1. UNC. The athletic programs in general at UNC are slime incarnate. The old-boy behind the scenes ACC corruption flavor is far more insidious than the thug/bling ethos of Miami, which at least is right-up-in-your-face "honest". UNC tried harder than anyone else to keep VT out of the ACC. UNC is also a direct recruiting threat in VT base areas, with the under-the-table money to back it up. All this program aggression, yet their (football) fan base can't match it by showing up at games.

2. Pitt. Not a slime program like UNC, but Narduzzi is the most hateful active coach in the league. His presence alone is enough to place Pitt near the top of this list in my book. Plus as a VT fan, I'm simply sick to death of the program. Years ago, Walt Harris just had VT's number and I'm just not over it. I'd be more than happy to see Pitt go find an athletic home in some other conference.

3. Miami. The aforementioned thug/bling philosophy is enough to place Miami on the bad side of this list, but there's a few leavening factors. VT/Miami has been a long-standing and flavorful rivalry which predates ACC days. No Carolina mafia overtone here. Coach Manny Diaz is a pretty good guy (though I also think the Canes fans don't like that). And I still remember Cane of NY, a reminder that there's good guys even in a swamp like Miami.

4. UVa. OK, these guys are our traditional rivals, with a healthy dose of culture conflict to boot. There's enough of all that to ensure there will be enough friction to keep the rivalry interesting. But the Hoos run programs light-years higher on the propriety scale than UNC. And we should never forget that UVa directly advocated for VT at conference expansion time. If UVa manages to legitimately beat VT in football one of these days, it will suck -- but I would give a tip of the hat just the same.

5. Duke. That loss last week was entirely on VT, not Duke going for the RUTS. The Dookies were just doing their job. Unlike Krzysewski's bball program which is infinitely irritating, they've got a fine, upstanding football coach. It's a miracle Cutcliffe has been able to bring that team this far considering what he has to work with. The biggest black mark Duke has from a VT standpoint is that they're still administratively part of the Carolina mafia.

6. Georgia Tech. Up through last year, the presence of Paul Johnson (most hateful ACC coach of all time) would have landed GT well up this list in Pitt territory. But really other than Johnson, GT hasn't got too much to hate. It's basically an engineering school like VT, but in a completely different (urban) environment. They have been the victims of the Carolina bias before, just like VT. Now that Cyrano Jones is gone off the GT sideline, we can breathe a sigh of relief from the triple option.