The 2024 college football season is set to begin in just a few days, and two members of a major conference have tried to battle the league in the courtroom.
Florida State and Clemson are each involved in legal issues with the ACC. Florida State is challenging the ACC’s grant of rights, and a court ruled in favor of the conference when Clemson attempted to do the same earlier this year.
With the legal battles in mind, ACC commissioner Jim Phillips warned the two schools this week.
“It’s a harmful, kind of, situation. But we’re going to do just that. We’re going to fight. And that’s the way it should be,” Phillips said in a Tuesday appearance on ESPN’s “SportsCenter.”
“When you sign an agreement twice — willingly sign — and that you are part of a group that comes together and decides this is what you want to do for the next 20 years, you should be held accountable for that.”
Phillips then shifted his focus to the upcoming football season, where the ACC will look to get back into the College Football Playoff after an undefeated Florida State was excluded last year.
“Some of the legal conversations and some of the dynamics around these cases has taken away from the ACC, taken away the incredible success that our student-athletes are having in the sport of football and across all 28 of our sports,” Phillips said on ESPN.
“With the kickoff this weekend, we can maybe put the legal side — legal issues to the side and we can focus on what young men and women are doing on the competitive playing field with our fall sports.”
Florida State will be competing in the marquee game of college football’s Week 0, as the No. 10-ranked Seminoles will take on ACC foe Georgia Tech on Saturday in Dublin, Ireland.
Florida State and Clemson are set to play each other on October 5 in Tallahassee.