2026 College Football Preview: ACC

Photo from The ACC

God bless the World Cup, eh?

College football ended, leading us right into the NFL Playoffs.

Those ended, which led us right into baseball season and the end of the European soccer season.

That ended, which led us right into the World Cup.

And now, the World Cup is done, and we are just about one month away from College. Football. Season.

As with every year, we will go over every single conference, and put the teams into tiers.

There are the favorites, the dark horses, the bowl bound teams, and those who should probably just look forward to next season.

By my own rules I’ve made this year, there can only be one true favorite. So the favorites tier will be that, and that alone.

I’m also going to go in reverse order this year. Get the bad news out of the way early.

If you don’t like it, get your own website, doofus.

Let’s start it off with the ACC.

Better Luck Next Year

Stanford Cardinal

It’s been quite a bit of turmoil in Stanford’s short lived time in the ACC, and it continues this year with first year head coach Tavita Pritchard.

He’s a friend of Stanford general manager Andrew Luck, and while that’s all well and good, he’s never been a head coach at a major level.

And now he takes over a job that is incredibly difficult, and without much returning help.

Michigan transfer Davis Warren will be the QB for the Cardinal, and he never exactly lit the world on fire so far in his college career, so Pritchard will have a tall order on his hands.

Let alone basically a whole new defensive line.

It’s going to be a tough few years.

Boston College Eagles

Bill O’Brien’s tenure has been, let’s say, an abject disaster.

Despite a first year 7-6 and bowl game for the Eagles, they followed it up with a terrible 2-10 season, and an angry rant at a reporter.

Now, O’Brien has taken over play calling duties and is betting on himself and a bunch of G6 transfers to turn this thing around, including Saginaw Valley State QB Mason McKenzie.

That’s hard enough, but it’s even harder now that Sophomore tight end Kaelan Chudzinski is going to miss the season with an Achilles injury, and he was one of the bright spots of the Eagles last year.

I just don’t see how this team gets 6 wins.

North Carolina Tar Heels

Year one of the Bill Belichick era went pretty poorly in Chapel Hill.

It’d frankly be hard to get worse.

However, the defense was decent, Bobby Petrino comes into fray as the new offensive coordinator, and even though new transfer QB Billy Edwards doesn’t exactly build excitement, they do bring in three new tight ends and return Demon June at running back.

So this feels like an old school Bill Belichick “defense and ground game” type of team.

They could get to six wins.

That’s what I thought, anyway.

And then their GM Michael Lombardi was put on administrative leave, and defensive coordinator Steven Belichick is on medical leave, which I hope he returns from soon.

But it just turned into another messy offseason where we’re going to end up discussing more about things off the field than we are on the field.

I don’t love it.

Bowl Game Bound

Clemson Tigers

I said last year in my preview that this was the make or break year for Clemson.

They won the ACC two years ago, brought back a lot of players, including senior QB Cade Klubnik, and I said that this team needed to be the favorites in the ACC, or at least competing until the very end.

They weren’t.

They weren’t even close.

They went 7-6, and barely scraped into a bowl game.

Offensive coordinator Kendall Briles is gone, and Chad Morris is back.

Christopher Vizzina will take over for Klubnik at QB, and the roster is still good in terms of high school recruiting.

But they lost a ton of starters both offensively and defensively, and Dabo has shown no signs in the portal era of fixing that issue.

So yeah. I’ve hit my limit.

Clemson should make a bowl game, but I have no faith in them competing for the ACC.

I’m ready to be proven wrong.

California Golden Bears

Last year, Cal realized they hit a wall, and fired Justin Wilcox.

In steps Tosh Lupoi to take over for Cal after a stint as Oregon’s defensive coordinator, and improve on what was a solid 2025 season, all things considered.

Crucially, Cal was able to keep quarterback Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele in Berkley.

Having a talented Sophomore QB stay in the fold so that Lupoi can focus on a Cal defense that brings in lots of Oregon transfers in fold, and the Cal should see a solid bowl season once again.

Pittsburgh Panthers

Is Pitt good?

Hell if I know.

After their ACC title win in 2021, they followed that up with a 9-4 2022, but then a horrid 3-9 in 2023, but then a 7-0 start in 2024, only to lose their last 6 games, and then were 7-2 last season before ending the year 8-5.

Could they be dark horses? Sure!

Could they stink to high heavens? Absolutely!

One good bit for the Panthers is they have tons of experience and depth in the trenches, and bring back Mason Heintschel who had a solid year after taking over for Eli Holstein last season.

But then again, Eli Holstein was supposed to be the top guy last year before that fell apart, and Pitt has absolutely no continuity in terms of weapons.

All in all?

Expect a bowl, but don’t be stunned if it goes to either extreme.

NC State Wolfpack

That’s just what the Dave Doeren does.

14 years as head coach of the Wolfpack, and Doeren has boasted 10 seasons with a bowl.

11, if you count 2021 where they didn’t play a bowl due to COVID issues with UCLA, but went 9-3.

And they do return quarterback CJ Bailey and a strong offensive line.

So why aren’t they dark horses?

Because that’s what Dave Doeren does.

He gets you to a bowl.

He does not get you to a conference title game.

Syracuse Orange

Fran Brown was setting himself up as a star at Syracuse.

10 wins in year one, and a great start last year before QB Steve Angeli got hurt for the season against Clemson, and it all went to hell.

But this year, he brings in Malachi Nelson from UTEP, who has not come anywhere near his potential, but was still once a blue chip recruit, and Amari Odom from Kennesaw State, who just oversaw a C-USA title for the Owls to battle for the QB spot.

If one of them hits, I’ve seen nothing from Fran Brown’s tenure that makes me think this team won’t go bowling.

Wake Forest Demon Deacons

I thought Wake was going to stink to high heavens last year.

