The ACC coaches are going through ESPN's "car wash" this week, offering even more comments on the game's most controversial topics. For some coaches, these appearances are just a retread of issues discussed at media days earlier this month. For others, it's a chance to make some headlines with your two cents.
Clemson coach Dabo Swinney stepped up on Monday, joining Gary Pinkel in the call for Notre Dame to play a schedule that more closely resembles its fellow Power Five schools that are actually full members of Power Five conferences. Gary Pinkel said the Irish shold have to "join a league."
Dabo Swinney agrees w/Gary Pinkel: “Absolutely Notre Dame needs to be in conference or play 13 games to be in @CFBPlayoff"
— Brett McMurphy (@McMurphyESPN) July 27, 2015
Swinney took it a step further, conceding that the Irish may want to keep their partial ACC membership (independence, really) for football but suggesting they have to play a 13th game. That way, all of the teams competing for the College Football Playoff spots would have played the same number of games.
When the margin for error is so small, you could argue that avoiding a conference title game helps Notre Dame in that it increases the probability of an undefeated or one-loss regular season versus those teams coming the ACC, SEC, Big Ten and Pac-12.
Unfortunately for Swinney and Pinkel, Notre Dame has stood almost like a conference unto itself during the formation of the College Football Playoff, with athletic director Jack Swarbrick standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the Power Five conference commissioners. It's hard to turn back now, and Notre Dame isn't rushing to end its independence when it already arranged a scheduling agreement with the ACC through 2025 -- which also happens to be about the same time the College Football Playoff will be entering its second contract.
