ACC Power Rankings: Louisville, Clemson Earn Big Wins, NC State, Virginia Suffer Heartbreak in Week 3

Louisville couldn’t be stopped in a crucial ACC win against SMU as Lincoln Keinholz was dynamic. Clemson looked like the worst team in the ACC until they flipped a switch and came back against UNC. Virginia disappoints against West Virginia and holy cow what happened to NC State in Nashville?

17. Stanford (Prev 17): A 35-7 blowout at Duke isn’t a great look.

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16. Boston College (Prev 16): BC hosted the Maine Black Bears and only won 22-16. That sounds bad, and it is, but they led 16-0, and it didn’t get down to a single-digit game until the final few minutes.

15. Syracuse (Prev 13): Steve Angeli threw two more interceptions on Thursday to Pitt. It now appears Clemson made him look better than he was last season. I thought he was really spectacular, but I’m coming to grips with just how poor Coach Swinney has been at roster construction and resource allocation in the new era of college football. In any case, Syracuse lost 27-13 despite surrendering just 123 passing yards. Pitt controlled the ground game.

14. NC State (Prev 12): NC State suffered the kind of painful, improbable loss that just takes your breath away. The Wolfpack led 17-0 and it seemed like a blowout was coming. They remained up 10 points with under 10 minutes remaining. Then Vanderbilt worked the ball downfield and scored on a 43-yard completion to make it 31-28. They were within three, got a stop and got the ball back with under two minutes remaining.

QB Jared Curtis surgically picked apart NC State’s defense. Right when it looked like the Commodores would punch it in for the game-winning TD or at least make a game-tying FG, Curtis threw an interception. NC State ran the ball three times and took the clock down to 0:06 but didn’t clinch the game with a first down. On fourth down, leading by three, they elected to burn as much of those six seconds as possible and take a safety. This would leave them up by one-point, and barring a kickoff return following the safety clinch an NC State win. Only one…

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Publish date : 2026-09-21 11:05:00

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