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Two years ago, Florida State sued its own conference and completely trashed new Atlantic Coast Conference mate Stanford in the process. After completing a 13-0 season in 2023 that somehow saw them left out of the four-team College Football Playoff (questionably snubbed for a one-loss Alabama team), the Seminoles filed a lawsuit that claimed the ACC’s then-planned additions of Stanford, Cal and SMU were set to make any future CFP bids harder for the conference’s top contenders. The Seminoles claimed they would “dilute” and “diminish” the ACC in the future and damaged the conference’s “already deemed inadequate” strength of schedule metrics. On Saturday, Florida State failed to beat the same Stanford team that would “dilute” and “diminish” the ACC after the Cardinal stood strong at the goal line on the final play to pull off a 20-13 win that left the mighty Seminoles tied for last in the 17-member conference with an 0-4 record in ACC games behind third-place SMU (5-2 overall, 3-0 in conference), seventh-place Cal (5-2, 2-1) and ninth-place Stanford (3-4, 2-2). Advertisement Article continues below this ad This also comes after after a brutal 2024 campaign in which Florida State went a nightmarish 2-10 overall and 1-7 in ACC play, with their only win coming in a five-point triumph over the Golden Bears in Tallahassee. Meanwhile, the conference saw two schools make the new 12-team CFP: Clemson and SMU, one of those same new schools the Seminoles feared would hurt the conference. “This will necessarily handicap ACC members vying for a position in future CFPs against peers from the other Power Four conferences, including peers with inferior won-loss records,” Florida State’s lawsuit read in 2023. “Perhaps the most telling metric of the lack of media caché those new ACC members carry, one has forfeited all media payments otherwise due it as a ‘member’ of the ACC, while the other two forfeited approximately 66% of that payout … for the next several years.” Longtime ACC power Clemson also filed a lawsuit against the conference that mirrored Florida State’s. Both of those schools’ arguments lacked logic at the time, especially as the CFP planned to expand to 12 teams moving forward. Clemson also has a worse conference record this season than SMU, Cal and Stanford, and a matching 3-4 overall record to the Cardinal. Advertisement Article continues below this ad In fact, SMU just went to Clemson and crushed the Tigers (35-24), while Cal bested Bill Belichick’s struggling North Carolina team (which included a hard trolling of Belichick) to turn in Justin Wilcox’s best start to a season in Berkeley ever. Stanford, meanwhile, helped kick off a bit of a tailspin for the Seminoles. Rumors about Florida State firing head coach Mike Norvell were flying on Sunday despite what the Tallahassee Democrat reported is a $59.2 million buyout — which would be the second-highest buyout payment ever handed out in college football history. On Monday, FSU athletic director Michael Alford issued a statement saying Norvell’s status would be determined after the season ends. Hopefully the Seminoles — who are 1-11 in conference in the past two seasons — don’t “dilute” or “diminish” the conference more until then. More College Sports — Bay Area college won't bring sports back despite $45M cash infusion — Calif. university says no to nearly $9M raised to save swim programs — Cal replaces scandal-ridden AD with people involved in all the same scandals — Stanford fires football coach who was initially kept despite investigations Full college sports coverage For all of our Bay Area sports coverage, sign up for The Catch newsletter here.
