The ACC announces changes to its future regular-season football schedule model

Every decision that conferences make regarding football are aimed at putting its programs in a better position to compete for a spot in the annual College Football Playoffs.

The Atlantic Coast Conference made a major announcement on Monday, revealing that the conference's Athletic Directors "overwhelmingly" voted in favor of a new regular-season schedule model.

While there are still plenty of details to iron out (especially given that the league currently features 17 participants and doesn't match up in terms of scheduling), here's what we know:

The new schedule model features nine conference games per season. Each program must play a minimum of 10 games each year against Power 4 opponents. This makes the ACC one of two leagues who are committed to having every team play a minimum of 10 Power 4 games per season.

Sure, teams love to schedule opponents from lower levels of Division I college football early in the season to serve as a "preseason tune up" of sorts. However, these games do nothing in terms of strength of schedule, especially when you end up losing these games you were heavily favored to win.

With this change, programs are going to have to play higher levels of competition, as the goal is to ultimately make the conference stronger throughout.

For the UNC football program, they have a trip to Ireland scheduled to play TCU and a non-conference game against Notre Dame (remember, they are an independent in football) on the slate as well. The bout against the Fighting Irish might make an impact as to how many conference games are played for the Tar Heels in 2026 when this change is expected to come into effect.

The schedule change makes a lot of sense for the Atlantic Coast Conference. While the conference has fallen behind a bit in terms of competitiveness, this change should help them make up some ground as they look to narrow the gap between the likes of the SEC and the Big Ten.