The weekend always starts a day early in ACC Nation. So, if you’re up for some sports news we’ve got so much on our plates we thought we’d share an extra plate or two with you. If you’re keeping tabs there’s football, baseball, softball, golf, lacrosse, tennis, beach volleyball, water polo, the Learfield Cup, volleyball, rowing and a superb use of billboard advertising to promote the ACC.
The NFL Draft runs Thursday through Saturday and you can bank on plenty of reports in social media regarding players that didn’t get drafted, Undrafted Free Agents (UDFA) being signed by teams pretty much through next week. The ACC has a list on YouTube of 50 plus athletes hoping to put pen to paper soon. Worth a look!
NFL Draft ’26 | Adam Rank Previews First Round Picks
We have to compliment the folks in Charlotte for hooking up with Lamar Advertising to place a digital billboard that drivers eastbound on 65 near 279 just before Acrisure Stadium are sure to see. It’s right next door to Rivers Casino. Congratulations on stepping out to promote the conference. Looking forward to seeing similar efforts in the future.
Since we’ve started the look ahead with something different we’ll keep it in the world of unusual with something that has already occurred. By now the fact that the Stanford men’s gymnastics team won the NCAA 2026 title but here’s the quirk. In a two-way tie in vault, Stanford’s Iwai Junnosuke and Oklahoma’s Tyler Flores both scored 14.433. They shared the podium, both held the trophy and then to decide who was taking the title back home it all came down to a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors. Yes, you read that correctly. To add to the suspense the first game was a tie. By the second round Flores delivered a rock that broke Junnosuke’s scissors. Remember this because it’s sure to end up as a trivia question somewhere down the road.
Now for a quick whip-around the ACC and NCAA among other places to look at what’s to come this weekend.
Weekend
ACC Women’s Lacrosse Championship is underway with No. 1 seed North Carolina facing No. 4 seed Syracuse on Friday. Also on the schedule you’ll find No. 2 see Stanford going up against No. 3 seed Clemson. The winners head to the championship game on Sunday, April 26 in Charlotte at 12:00pm ET. The games are available on the ACC Network.
The NCAA Selection Show will deliver the full bracket on Sunday, May 3 at 9:00pm ET. There are 15 auto-bids and 14 at-large teams.
The ACC men’s lacrosse regular season wraps up this weekend before finding out their seeds for upcoming tournament. The NCAA Selection Show will feature 10 auto-bids and 8 at-large teams with seeding on Sunday, May 3 at 9:30pm ET on ESPNU.
ACC Men’s Golf Championship is underway now through Monday, April 27.
The conference has announced their 2026 Tennis Awards. Coach of the Year honors go to NC State’s Simon Earnshaw. The Player of the Year is Reese Brantmeier of North Carolina and the Freshman of the Year is SMU’s Amelie Van Impe.
The NCAA Selection Show for Tennis is on Monday, April 27 at 4:00pm ET for the men and 4:30pm ET for the women. For the 64 team fields the men have 27 auto-bids and 37 at-large while the women have 30 auto-bids and 34 at-large.
Stanford led the way at No. 1 in the Winter Edition of the Learfield Directors’ Cup followed by North Carolina at 3, Virginia at6 and Notre Dame at 10. There’s a total of 16 teams in the top 70. The ACC is the leading conference in the top 15 with 6 schools.
Raleigh will host the Lake Wheeler Invitational this weekend with 20 rowing teams competing against some of the top ACC schools. No. 8 Virginia, No. 13 Duke and No. 14 Miami are scheduled.
ACC Baseball | Heels Slide By Jackets Into No. 2
Better enjoy this weekend of regular season action of ACC Baseball. There’s only a total of 4 left. It’s a busy schedule and each game will be worth it’s weight in gold as far as how teams will fare in post-season invitations. No. 2 North Carolina heads to Duke, No. 3 Georgia Tech entertains Wake Forest, No. 8 Florida State heads out west to Stanford, No. 10 Virginia gets into an offensive battle with Pitt and No. 22 Boston College plays Notre Dame.
Weekend ACC Sports
There’s just one ranked ACC matchup in softball this weekend as No. 12 Duke and No. 23 Clemson have a 3-game series. A total of 6 conference teams are in the USA Softball Top 25. In addition to the aforementioned, there’s No. 12 Florida State, No. 13, Virginia Tech, No. 16, Stanford No. 18 and No. 25 Louisville.
ESPN announced the second year of “Showdown at the Net” for September 8-9 featuring 16 of 18 ACC volleyball programs taking on SEC teams. A neutral site event supporting Shriners Children will be on Wednesday, September 9 in Kissimmee, Florida at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex and feature Pitt and Tennessee at 7:00pm ET with Stanford and Texas A&M battling it out at 9:30pm ET with both games on ESPN2.
This week the Golf Channel will carry the NCAA Selection Show for women’s golf on Wednesday, April 29 at 4:00pm ET.
Beach Volleyball | Cardinal, ‘Noles And Bears In Top 10
The NCAA Women’s Beach Volleyball Selection Show is this weekend on Sunday, April 26 at 1:00pm at NCAA.com. There are 8 auto-bids and a total of 16 teams playing in Gulf Shores, Alabama, May 1-3.
Last but not least in women’s water polo there are two conference teams competing and it’s worth a note. Stanford is the No. 1 seed and Cal is the No. 4 seed. There are a total of 10 teams competing with play beginning on Friday and running through the weekend with the championship on Sunday, April 26.
