CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The ACC is changing its conference championship tiebreaker policy.
Head-to-head matchups will remain the top tiebreaker, followed by winning percentage, but subsequent tiebreakers involving three or more teams will be settled by which team ranks highest in Sport Source Analytics’ Team Success Ranking, which is one of the metrics used by the College Football Playoff committee.
Last year, the league needed its seventh tiebreaker to settle a five-way tie for second place in the conference standings at 6-2. Miami, which later reached the national championship game after earning the last at-large bid in the College Football Playoff, was excluded from the title game in favor of Virginia and Duke. Miami was ranked No. 12 in the penultimate CFP rankings and moved up to No. 10 after being idle on championship week, edging out Notre Dame. The Hurricanes had trailed the Irish in every CFP poll but the last one, despite beating the Irish 27-24 in Miami in Week 1.
ACC champion Duke did not qualify for the field after finishing below Sun Belt champion James Madison in the final CFP poll.
ACC commissioner Jim Phillips said that no team will be “rewarded or penalized” for how many conference games it played. This year, the ACC begins a new scheduling system in which 12 of the league’s 17 teams will play nine conference games and the other five (Boston College, Clemson, Florida State, Georgia Tech and North Carolina) will play eight because of pre-existing nonconference games against power conference opponents.
Beginning in 2027, all but one ACC team will play nine conference games. The team playing eight conference games will rotate each year.
The imbalanced number of conference games has the potential to cause some quirkiness. While the teams will be ordered by winning percentage in the conference standings, the number of wins or losses could trigger the need for a tiebreaker. For example: a 7-1 team (.875 winning percentage) would be ahead of a 7-2 (.779) team in the standings, but those teams could tie for the second spot in the ACC title game behind an undefeated first-place team because of the equal number of victories. Or an 8-1 team (.889) could land in a tiebreaker with a 7-1 team.
Last December, Phillips said the league would examine its tiebreaker policies, and the league’s leadership has spent time in the seven months since assessing its options. One popular option that would boost the league’s odds of sending its champion to the College Football Playoff field is using the final CFP rankings as a tiebreaker. However, those rankings aren’t released until Tuesday of championship week, meaning the ACC’s title game participants wouldn’t be decided until then.
College Football Playoff selection rules provide five spots in the field for the five highest-ranked conference champions. Miami’s exclusion from the ACC title game after losing the tiebreaker last year paved the way for two Group of 6 conference champions to be included in the 12-team Playoff field for the first time. James Madison and American champion Tulane were both included in the field. Both teams lost first-round road games, with the Dukes losing at Oregon 51-34 after trailing 34-6 at halftime. Tulane lost 41-10 at Ole Miss.
Miami beat Texas A&M in College Station in the first round and beat Ole Miss 31-27 two rounds later to advance to the title game, where it lost 27-21 to Indiana.
The full text of the conference’s new tiebreaker procedures:
1. Defining Tied Teams:
a. Step 1: Identify the team or teams with the best Conference win percentage; plus,
b. Step 2: Any team or teams which played an alternate number of Conference games and have either the same number of Conference wins or the same number of Conference losses as the team(s) identified in Step 1.
c. No other teams may be defined as Tied Teams.
2. Once the Tied Teams have been identified:
a. In the event of a tie involving teams which played an alternate number of Conference games, all ties will be broken starting with the highest win percentage, working downward.
b. Two-Team Tie
i. The tied team which defeated the other tied team in head-to-head Conference competition.
ii. The tied team with the better ranking in the Team Success Ranking provided by SportSource Analytics following the conclusion of all regular-season games.
iii. The participant shall be chosen by a draw as administered by the Commissioner or Commissioner’s designee.
c. Three (or More) Team Tie
i. If all the Tied Teams are common opponents:
1. The Tied Team with the best record among the Tied Teams; if necessary, the tiebreaker will restart, including the definition of tied teams.
2. The Tied Team with the best ranking in the Team Success Ranking provided by SportSource Analytics following the conclusion of regular-season games; if necessary, the tiebreaker will restart, including the definition of tied teams.
3. The participant shall be chosen by a draw as administered by the Commissioner or Commissioner’s designee; if necessary, the tiebreaker will restart, including the definition of tied teams.
ii. If all the Tied Teams are not common opponents:
1. The Tied Team which defeated each of the other Tied Teams is placed into the Championship Game and removed from the tie. The tied team which lost to each of the other Tied Teams is removed from the tie; if necessary, the tiebreaker will restart, including the definition of tied teams.
2. The Tied Team with the best ranking in the Team Success Ranking provided by SportSource Analytics following the conclusion of regular-season games is placed into the Championship Game and removed from the tie; if necessary, the tiebreaker will restart, including the definition of tied teams.
3. The participant shall be chosen by a draw as administered by the Commissioner or Commissioner’s designee; if necessary, the tiebreaker will restart, including the definition of tied teams.
