The absurdity of ACC travel with the new lineup of schools has been discussed since July. Travel to and from Dallas to play SMU is one thing. But going to and from the Bay Area in California to play Cal and Stanford is a whole other hassle altogether. Now Wake Forest makes its cross-country trek to play at Stanford this weekend.
Cal and Stanford
Cal traveled out to Florida State early in the season. They had a bye week and a couple of home games before having to get back on the jumbo jet to go to Pitt. They will go to Winston-Salem, North Carolina for a game against Wake Forest on November 8th. That is the last big journey of the year. Plus, as we reported back in July, Cal bought a jumbo jet from Delta, with sleeper seats and all the creature comforts to make their travel easier.
Stanford, in its first year of the airlines’ mileage conference, has had it a little tougher. They went to Syracuse, then back to the Bay Area. Head coach Troy Taylor made certain to impress upon the media in July, that there would be no breaks from classes for his players. Come back to California on Sunday and get back to class on Monday. Five days after the FSU trip, they were getting ready to go cross country again for a game that weekend at Clemson. They have also made their every-other-year trip to Notre Dame and will be going to Raleigh, North Carolina before the season is over.
But for this week, they get to stay at home and host Wake Forest. This is the farthest the Demon Deacons have travelled for a game since 2014 when they went to Logan Utah (2,071 miles each way), to play Utah State. The trip to Stanford (the school is no longer a part of the community of Palo Alto), will be 2,727 miles each way.
Demon Deacons on the West Coast
Wake head coach Dave Clawson joked at his weekly press conference that he was glad to get to play, “Our ACC rivals, Stanford.” He continued his comedy routine with, “I’m sure there’s a lot of bad blood and hate that’s been built up in this rivalry.”…