Notre Dame says jump. ACC asks how high. Inside college football's most dysfunctional relationship

Matt Hayes, USA TODAYFri, May 15, 2026 at 9:13 AM UTC

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Notre Dame says jump. ACC asks how high. Inside college football's most dysfunctional relationship

AMELIA ISLAND, FL – The dynamics of it all are just so odd and off-putting, it's uncomfortable to watch it play out.

One side gets what it wants without a hint of guilt in the surreal marriage between Notre Dame and the ACC. The other plays the role of sorry sod while being blamed for all shortcomings.

Guess who's who in this narcissistic relationship?

“What does (Notre Dame) have to do for someone in this conference to get pissed off?” an ACC coach told USA TODAY Sports earlier this week during the league’s annual spring meetings.

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We now know, unequivocally, what Notre Dame can do: Insult the ACC, and blame the conference for the Irish not being selected to the College Football Playoff in 2025.

It can have athletic director Pete Bevacqua declare five months ago there is “permanent damage to the relationship between Notre Dame and the conference” — then stroll the halls of the swanky Ritz-Carlton resort this week and reaffirm a relationship that’s “incredibly strong.”

All while the ACC doesn’t take punitive action for behavior unbecoming a league member, or that endangers the good standing of the conference. The same, basic don’t-say-anything-stupid deal every FBS conference tells every member institution.

Only Notre Dame isn’t technically a member of the ACC in football. It just receives five football games annually from an absurd agreement between the parties ― one that allows Notre Dame to keep every cent of its booming media rights deal with NBC.

The way Notre Dame sees it, if anyone is getting a deal in this marriage, it's the ACC.

In exchange for Notre Dame — in its infinite grace, no less — allowing the ACC to give the Irish five football games, the Irish will bless the ACC with its conference presence (see: affiliation) in Olympic sports. Notre Dame, you see, is allowing the ACC access to its orbit, and who wouldn't want that?

A therapist would have a field day with this relationship.

The ACC didn’t fine Notre Dame — there’s zero chance another conference school could claim “permanent damage” and not get fined — for its insufferable insubordination in December.

Didn’t blink when Notre Dame — after it lost to Miami in the regular season and had the same record as Miami at the end of the 2025 season — believed it should’ve been selected to the CFP, and blamed the ACC for a lack of support. Whatever that means.

In fact, five months after the fact, ACC commissioner Jim Phillips — truly one of the good dudes in the sport who inherited an untenable situation — said Wednesday that “Notre Dame was a CFP-worthy team in 2025.”

How disgustingly offensive and one-sided can this relationship get?

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What’s next, Notre Dame demanding it doesn’t have to play Miami after this season? Or it won’t play SMU, the next program on the rise in the conference?

Or worse, it chooses who it plays and where it plays — including a couple of neutral site road games (see: ACC home games) sold to Amazon or Netflix or Apple. If you don’t think that’s coming, you clearly haven’t been following this submissive relationship.

Notre Dame speaks, the ACC jumps.

Because if it wasn’t that way, the ACC would’ve fined Notre Dame and told them the same thing the CFP selection committee told the Irish.

You lost to Miami. Deal with it.

And if Notre Dame wasn’t happy with that setup, go sell your narcissistic relationship to the Big 12. Because the Big Ten and SEC aren’t buying it, either.

That, everyone, is the craziest part of this dysfunctional deal. The ACC thinks it has no power when it clearly does.

Notre Dame says more than 90% of its ACC road games are sold out. Great, how about those TV ratings that drive the engine of the sport?

The Irish had two top-50 rated games in 2025, and one was against Miami. The other was against Texas A&M, and despite what Domers think, that game was a ratings hit because Texas A&M is ascending under coach Mike Elko — and Texas A&M is a member of the SEC.

You remember the SEC, right? Merely the biggest, baddest television property in college football. By a long, long way.

The SEC may have forgotten how to win a national title, but the difference between the collective SEC and everyone else in television ratings — including the Big Ten — is night and day.

Two years ago, Notre Dame used those five ACC games to bolster its resume and reach the CFP, and advanced to the championship game with an impressive run of wins over Indiana, Georgia and Penn State.

Then came the national title game against Ohio State, one of the top three television draws in college football. The game averaged 22.1 million viewers, and was the fifth-least watched national title game since 1998.

Meanwhile, the ACC is walking on eggshells around Notre Dame, afraid of its own shadow ― and certainly afraid to stand up for itself.

A therapist would have a field day with this relationship.

Matt Hayes is the senior national college football writer for USA TODAY Sports Network. Follow him on X at @MattHayesCFB.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Notre Dame, ACC is the most unhealthy relationship in college sports

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