Now or never, ESPN's Pete Thamel implies 'soft deadline' for ACC expansion

Stanford and Cal may be running out of time to be invited to the ACC

With expansion talks gearing back up with the ACC and the two Bay Area Pac-12 schools, it isn't something that is expected to be a long lasting discussion.

The process has already dragged out a few weeks, and they were reportedly expected to come to a decision sometime soon but haven't. Stanford and Cal have Notre Dame pushing for them, and SMU has already expressed a willingness to join the ACC for free. Even with attempting to accommodate the ACC the best they can, they still have come up short on votes of support from the conference members. 

Something that could be settled in the coming days, but according to ESPN's Pete Thamel now has what he referred to as a 'soft deadline'. 

“Those conversations are ongoing right now,” Thamel said Friday on College Football Live. “The athletic directors from the ACC met last night. They had a phone call and they will meet again. There has been no meeting determined as of yet. But I imagine these conversations are going to spill into next week. A week from today, I feel like there’s a soft deadline of Week 1 and the season starting. We’ll have some clarity on that. There’s still some optimism, there still feels like there’s some momentum for this to happen."

He continued explaining what the hold up is for the three to be added to the ACC.

“It comes down to money, like most things in realignment, and how that money that SMU and ‘Cal-ford,’ as they’re called — Cal and Stanford — end up getting divided up in a success pool amongst the current ACC teams.”

Based on reports early on Saturday, Stanford and Cal are already working on a contingency plan should they not get the invitation to the ACC, as it was reported they are looking into joining the Big 12.