Last year at this time, the Virginia Tech football team was considered a dark horse to crash the new 12-team College Football Playoff from the ACC. Instead, while the Hokies were stumbling to a 6-6 regular season, SMU took the bull by the horns and crashed with a 12-1 record and a last-second loss to Clemson in the ACC Championship Game.
Now, a year later, the vibes surrounding the Hokies are different, and there are some other schools that are sitting in the same boat as Virginia Tech did a year ago. Clemson is the clear-cut favorite to run away from the rest of the conference and collect the automatic bid to the CFP by winning the conference championship, but if the ACC gets a second school, who could that be?