CLEMSON — Why does the ACC make everything so hard?

If you do not know what I am talking about, the conference announced on Tuesday its plan to begin a nine-game schedule inside the league. The problem, however, is that 12 of the 17 football members will play nine games, while the other five play eight for the 2026 season.

Of course, Clemson is one of those five teams. Reportedly, the Tigers will be the only team in the ACC to play eight games in 2027, due to prior scheduling commitments in non-conference games with Notre Dame and South Carolina.

What the league does after 2027, I have no idea.

Granted, the ACC had no choice in the matter. If it wants to keep up with the Jones and create more revenue for its league members, it had to try and create a nine-game schedule.

The problem is it has 17 teams because Notre Dame will not man up and join the league as a football member. The Irish, I believe, cause more of a headache than they help in their relationship with the league.

But that is a column for another day.

Today is about the ACC, and what it is trying to do.

So next year, five teams—Boston College, Clemson, Florida State, Georgia Tech and North Carolina—will play eight conference games, while the other 12 play nine.

How is that going to work?

The league says it will release its new tiebreaker policies at a later time. But what can those be.

If one team is 8-1 (.888) in league play and the other is 7-1 (.875) then the team with an 8-1 record has a better win percentage. It is what it is, right?

Do you really need a tiebreaker for that, but the question is, will it be fair?

And that answer is likely, no.

Because the ACC has most of the conference playing nine games and the rest playing eight, it is not going to end well for the ACC.

Remember what just happened? Duke won the ACC, despite going 8-5 (6-2 ACC), because it won a crazy tiebreaker. It was the seventh tiebreaker, I believe, on the list.

It cost the ACC an automatic qualifier in the College Football Playoff because the conference champion was ranked lower in the CFP standings than two Group of 5 Champions.

That is embarrassing ACC.

Now you are risking a Clemson or Florida State team from getting in the CFP next year because of a tiebreaker that will likely give more credence to the team playing more games.

Remember, Notre Dame was punished this year by the CFP because it did not have that extra data point for playing in a conference title game. Clemson could be Notre Dame in the future.

Clemson could be Notre Dame the next two years, unless it wins all of its conference games. But then again, isn’t 9-0 better than 8-0?

What does the conference do if three teams are undefeated and two teams are 9-0 and one is 8-0?

What’s the ACC doing?

The ACC needs to make Notre Dame join the conference full-time or go find someone else who can. But that is the problem, right? Notre Dame is too valuable to the ACC to lose.