ACC basketball’s 2025-26 resurgence fuels return to national relevance

The Atlantic Coast Conference has put its utter disappointment from last season emphatically in the rear-view mirror.

More than halfway through the 2025-26 regular season, the ACC has witnessed a remarkable turnaround, and the league is battling other power conferences for national supremacy.

In 2024-25, the ACC only received four bids to the NCAA Tournament, and North Carolina was a controversial at-large selection. Looking ahead to this spring’s Big Dance, as many as eight to 12 ACC teams have a feasible chance to hear their name called on Selection Sunday.

Five ACC squads, led by No. 6 Duke, are ranked in the latest Associated Press top 25. Another three conference teams are receiving votes. There are ACC members that will likely be in the mix for deep March Madness runs, such as the Blue Devils, North Carolina, Virginia, Louisville and Clemson.

The ACC is having a resurgence

What makes the ACC more legit this season, however, is the conference’s overall depth. Teams lower down in the conference pecking order, such as Syracuse, are surging.

The Orange have won three straight, while Clemson has captured eight consecutive victories and Miami is up to 10 triumphs in a row.

In another indication of the ACC’s relative strength, the conference has 13 teams that are currently in the top 75 overall of the NCAA NET rankings. That is on par with other heavyweight leagues, such as the Big 12, Big Ten and the SEC.

By comparison, in 2024-25, the ACC had just seven of its schools in the NET’s top 75.

In the ACC/SEC Challenge, in December the SEC prevailed, 9-7. However, many of the games were quite close, and the ACC greatly improved from the prior season, when the powerhouse SEC blasted the ACC, 14-2.

In recent seasons, the ACC has paled in comparison to other power leagues pertaining to total March Madness invites, even as the ACC has seen conference members get to the Final Four, such as Duke in 2025, N.C. State in 2024, Miami in 2023 and Duke/North Carolina in 2022.

This season, the ACC could experience a massive surge of its schools landing bids to the 2026 NCAA Tournament, and it’s entirely possible that an ACC team will get to the Final Four. This conference is back, and in a big-time way.