37 45 8 10 7 7 | 8 8 9 7 7 14 Date 5 December 2015 | |
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Announcers Chris Fowler (play-by-play), Kirk Herbstreit (color), Heather Cox (sidelines), Tom Rinaldi (sidelines) Similar 2015 ACC Men's Basketbal, 2014 ACC Championship Game, 2016 ACC Men's Basketbal, 2015 Orange Bowl, 2015 SEC Championship Game | ||
The 2015 ACC Championship Game was the eleventh football championship game for the Atlantic Coast Conference. It featured the Clemson Tigers, winners of the ACC's Atlantic Division, and the North Carolina Tar Heels, the winners of the ACC's Coastal Division. It was the first time in ACC championship game history in which both participating teams were undefeated in conference play. This was the game's sixth consecutive year at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina.
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Atlantic Division champions
The Clemson Tigers went into the game as the consensus #1 team in the nation after clinching the ACC Atlantic Division title against the Florida State Seminoles on November 7, 2015.
Coastal Division champions
The Tar Heels entered the game ranked #8 in the AP poll and #10 in the CFP poll, having clinched the ACC Coastal Division against Virginia Tech on November 21, 2015.
Ticket Sales
The 2015 ACC Championship Game marks the third time in the game's history in which the game was considered a sell-out. A record 74,514 tickets were sold for the game. Previous sell-out years were 2010 and 2011. The high number of tickets sold were attributed to the fact that the championship game site was a relatively close distance for both participating schools (and thus a large portion of their fan bases), as well as having two highly ranked teams (Clemson at #1 and UNC at #8) with a single loss between them. The previous three years' games saw large tarps covering parts of the upper deck due to the lack of tickets sold.
Playoff Implications
Much of the debate around the ACC Championship Game involved scenarios of "what if" North Carolina upsets the undefeated Tigers? It was assumed that, should Clemson win the game, they would be the #1 seeded team in the College Football Playoff, given that they were already ranked #1 by the selection committee going into the game. However, should Clemson have lost the game, there were several hypotheses about who the selection committee would select as the top 4 teams to participate in the playoff.
One theory was that if North Carolina were to win the ACC championship, they should be included in the playoff because they only had a single loss on the season (something that others vying for a spot also had) and would have beaten the consensus #1 team in the country at a neutral site. Alternatively, others argued that North Carolina would not be deserving of one of the top 4 spots because of their current rank (#10) in the selection committee poll as well as their weak strength of schedule.
Another theory stated that even with a loss in the ACC Championship Game, Clemson should still be in the playoff. This was due to the fact that Clemson had been widely considered the best team for latter part of the regular season, and had quality wins against Notre Dame and Florida State. A loss in the championship game would be viewed as a "quality" loss to a top 10 opponent, and a better loss than other 1 loss teams in consideration, including North Carolina.
Lastly, it was thought that a loss by Clemson would leave both ACC teams out of the playoff, and either Ohio State or Stanford would take the 4th playoff spot.
Scoring summary
1st quarter scoring:
2nd quarter scoring:
3rd quarter scoring:
4th quarter scoring: