$70 million in extra revenue for ACC if Stanford, Cal, and SMU join the conference with adequate votes: Reports

The move to expand by the ACC appears very much alive following its initial failure. The conference leadership is considering bringing in Stanford, Cal and SMU to ensure a much stronger league and keep up with the competition in the Power Five landscape.

The potential for expansion in the Atlantic Coast Conference remains valid as league administrators have introduced new financial models into discussion. The projections indicate an annual increase of more than $70 million in media revenue for the conference should ESPN fulfill its obligation.

However, the right amount of votes is still needed among existing members to ratify expansion. Four universities within the league have maintained opposition against the possibility of expansion, but only one of them has to flip its initial decision to get the required 75% votes.

The financial concession from ACC expansion candidates to benefit existing members

The three candidates for the current wave of ACC expansion are offering huge financial concessions to be admitted into the league. This is in a bid to attain and retain Power Five status in the realm of college sports on the part of the expansion candidates.

SMU has offered not to receive anything from media revenue distribution in their first seven years in the league. Stanford and Cal, on the other hand, will receive around 30% of the media revenue due to them in the same period of time. This will in turn benefit the current members of the league.

Following the deduction of what is due to Stanford and Cal in the extra $70 million from ESPN after concession is taken into account, there's a monetary pool worth around $55 million to be redistributed among the current teams, leading to an extra source of revenue for the teams over the next seven years.

The model for the distribution of the money is still under discussion within the leadership of the league. It is expected that the model to be agreed upon will be competitive merit-based, which rewards the best-performing teams in the league.

Will the monetary pool convince a vote flip?

Ensuring there's a vote flip is the ultimate goal of the ACC as it progresses on the expansion plan. Florida State, Clemson, North Carolina and North Carolina State haven't shown any sign of reneging on their initial decisions of not supporting an expansion.

However, with a financial benefit coming from the expansion, it remains to be seen whether one of the teams will be convinced to vote yes. There's an expectation that the flip will likely come from either North Carolina or North Carolina State.