Atlantic Coast Conference Announces Bowl Pairings

Dec. 1, 2004

Greensboro, NC — – The Atlantic Coast Conference, in conjunction with the Toyota Gator Bowl and the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl, confirmed today that its top three bowl games will be filled by Miami, Virginia Tech and Florida State.

The winner of Saturday’s Virginia Tech at Miami game will receive the conference’s Bowl Championship Series (BCS) bid. Should Virginia Tech win, the 10th-ranked Hokies would be the conference’s outright champion with a 7-1 league mark and receive an automatic bid to the BCS.

Should Miami win, the ninth-ranked Hurricanes would tie with Virginia Tech and Florida State as conference tri-champions with identical 6-2 league records. Miami would then earn the BCS bid, providing it is the highest ranked team among the three teams, in this Sunday’s final BCS standings.

In working with the league’s bowl partners, 16th-ranked Florida State has accepted an invitation to play Big East opponent and 24th-ranked West Virginia in the Toyota Gator Bowl in Jacksonville, Fla., on New Year’s Day.

The Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl will invite either Virginia Tech or Miami to face a Southeastern Conference foe in Atlanta, Ga., on New Year’s Eve.

The ACC is the winningest conference in the nation in terms of bowl success among conferences with 50 or more bowl appearances. Following last year’s 5-1 mark, the 11 current ACC teams are a combined 120-107-5 (.528) in bowl game play.

The ACC is the only conference in Division I-A to post a winning record in post-season play in each of the past three seasons. Since 2001, ACC teams are 13-6 in post-season play and own the best bowl winning percentage (.684) among all BCS conferences.