Richard and Alex preview 2025 in the Atlantic Coast Conference, discussing the league in the following order:

* Clemson, now with a light sprinkling of transfers, has every ingredient

* Miami’s defense should finally arrive, but will Mario Cristobal come through on the margins?

* Louisville has both of us excited

* SMU is graded on a different curve now, and on that curve, it has work to do

* Georgia Tech is in its best spot since we started podcasting

* Duke might be a better team … with a worse record

* Florida State (coming off a 2-10 season with one FBS win over Cal by five points)

* North Carolina is one of the ACC’s more interesting teams even before you get to the Belichick of it all

* Pitt has offensive firepower, elite linebackers, and a lot to figure out anyway after sputtering to end 2024

* Virginia Tech isn’t out of reasons for optimism, but it’s getting there

* NC State shows worrying signs of a program in decline, but does have a QB of the future

* Syracuse gets a bad schedule draw and will decline in Fran Brown’s second year

* Boston College shows good and bad signs under Bill O’Brien

* Virginia has certainty at QB and uncertainty at a lot of other places

* Cal appears to be heading toward the end with Justin Wilcox

* Wake Forest straps in for a rebuild

* Stanford is interesting for the long term, but check back after 2025

Then we share our nominees for preseason awards: the SZD Dude of the Year, the Low-Key Cool Game of the Year, the Minority Coach of the Week In an Interesting Schematic Spot (of the Year), and the Coach Who’s Not Gonna Be Here Next Year. Producer: Anthony Vito.

Catch up on all of our 2025 previews

We already have previews available for the following conferences:

* Conference USA

* Big 12

* MAC

* Pac-12 and FBS independents

* Sun Belt

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College Football Previews 2025: The ACC

Split Zone Duo: College Football Podcast