First year head coach with a bunch of new transfers at a football program that is far from a powerhouse.

And instead, Jake Dickert went 9-4 and made me look like an idiot.

The defense was outstanding, and returns guys like DE Langston Hardy and DB Davaughn Patterson.

But the offense wasn’t great, and now it starts over with Gio Lopez at QB after his horrendous season at UNC.

So I can’t give Wake the benefit of saying they’re dark horse contenders despite a weak ACC yet.

But if Dickert can make Lopez look like he did at South Alabama, maybe I’ll start to believe more going forward.

Florida State Seminoles

Three years ago, FSU went 13-0 and was wrongly left out of the college football playoff.

Two years ago, they went 2-10 with one FBS win.

Last year, they started hot with a huge upset win over Alabama, but a tough loss to Virginia in overtime led to a downward spiral leading them to go 5-7 and miss out on a bowl game.

Once again, Mike Norvell brings in a bunch of transfers to try to righten the ship.

Will he?

Hell if I know.

But maybe they’ll get that extra win to go bowling.

Dark Horses

Duke Blue Devils

Did they lose quarterback Darian Mensah to Miami? Yes

Did they go 7-5 last year? Also yes.

Is this still Duke FOOTBALL? Absolutely.

But they won the ACC title last year despite their 7-5 record (thank you, weird tiebreaker rules), and they return a dominant running game with Nate Sheppard, plus two transfers to carry some of the burden.

And as for the defense, I trust head coach Manny Diaz to make sure they’re up to snuff after a down year in which he started plenty of underclassmen.

So why can’t they do it again?

Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets

Brent Key is going to run the ball down your throats, and he is not going to give a damn about it.

And even though the Haynes King & Jamal Haynes are gone, the Jackets do bring another Haynes into the ground game with Justice Haynes as a transfer from Michigan, as well as Alberto Mendoza, the brother of Heisman Winning QB Fernando Mendoza, and the line brings back both tackles.

Brent Key has succeeded with a good ground game for years in Atlanta, and it looks like he’ll have another successful year.

Louisville Cardinals

Last year was supposed to be the year for Louisville.

Jeff Brohm had a very talented team and a weak ACC, but they had some shockingly weird losses at home to Virginia, Cal, and Clemson.

Now, the Cardinals once again have a very talented team, extremely good skill players like running back Isaac Brown and receivers Tre Richardson and Lawayne McCoy, and the ACC is, apart from the top team, once again weak.

The path to get to Charlotte is clear, much like it was the last two seasons.

Let’s see if they take it.

Virginia Cavaliers

Tony Elliott needed a great year to save his job last season, and boy oh boy did he get one, going 10-2 and heading to the ACC title game, where a win over Duke would have the Cavaliers in the college football playoff.

Unfortunately, they fell in overtime and missed out on the playoff, and now have to rebuild the entire team in the portal just like they did a year ago.

But hey, it doesn’t look so bad.

They bring in Beau Pribula from Missouri at QB, as well as Solomon Beebe from UAB at running back, and Da’Shawn Martin at WR from Kent State, all three of whom were excellent last year.

Granted, Florida State had one awesome year with the portal, has tried to continue it, and failed miserably.

But hey, if it hits, UVA should be right back in the mix of things come November.

Virginia Tech Hokies

I know.

This looks crazy.

But despite all the memes about James Franklin in big spots, he is still a damn good coach, and he also isn’t going to be in many big spots this year for the Hokies.

The only top team they’re scheduled to play is Miami, he brings a bunch of guys from Penn State with him like QB Ethan Grunkenmeyer, offensive coordinator Ty Howle, and his defensive coordinator is Brent Pry.

Brent Pry, if you don’t know, is the former Virginia Tech head coach who was fired last year.

Yep. He’s back, and he’s coaching the defense, and it’s a defense that he knows well with returning players like Kemari Copeland and Thomas Williams.

It sounds crazy, and it might be crazy, but I don’t see any reason why Virginia Tech can’t be really good, really quickly.

SMU Mustangs

SMU’s season, in my opinion, relies entirely on quarterback Kevin Jennings.

Two years ago, he was outstanding, and the Mustangs went to the playoffs.

Last year, he underperformed, and the Mustangs went 9-4, which is still good, but far from what they were expecting.

Now, he comes back with a new set of offensive coordinators, and the defensive side has new coordinators as well.

And yes, I said coordinators.

Both sides of the ball have co coordinators.

It kind of sounds like a mess, to be honest.

But hey, if it works, the talent is there to compete.

Playoff Bound

Notre Dame Fighting Irish

Yes, I know Notre Dame isn’t in the ACC.

But there are only two independents left in college football, and I didn’t know where to put them for a preview, so to the ACC they go.

Obviously, they can’t win the conference title, but they absolutely can compete for the playoff.

CJ Carr might be the best QB in college football, the defense returns tons of starters, and even though the Irish lost both of their running backs to the NFL, the running game has never been an issue with the Irish, so Aneyas Williams should have a big year as well.

Last year, the Irish started with two close losses to two playoff teams, but started to play their best football down the stretch, and likely could have made a lot of noise in the playoffs had they gotten in.

So this year, they’ll be prepared to hit the ground running, and I expect them to.

The Favorites

Miami Hurricanes

The national runners up return with a score to settle.

The offense should be outstanding once again, with transfer quarterback Darian Mensah and stud wide receiver Malachi Toney, as well as transfer receiver Cooper Barkate from Duke.

And while the defensive line lost so much talent to the NFL, and that may be the difference between Miami being title contenders and just a playoff team, but they are far and away the best team in the ACC, and anything less than a conference title should be considered a failure.

Well, unless they miss out and go to the title game like they did last year.

That wouldn’t be so bad, I guess.