Notre Dame joining ACC for every sport but football

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - Notre Dame got everything it wanted, and the Atlantic Coast Conference got Notre Dame.

The school announced Wednesday that it would join the ACC in all the conference's sports except football, though it will play five games annually against league programs and have access to its non-BCS bowl tie-ins. It's unclear exactly when the Irish will leave the Big East for its non-football sports.

"I don't think there's out there a better situation than the situation we have," said the Rev. John I. Jenkins, Notre Dame's president. "The ACC has allowed us to retain a tradition [of football independence] that's so central to our identity in football while we're joining a conference that athletically as well as academically fits Notre Dame perfectly."

The ACC, meanwhile, announced that it had increased its exit fees for member schools to three times the league's annual operation budget - which currently would come to more than $50 million. ACC commissioner John Swofford said the exit fee goes into effect immediately and would apply to Notre Dame.

Bill Bradshaw, the athletic director at Temple, said he was disappointed that Notre Dame was leaving the Big East.

"They've added to the brand of the Big East," Bradshaw said. "On the other hand, the most important thing that is in front of us now is the media-rights negotiations [for the Big East]. I believe there's a unanimous feeling that the media-rights negotiations will go on unencumbered by this move."

Said Temple football coach Steve Addazio of the defection, "Nothing surprises me anymore."

Villanova athletic director Vince Nicastro was not surprised, either. The Wildcats are in the Big East in every sport except football. "It's not entirely unexpected that they were looking to move," Nicastro said. "Although they are not really moving football into the ACC, they are using it to sort of better position their football program moving forward."

Jenkins and athletic director Jack Swarbrick attended a news conference Wednesday at North Carolina's Kenan Stadium, where the Irish played the Tar Heels in 2008 in their first visit in more than three decades.

For the ACC, the addition of Notre Dame was a show of stability amid constantly shifting league affiliations. The ACC - which will add Pittsburgh and Syracuse from the Big East next year - had informal discussions with Notre Dame over the years, as had other potential suitors for the school.

But the ACC made an exception to its all-or-nothing requirement for schools to be full members and equally share revenue to get a deal done.