The Thanksgiving holiday provided a welcome respite from conference realignment rumors, but with turkey day in the rearview mirror the conference carousel is starting back up with a vengeance.
CBS reporter Jeremy Fowler was the first to check in, sending out a report yesterday that the ACC was likely to expand this week, but that the conference was unlikely to go past 14 teams. That timeline would seem to dovetail with the notion that the ACC would wait until it's regularly scheduled meetings around the ACC Championship game -- which will be played Saturday -- to make a decision.
However the fact that only one team may be picked is a lot less friendly than the everybody (except USF) is happy and singing kumbabya rumor from last week that UConn, Louisville and Cincinnati could all get invited together. That means it's once again down to UConn and Louisville. Both schools apparently have a few things working in their favor, but Fowler did indicate that UConn might have a few more advantages:
A prominent official from an ACC school told me Louisville and UConn both have something to offer but stressed academics will matter to presidents. This favors UConn, widely considered a top-75 national university. The Hartford area also is larger than Louisville's, but the Cardinals have a strong football/basketball product and aggressive AD Tom Jurich.
That doesn't mean we'll be getting news today or tomorrow though. Brett McMurphy, the godfather of realignment reporting, made it sound like rumors (or hopes) of an immediate answer aren't something to hang your hat on:
Nope, but I have bad hearing RT @timprince3: hearing the rumors about acc making an announcement tomorrow?
— Brett McMurphy (@McMurphyESPN) November 26, 2012
That doesn't mean something won't happen this week, but it probably means there might be a few more days for everyone to be on pins and needles.
So in summation: I hope you enjoyed the break from all of this, because we'll probably be hearing a lot about it in the next few days and it could get very, very stressful.