Clemson Clinches Spot in 20th ACC Football Championship Game
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (theACC.com) – The Clemson Tigers clinched a spot in the 2024 Atlantic Coast Conference Football Championship Game in Charlotte, North Carolina, on Saturday, December 7 at 8 p.m. ET on ABC. This is the 15th time in the last 16 years that the game will be held in primetime. The No. 12 nationally ranked Tigers, who are 9-3 overall on the season and finished 7-1 in ACC play, will take on No. 9 SMU, who finished the regular season at 11-1 overall and 8-0 in the ACC.
The 20th ACC Football Championship Game will feature two top-12 nationally ranked teams in No. 9 SMU and No. 12 Clemson.
Ranked No. 12 in the latest College Football Playoff (CFP) rankings on Tuesday, November 26, the Tigers have been ranked in each of the CFP rankings this year. Clemson has also been ranked all season long in both the Associated Press and US LBM Coaches Top 25 polls, climbing as high as No. 9 in the AP Poll (October 20) and No. 8 in the Coaches Poll (October 27).
The Tigers have been perennial powers under head coach Dabo Swinney, and this year have done it with a top-12 offense in both total and scoring offense, lighting up the scoreboard with an average of 35.7 points per game. The Tigers have had a balanced offensive attack, as Clemson’s offense is the only team ranked in the top 26 nationally in both passing (275.1 ypg) and rushing (190.6 ypg) offense and is the only program in the country averaging both 190 or more rushing yards and 270 or more passing yards per game this year.
It is the Tigers’ 10 appearance in the ACC Football Championship Game with their last trip in 2022. The 10 championship game appearances are the most among all ACC teams, with the next highest being Florida State and Virginia Tech with six appearances each.
Clemson will be looking to win its league-leading 22nd ACC football championship title and aims for its ninth victory in the ACC Championship Game. Since the championship game's inception in 2005, the Tigers won the ACC Football Championship Game in 2011, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2022.
As the second team to clinch a spot in the championship game, the Tigers’ bench will be on the south side of the stadium. SMU’s bench will be on the north side of the field.
The ACC Football Championship Game will feature the top two teams for the second straight year based on the highest winning percentage in regular-season conference play.
This year marks the first of the expanded 12-team College Football Playoff. The new format will include the five highest-ranked conference champions plus the next seven highest-ranked teams as determined by the CFP Selection Committee.
Bank of America Stadium, home of the NFL’s Carolina Panthers, has been the site of 13 of the last 14 ACC Football Championship Games. In 2018, the ACC, Charlotte Sports Foundation and Carolina Panthers announced a 10-year agreement to keep the ACC Football Championship Game in Charlotte through the 2030 season.
Not including the 2020 game, which had limited attendance due to the pandemic, ACC Football Championship Games played at Bank of America Stadium have had an average attendance of nearly 70,000 fans. The game’s attendance record is 74,514 for the 2015 contest between Clemson and North Carolina, which also set an attendance record for Bank of America Stadium at the time.
The ACC Champion has gone on to play in the National Championship Game or compete in the College Football Playoff in eight of the last 11 seasons, with two teams making the playoff in 2020. The ACC has won the second-most national titles since the CFP began in 2014 and is one of only two conferences to have a .500 or better winning percentage in the playoffs. The ACC has had three different teams to reach the CFP - Clemson (2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020), Florida State (2014), and Notre Dame (2020), who competed as a full ACC member in 2020.