the strategy advanced by Jim Valvano and the 1983 Wolfpack basketball team. That is to say their strategy has always been to extend the game(i.e., their existence) on the off chance an opponent would make a mistake. The dye was cast for the ACC a long time ago with the Big State universities rolling in to the Big10, SEC and PAC 12 along with the forerunners of the current Big 12(SWC and Big 8).

As a mix of some state universities and some smaller private institutions the ACC has to be strategically adept at extending the game until there is (1) a real chance to go big (2) a niche with the big boys they can settle in to or (3)an exit strategy that gets conference members to their best combined landing spots. So far they have outlasted the SWC, the Big East, the Big 8 and now possibly the Big 12 along with substantially improving their position relative to the PAC12. That leaves the Big10 and SEC, two formidable competitors, that likely due to demographics would have been a pipe dream even from the beginning.