed hierarchy, with its weaker (West) division already owning a clear-cut favorite and its stronger division having three teams which have separated themselves from the pack. The ACC doesn’t have that dominant weaker division champion (not yet) or a three-deep stronger division. That second tier below Florida State and Clemson is more fluid.
Before explaining why Miami and Duke are the best choices as “season shapers” in the ACC, let’s explain why other teams fall just short of this designation.
Your mileage may vary here, but Pittsburgh and North Carolina appear to be the favorites in the ACC Coastal. They have both won at Georgia Tech. They both avoid Florida State and Clemson down the stretch. They meet just a week from now, meaning that if both teams avoid stumbles this weekend, the winner will become the clear target in the Coastal. A season shaper is generally not the divisional leader or favorite heading into November, although if we’re interested in a team which is third-best in its league, the Coastal champion — sliding behind Clemson and FSU — would get the bronze medal. It simply seems a little more determinative of the league’s depth to focus on the teams which will fill the middle slots in the Coastal. That’s likely to be Miami, Duke, and Virginia Tech.
Okay, you might ask, “Why is Virginia Tech not a season shaper?” The Pitt-UNC winner is too good to be a season shaper. Virginia Tech? Well, ummm…
… the Hokies don’t appear to be good enough to be a season shaper, though that verdict could still change.
The situation facing Virginia Tech is a grim one. By losing to Miami (in a game which involved some season-shaper stakes, to be honest), the Hokies have already lost to Pittsburgh and The U in their division. Virginia Tech would need to go at least 4-1 down the stretch to finish in the upper half of the ACC. There’s little room for error in Blacksburg, such that the Hokies don’t have much of a ceiling but are looking down at a very low floor.
With Duke and Miami, two “fork in the road” situations exist, and this is what the concept of a season shaper was made for.
Duke and Miami — with strong finishes — could dramatically recast the way in which they’re both seen. Neither team has lost a divisional game, so the road ahead is such that if the Blue Devils or Hurricanes catch fire, they could steal the Coastal under the rosiest of scenarios. Yet, if they plummet, they’ll drag the reputation of the Coastal with them. North Carolina and Pittsburgh currently appear to be too strong to drop to the lower reaches of the Coastal (though that verdict could change in a heartbeat), and Virginia Tech doesn’t have enough upside to shoot for. Only a 5-0 finish could profoundly change the way we see the Hokies at the end of the season.
Miami and Duke? These are the teams who have a real choice about how they — and the conference (and division) in which they play — will be evaluated by season’s end. Their seasons have not been soaring successes (Duke has played only one ACC Coastal game, so the Blue Devils would get an “incomplete” note on a report card at this midseason stage) or crushing failures (Miami can rescue itself in the coming weeks, regardless of whether you think that’s probable or not). They could lift the Coastal up or bring it down.
Shaping a season? Sure sounds like it.
