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.”
With TV schedules rarely finalized until one to two weeks before the game. With the need to have logistics in place well before that, Wake had to plan for the trip without knowing if they were playing at noon Pacific time on Saturday or 8 pm. The game wound up being scheduled for 12:30 pm Pacific time.
The Logistics
He was asked by Decons Illustrated reporter Conor O’Neill about all the specifics that go into the trip. The team was going to practice Thursday morning and then make the cross-country flight. That’s a day earlier than they usually leave for road trips.
“I made that decision (to leave on Thursday) earlier in the year,” Clawson said Tuesday. “For the logistics of getting out to California, I mean you’ve to plan those things in the Summer. And you got to get the plane early. My concern was if we ended up having a 7:30 or 8 o’clock West Coast kickoff time. Like, you have to plan for that in case it is that way and I would want to get out early and adjust to the time change.”
He said if he had known the kickoff time was going to be 12:30 West Coast time, the team would not have worried about being there long enough to adjust to the time difference. They would have gone out Friday instead. The equipment truck left Winston-Salem early Wednesday for the cross-country drive.
A Break Afterward
Clawson said because of the extent of the travel, a lot is riding on the game times, which don’t get revealed until six to 12 days before the games. “When you’re a West Coast team playing East, you don’t want the noon kickoff. When you’re an East Coast team playing West, you don’t want the eight o’clock kickoff.” He added that anything else in the middle gives you times you are used to playing football games, so the time and sleep adjustment for the players is not so dramatic.
Clawson said that even with all of the time issues, length of travel, and schedules, he got one thing Stanford did not get earlier in the year. Wake has a bye week after the road trip. The Deacs won’t play again until November 8th, ironically enough against Cal.
