CLEMSON — There is always that one voter in the preseason polls.
Do you know what I am talking about?
There is that one guy or lady who picks the team they are covering to win a conference championship in their respected preseason poll, though they know that team has no chance, in you know where, to win the conference title, yet they still do it.
A few years ago, someone picked South Carolina or Arkansas or someone like that to win the SEC when there was no chance that was going to happen. On Tuesday, someone did the same thing in the ACC.
Miami was picked to win the ACC Championship this year in the ACC’s preseason media poll, which 165 out of the 188 voters picked, including yours truly. However, for some reason, Stanford, who was picked to finish No. 17 (last place) in the preseason poll, garnered a first-place vote.
Stanford!? Yep! Stanford. Someone picked Stanford to win the league.
Ridiculous!
Luckily, it did not affect the voting. Stanford finished with 483 points, eight points behind Boston College’s 491 points for 16th place. For some reason, North Carolina tallied 831 points to finish in 15th place. I am not sure how that happened. For the record, I picked the Tar Heels last.
I did get 1,2, 3 and 4 correctly in the poll. I picked Miami to win it all, followed by SMU, Louisville and Clemson. I think most had that thought, though some did not considering Clemson received seven first place votes, followed by six for SMU, four for Louisville, three for Florida State and two for Georgia Tech.
You read that correctly. The Seminoles, and all of their chaos, received three first place votes. As for the Tigers, their preseason No. 4 position is their lowest in this poll since 2014.
Clemson tallied 2,520 points, just 49 below Louisville for third place.
Let’s be honest, though. Does any of this matter?
It does not.
Three times in the previous five years (2021,2023 and 2025), Clemson was predicted to win the ACC and we all know what happened in those years. In 2024, FSU was the preseason pick to win the ACC and they went 2-10.
So, there’s that.
Duke, by the way, was picked to finish sixth in last year’s preseason poll and it went on to win its first ACC Championship since 1989. Virginia, who the Blue Devils beat in the title game, was No. 14 in last year’s predictions.
The media has not been very good as of late predicting the ACC Champion. It has been wrong in four of the last five seasons. Only the 2022 Clemson team did it get correct.
So maybe there is hope for Stanford.