Florida State lawsuit vs. ACC to continue in Tallahassee
TALLAHASSEE — Near the end of arguments in Tuesday’s seven-hour legal hearing between Florida State and the ACC, a hypothetical scenario started to feel real.
What if dueling lawsuits between the Seminoles and their conference keep unfolding simultaneously in Florida and North Carolina?
“Then we do have chaos,” ACC attorney James Cooney said.
Buckle up.
A Leon County judge, John C. Cooper, denied the ACC’s motion to postpone FSU’s lawsuit against the league in Tallahassee. Cooper’s ruling from the bench comes less than a week after a Charlotte judge issued his mirror opinion: that the ACC’s lawsuit against FSU will continue in North Carolina.
That means the nine-figure future of the Seminoles, the league and nationwide conference realignment will continue playing out in two different courtrooms in two different states under two sets of applicable laws — at the same time. The dueling lawsuits between Clemson and the conference in both Carolinas add complexity to when, how and if two of the ACC’s biggest heavyweights could leave.
The ACC had hoped for a different outcome when it sued FSU on Dec. 21, a day before Florida State’s trustees met to sue the conference first. Cooper took issue with some of the ACC’s filing.
He had questions about whether the conference followed its voting protocols before or after it filed its complaint in Charlotte. The ACC’s presidents and chancellors approved an amended lawsuit against FSU during a special Jan. 12 virtual meeting. ACC officials have said the vote was unanimous among present members … but have not said who was present.
On Tuesday, Cooney said 12 members were there. That means three of the 15 members were not. FSU wasn’t invited, according to emails obtained by the Tampa Bay Times. Clemson said it never authorized the suit, so the Tigers weren’t there, either. That leaves one other, unspecified ACC school that sat out the vote.
Regardless of the participants, Cooper said it seemed like part of a rush to the courthouse or forum shopping — two things that are legally frowned upon.
Other factors were at play, too. Cooper suggested the state of Florida’s broad open records law could mean some documents — like the TV contract between ESPN and the ACC — should be public in Florida but maybe not in North Carolina. That contract is a sticking point in this dispute and has made some key figures tricky to pin down.
FSU initially said its total cost to leave the ACC would be $572 million (an exit fee of about $130 million, plus withheld TV revenue through 2036). Or, as FSU attorney Peter Rush said, that’s 12 years of TV rights for “what should have been the national champion’s home games” — a reference to the Seminoles’ College Football Playoff snub.
The total figure, Rush said Tuesday, isn’t $572 million. It’s more like $700 million.
Whatever the specific number would be, it’s massive. That was part of Rush’s argument: If a Florida entity risks losing or paying almost three-quarters of a billion dollars, that decision needs to come from a Florida court.
“This is Florida State’s money,” Rush said. “This is Florida State’s team. This is Florida State’s media rights.”
Cooper agreed enough to decide that the state of Florida has a major stake in this litigation’s outcome. That means it’s continuing here, even as it persists in North Carolina (though FSU said in a filing Tuesday that it will appeal last week’s opinion to North Carolina’s supreme court).
Tuesday’s hearing in Room 3G of the Leon County Courthouse initially was scheduled for 90 minutes. But after three hours, the judge hadn’t even finished his first talks with the ACC. By the end of the day, many issues remained unresolved. Cooper did not hear arguments for and against the conference’s motion to dismiss FSU’s case or matters related to discovery.
The hearing is scheduled to continue on April 22.
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