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ACC preseason power rankings: Will anyone challenge Florida State, Clemson?

Published: Aug 23, 2024 · 9:17 AM EDT

The ACC is gearing up for a huge 2024 campaign after adding 3 new members this offseason.

There’s also several teams who have legitimate College Football Playoff aspirations entering the year now that the field has expanded to 12 teams. Florida State and Clemson, the top favorites to win the league, both have a lot to prove this fall. The same is true for Miami, who is hoping to have its best season of the Mario Cristobal era in 2024.

Without further adieu, here are Saturday Down South’s preseason ACC power rankings for the 2024 season:

17. Duke

No Mike Elko, no Riley Leonard, big problems. I think Manny Diaz is a good coach but I’m expecting this to be a complete rebuilding year in Durham.

16. Wake Forest

Wake Forest fell off big-time last year without Sam Hartman, and it’s still not clear if the Demon Deacons have a quarterback capable of running their offense the way that Dave Clawson wants it run. It’s hard to find a power-conference program that’s been hurt more by the transfer portal than Wake Forest over the past couple of seasons. I believe in Clawson as a coach, but we’ll see if Wake can get back up off the mat.

15. Virginia

Just when I was starting to believe that Virginia might be headed in the right direction, there’s been talk that the Cavaliers might try to redshirt Anthony Colandrea this season in favor of starting Tony Muskett at quarterback. Did no one at Virginia see how that plan worked out for NC State last season? Colandrea needs to be reigned in a bit, but he’d give Virginia a chance to win some games it otherwise has no business competing in. My opinion of this team will sway heavily based on who starts under center.

14. Stanford

I’m loosely buying Stanford to exceed expectations in the ACC this season, but the bar is relatively low there. The Cardinal have a win total of 3.5. I think they’ll go over but a bowl berth would be a big surprise.

13. Boston College

Thomas Castellanos emerged as one of the most fun quarterbacks in the ACC last season. His dynamic ability as a runner almost led BC to upsetting Florida State early in the year. How will his style mesh with new head coach Bill O’Brien? That’s very much an open question — and the main reason why I don’t have the Eagles any higher than this ranking.

12. Pitt

Pitt gets this spot because its defense should once again be at least competent under Pat Narduzzi’s direction. The offense has not been good since Kenny Pickett departed a couple of years ago, but Narduzzi seems to be listening to critics. He hired former Western Carolina OC Kade Bell to run the offense this offseason. Bell ran a high-tempo attack at Western Carolina and is expected to bring that approach to Pitt. Seeing how the program transitions to that style of offense will be one of the more interesting subplots in the early going of ACC play in 2024.

11. Cal

I prefer Cal over Stanford for this year when looking at the ACC’s new west-coast additions. The Golden Bears had a very solid offense last season — which is not normally how things go with the Golden Bears, at least in recent years. Their defense struggled mightily, however, but I trust Justin Wilcox to get that figured out pretty quickly.

10. Syracuse

Syracuse hired Fran Brown to be its head coach and got former Ohio State quarterback Kyle McCord out of the the transfer portal. There’s some legitimate reasons for optimism going into this season, but it’s still Year 1 of a rebuild.

9. North Carolina

Mack Brown can preach “complementary football” all he wants — everyone should be in wait-and-see mode with the Tar Heels. This is a program that has gone 5-9 from Oct. 20 onward over the past 2 years. And now Carolina is conducting a pretty uninspiring 3-way quarterback battle to replace Drake Maye. New defensive coordinator Geoff Collins does bring some credibility to UNC’s defense, but I’m not sure if there’s enough talent here to warrant much excitement about the 2024 version of this team.

8. Georgia Tech

I’m ready to give Haynes King and Georgia Tech the benefit of the doubt on this level: This offense is going to be fun. I can’t say much about the defense — especially considering the tough schedule the Yellow Jackets have to face this year), but the offense should keep this team in a lot of games. I wouldn’t completely dismiss a closer-than-expected game against Florida State in Dublin, either.

7. Louisville

Louisville reached the ACC Championship Game last season but didn’t have nearly enough offense to compete with Florida State in that contest. In comes quarterback Tyler Shough, who undoubtedly has been impressive when healthy during his college career. The problem is that he’s almost never been healthy. This will be his 7th season in college football. He’s never attempted 180 passes in a season. He’s thrown for 20 total touchdown passes over the last 3 years combined, and his yards-per-attempt numbers have fallen in each of those campaigns.

I’m sure Louisville’s defense will be fierce again, but I’m not at a point where I can consider Louisville a series contender in this league.

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6. SMU

I see SMU as a dark horse to compete for a spot in the ACC Championship Game. The Mustangs are 11th nationally in ESPN’s weighted returning production metric. Quarterback Preston Stone is back and is one of the more proven passers in this league entering the year. SMU also added some key power-conference transfers to help raise the baseline ahead of this transition to the ACC.

There’s a chance SMU’s defense is a touch overrated after playing in a weak AAC last season, but we won’t know for sure until late September/early October when the Mustangs face Florida State and Louisville in back-to-back weeks. If SMU can split those games, I think there’s a very good chance we see Rhett Lashlee’s team in the ACC Championship Game in December.

