between the ACC and Big Ten and SEC. Conference membership and the ACC lagging behind in setting up a sports network doomed the ACC's chances. As everyone knows (as it has been mentioned on this board since its first day) the formula for conference revenue success is in bringing in large state universities invested in football. The ACC's overload of private universities doomed the ACC's chances of ever getting the revenue that the Big Ten and SEC receive. Plus the ACC has Louisville, Pittsburgh, and Georgia Tech who take a back seat to their state rivals playing either in the SEC or Big 10. It's okay to have one private like Vanderbilt or Northwestern but not one-third of its membership that the ACC has. Having South Carolina and Maryland depart didn't help. Adding BC doesn't seem like a good move after observing them for 15 years in the conference. Pitt doesn't even have a campus football stadium. They can't even paint the ACC logo on their field because the Steelers play there. Duke has a good football coach but it appears their program has hit their ceiling and Duke is always going to be Dook when it comes to passion for big time college football. Wake's best crowds are when they're hosting Clemson, NC State, FSU or Tech. Miami's fans only show up if they're in the Top 10 and that hasn't happened much since they join the conference. I doubt anything will change and the ACC is stuck with its 14.5 member institutions. IMHO, the best that Jim Phillips can do is to prevent the revenue gap from getting larger. Also mentioned on this board a million times, FSU, Miami, UNC, Tech, and a few other ACC schools need to have perennial Top 25 programs. Clemson has been carrying the conference for some time now like FSU did before the conference expanded to 11.