The ACC will never match the SEC in football. Not for any extended period of time, anyway.

But if Clemson had pulled off an upset of Alabama in Monday night’s National Championship Game, the silly finger twirling from Clemson fans the mind-numbing tomahawk chops from Florida State fans would have tortured SEC fans until next fall.

Laugh, all you want. And for the most part, it would be justified.

In most years, the ACC can’t compete with the SEC on the football field. Too many small schools with small stadiums, modest resources and a serious lack of football tradition.

Florida State and Clemson are the only ACC schools with football programs that would fit in the SEC. Georgia Tech, one of the ACC’s top football programs, dropped out of the SEC when it felt it could no longer compete. But it’s fared well in the ACC.

Still, the ACC has made waves in the last two years, sweeping the SEC 4-0 in intra-state rivalry games in 2014 and following up with a 3-1 record in the same games this season.

With the Crimson Tide’s 40-35 victory over Clemson, the SEC was 5-4 against the ACC in the 2015 season. Thanks to Alabama and Mississippi State, which routed N.C. State in the Belk Bowl, the SEC won two of three from the ACC in bowl matchups.

And during the regular season, SEC cellar dweller South Carolina beat ACC Coastal Division champion North Carolina. And Auburn, the last-place team in the SEC West, beat Louisville, the ACC’s fourth-best team.

But Florida State beat SEC East champion Florida. Louisville continues to dominate Kentucky and Clemson has reestablished its dominance over South Carolina after losing five straight to Steve Spurrier teams.

Only Georgia, which plays Georgia Tech, looks like a good bet to win the SEC-ACC rivalry games in the next few years. The other matchups favor the ACC — at least until Jim McElwain can fix the Florida offense.

So while the SEC obviously has more depth at the top and much more strength in the middle of its standings, the ACC should continue to pick up victories against the SEC.

The annual rivalry matchups make the head-to-head records deceptive. SEC teams aren’t playing Wake Forest, Duke, Boston College, Syracuse, Virginia very often. They’re playing Clemson and Florida State every year.

The ACC has its problems. To survive, it expanded into the Northeast, adding basketball schools such as Syracuse, Boston College for television markets, but further diluting its football strength. So far it’s gamble with another metro campus, Louisville (remember it’s the “Atlantic Coast” Conference), has turned out well.

Taking in Notre Dame for every sport except football, is an embarrassment none of the other Power 5 conferences would accept. In the four states where the SEC and ACC each have members, the SEC has the flagship university in all of them.

Florida State and Clemson are the only ACC schools with football programs that would fit into the SEC. They’re the only two ACC programs with the athletes necessary to get through the SEC meat grinder.

Still, the ACC has made waves in the last two years. The rivalry between the two Power 5 Southern conferences is heating up. It’s hard for the SEC to laugh at the ACC anymore. Especially on the last Saturday of the regular season.