5. NC State

I’m not quite as high on NC State as some other prognostications for 1 simple reason: Payton Wilson isn’t here anymore. Last year’s Bednarik Winner is in the NFL now, and it seems incredibly unlikely that the Wolfpack will be able to replace his prodigious production in any meaningful way.

I’m also not sold on Grayson McCall at this point in his career. McCall was one of the most efficient quarterbacks in the country for Coastal Carolina back in 2021, but was something much less than that over the past 2 seasons. Maybe he’s a perfect fit in Robert Anae’s offense and he fulfills the potential that everyone saw in Brennan Armstrong a year ago. But I’m not ready to go there yet.

Still, Dave Doeren and his coaching staff deserve a lot of credit for the program they’ve built in Raleigh. NC State is not going to have a giant fall-off this season — its success has been much too sustainable for that. There’s definitely 10-win upside here if McCall is good.

4. Virginia Tech

Virginia Tech returns almost everyone from last year’s team. Brent Pry appears to have the Hokies ready to compete at a high level entering his third year with the program. Kyron Drones, however, will need to be better as a passer in order for Virginia Tech to meet these lofty expectations. He was an effective runner and did a good job of taking care of the ball, but 7.3 yards per attempt isn’t going to cut it for the Hokies if they want to be in the ACC Championship Game conversation.

With that being said, Virginia Tech’s schedule lines up very well for it to be nationally relevant into at least early November. The Hokies will host Clemson on Nov. 9, but that’s likely to be just their 2nd game of the season against a top-25 opponent (at Miami on Sept. 27 is the other). It’s possible Virginia Tech will be favored in as many as 10 games this season in Vegas.

Virginia Tech is 4th nationally in ESPN’s weighted returning production rankings. Breaking that down further, the Hokies are 2nd offensively and 13th defensively. That bodes well for a team that’s looking to take another big jump in 2024.

3. Miami

From a talent perspective, this is as low as Miami can be placed — and reasonable minds could argue the Canes should be at No. 1 or No. 2. But nothing is ever easy for Mario Cristobal or the Hurricanes, and I don’t expect that to change even if this is the ACC’s most talented roster in 2024. Cam Ward offers a major upgrade at quarterback for Miami, but he may not be as good as his public perception would lead you to believe. Ward finished 50th nationally last season in ESPN’s Total QBR stat, which includes his rushing contributions.

Defensively, Miami has to replace 2 elite safeties off of last season’s team in Kam Kinchens and James Williams — both of whom were picked in the 2024 NFL Draft. Miami will also be counting on several new transfers on its defensive front, although Rueben Bain is back to lead that unit after an outstanding freshman campaign.

The pieces are here for Miami to have the best season it’s had since it entered the ACC. Whether or not that comes to fruition is anyone’s guess.

2. Florida State

All credit to Florida State for its 13-0 start to last season, but the Noles lost a ton to the NFL this offseason on both sides of the ball. Mike Norvell and his staff did a solid job of replacing some of the pieces that left, but this will undoubtedly be a different team in 2024.

DJ Uiagalelei steps in as one of the top quarterbacks in the ACC entering the year — though that isn’t a tremendously-high bar to clear. The former Clemson QB had a nice rebound season at Oregon State in 2023 and figures to have a very strong supporting cast this season.

Still, I have some significant concerns about FSU’s offense. How will they replace Keon Coleman at Johnny Wilson at receiver? Why did the Noles have a rushing success rate in the 17th percentile last season and will that improve without Trey Benson? How will FSU’s offensive line gel with a pair of new starters at the guard spots? There’s enough questions here to keep Florida State out of the top spot in these preseason rankings, but the Noles certainly have the talent to win this league.

1. Clemson

There’s a lot of good and a lot of bad when it comes to Clemson, but I’m finding more reasons to be optimistic about the Tigers in 2024. For one thing, they were genuinely unlucky with regards to red zone turnovers last season, which contributed to multiple early-season losses. I think it’s fair to expect some positive regression in that department in 2024.

More tangibly, Clemson’s offense is a lot more experienced across the board than it was a year ago. It’s Year 2 in the Garrett Riley system for quarterback Cade Klubnik. Clemson’s wide receiver room looks like it’s the best it’s been in years. The offensive line is relatively strong. And defensively, Clemson has multiple potential All-ACC standouts to go along with one of the most-respected coordinators in the country in Wes Goodwin.

So what’s bad? Aside from Dabo Swinney’s controversial roster-building philosophies, Klubnik’s efficiency as a passer is the main thing that could hold Clemson back this year. Klubnik averaged just 6.3 yards per attempt last season, which is a long way off from even being mediocre at the Power-4 level. The supporting cast is good enough to make Clemson a legitimate threat to advance in the College Football Playoff, but Clemson needs Klubnik to level-up if it wants to get back on track this fall. This ranking is a vote of confidence that Klubnik will show some meaningful improvement this season.

Clemson is +350 to win the ACC over at FanDuel.

Spenser Davis

Spenser is a news editor for Saturday Down South and covers college football across all Saturday Football brands.