Here is a little exercise I did to weigh the strength of schedules for the 13 ACC softball teams, based on pre-season team rankings by the conference’s coaches.

Here were the pre-season rankings:
1 FSU
2 Clemson
3 VT
4 Duke
5 Notre Dame
6 Louisville
7 Georgia Tech
8 UNC
9 NC State
10 Virginia
11 Pitt
12 Syracuse
13 Boston College

Each team plays eight series (24 games) vs ACC teams and misses four ACC teams. To arrive at a point system for rating schedules, I assigned 1 point for playing the top-picked team and 13 points for playing the last place 13th pick. I rated the other teams with points equal to what place they were picked. Schedules are ranked below. TEAMS WITH THE HIGHER TOTAL POINTS WILL PLAY THE WEAKER ACC SCHEDULES, BASED ON THIS ANALYSIS. And teams with the lower total points theoretically play the tougher schedules.

The Hokies’ ACC schedule ties for 11th least-toughest. Pre-season favorite FSU ties for 11th with the Hokies.

Teams ranked by points in order of toughest ACC schedules:
45 Clemson
50 Pitt
51 UNC
52 Georgia Tech
52 Virginia
53 Syracuse
53 BC
56 Louisville
60 Notre Dame
61 NC State
63 VT
63 FSU
69 Duke

A key takeaway is that not only does Duke have the weakest overall ACC schedule in this measure, the fourth-picked Blue Devils do NOT face FSU or VT, two of the teams picked ahead of them. Duke does play Clemson but gets the Tigers in Durham. The next toughest series for Duke is at Notre Dame. Duke plays five of its eight ACC series against teams picked 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th and 13th, respectively, and three of those five at home! Duke closes its ACC schedule with consecutive series against BC (13th), UVA (10th), Syracuse (12th) and Pitt (11th). Soft.

FSU, tied with VT in theoretical schedule strength here, gets VT and Clemson at home.

VT plays: at Clemson (picked 2nd), Syracuse (12th), UNC (8th), at Pitt (11th), at FSU (1st), UVA (10th), Louisville (6th), at BC (13th).