By Brian Murphy, WRAL

Randy Woodson cast the decisive vote in September that approved that stretched the Atlantic Coast Conference’s geographic bounds to the Pacific and swelled its membership to 18 teams.

The NC State chancellor — who took over in Raleigh in 2010 when the ACC had a mere 12 teams — announced Thursday that this would be his final school year in Raleigh.

He will retire on June 30, 2025 when his contract expires.

California, Stanford and SMU — the three schools that were let in by Woodson’s expansion vote — play their first seasons in the ACC this year.

Despite record revenues and larger-than-ever payouts to its members, the ACC is in a fragile state. Football powers Florida State and Clemson have filed lawsuits against the league, seeking cheap exits.

Their exits could set off a destabilizing chain reaction for the league of which NC State is a founding member. The ACC, headquartered in North Carolina and nearly synonymous with the state, was founded in 1953.

“Obviously we want the ACC to be successful,” Woodson said Thursday. “All of us do. I feel good about where we are. I feel good about the competition. We’re excited. We have a great football team this year.”

The Wolfpack are coming off the greatest athletic season in school history.

The men’s and women’s basketball teams reached the Final Four. The men won their first ACC title since 1983. The baseball team advanced to the College World Series. The football team won nine games, throttled rival North Carolina, and had seems poised for more after attracting several high-profile transfers. The women’s cross country team won a conference crown and a third straight national championship. NC State also claimed ACC titles in gymnastics, men’s swimming and wrestling.

“We’ve had a phenomenal year in athletics,” Woodson said. “We’ve got a great future, a great athletic director that signed a new contract. Our goal always is to compete at the highest level. Our goal is to be in a position to compete in conferences, in our case, the ACC, against the best competition in the country. And that will always be our goal.”

Asked if he is confident the ACC can remain a top-tier conference, Woodson said without hesitation: “I’m very confident.”

Athletic director Boo Corrigan, who was hired in 2019, signed a contract extension through 2029.

“Chancellor Woodson’s leadership has been transformative on so many levels for NC State, but especially as we have navigated all of the changes in college athletics,” Coorigan said. “His support has been unwavering and his guidance has been significant. I value him as a leader and a mentor, but even more so as a friend.”

Woodson’s legacy? He said he’d leave that to other to discuss. The expansion vote, though, will be part of it on the athletics side.

NC State was initially against the expansion. With Clemson, Florida State and North Carolina also opposed, there were not enough votes for the ACC to expand.

But Woodson changed his mind, a decision he has never fully explained.

“The addition of these outstanding universities gives us even greater opportunities to build on the Wolfpack’s national presence, which in turn will generate more long-term benefits for our student-athletes, our athletic programs and our loyal fan base,” Woodson said in a statement at the time.

Athletic director Boo Corrigan denied there was any flip. He said the expansion deal changed in financial and travel terms — and NC State changed with it.

“The troubling thing to me was the idea that there was any flipping,” Corrigan said in late September. “To me, a flipping of a vote means here’s what it is, you take a lot of pressure and there’s a lot of pressure to change your mind.”

The incoming schools are not taking a full share of ACC distribution, leaving money for the league’s new success initiative and, perhaps, other distribution to help with travel.

“It was one thing and then it became something completely different,” Corrigan said. “When it became something completely different, the chancellor and I had spent a lot of time talking about it, we voted for expansion.”

Source: wralsportsfan.com