One of the little slivers of minutiae that never really got brought up much in the last year but nonetheless seemed quite interesting was what sort of impact the ACC’s expansion to 14 teams (and the expansion of the conference schedule to nine games was just what is the fate of Maryland’s 2013 and 2014 games against Virginia Tech?
Based on the old ACC scheduling rotation, the Hokies and Terrapins were to meet next year for the first time since 2009. That game was to be in Blacksburg.
SEE RELATED:
More notable is the 2014 Maryland home game the Terrapins agreed to move to Baltimore’s M&T Bank Stadium.
The ACC has not unveiled its 14-team schedule rotation, which on the surface seems like it could endanger that Maryland-Virginia Tech game in Baltimore (if not the entire home-and-home).
Maryland athletic director Kevin Anderson shed some light on the situation during an interview in his office last week in one of the moments when we weren’t directly discussing football season ticket sales:
PS: On the point of the Virginia Tech game [in Baltimore in 2014], because of the fact two teams come in and it’s a nine-game schedule, is that game in danger as far as you know of of being played or not?
KA: No.
PS: It is definitely going to be played in [2014]?
KA: The schedule is what the schedule is with the ACC now and nobody’s told me it will be any different. One of the reasons with the Virginia Tech [game] and why we’re doing this is we would play them two times at home so we thought to bring that to Baltimore would be a good thing. I don’t think we would have done the deal had it been different.
PS: Had you guys not played them here in ’05 and ’09?
KA: Correct.
So there it is. If for whatever reason that 2014 game is in any jeopardy, Anderson says he has yet to hear about it. Considering the boost (both financially and intangibly) Maryland hopes to get from moving both that game and next year’s meeting with West Virginia into M&T Bank Stadium, the Terps seem like they will avoid the most obvious potential scheduling foible they might have encountered thanks to ACC expansion.
—- Patrick Stevens
