By Brian Murphy, WRAL

North Carolina and NC State, conference rivals for more than 100 years, won’t be guaranteed to meet twice each season in men’s basketball when the ACC reverts to an 18-game conference schedule in 2025-26.

The 18-team league is making the move to enhance its chances at getting more teams in the NCAA Tournament. The league got four of its teams in this year’s event, a record-low percentage of its overall membership.

“Moving to an 18-game conference schedule is a direct result of our ongoing strategic review and analysis and provides our schools a better balance of non-conference and conference games,” ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips said in a statement.

But the annual home-and-home meetings between the Tar Heels and the Wolfpack are likely to be a casualty of the move. The rivals could still meet twice annually, but it is unlikely to be every year.

Each ACC team will play its permanent rival — for UNC, it will be Duke; for NC State, it will be Wake Forest — home and away each season.

Each team will have a second team that it plays home and away each year, but that doesn’t have to be the same “variable rival” each season. It will be announced each year and is expected to be based on producing the best matchups for NCAA Tournament and NET ranking purposes.

Then schools will play seven teams once at home and seven other teams once on the road. Each team will miss one other conference team each year.

The league’s teams have had success once they get into the tournament. Of the 19 teams to secure a spot in March Madness in the last four seasons, five have reached the Final Four, including Duke in 2025. The league’s last national championship was in 2019 (Virginia).

But the league hasn’t received more than five bids to the NCAA Tournament since 2021, when the 15-member league got seven bids. In the five tournaments held between 2016 and 2021, the league received 39 bids.

The league went to 20-game slate for the 2019-20 season, timed with the launch of the ACC Network.

The 2025-26 opponents and conference schedule will be announced at a later date.

The ACC moved to an 18-game schedule in women’s basketball with NC State and UNC playing just once per year. In women’s basketball, each team plays 16 teams once and one team twice annually.

Primary rivals for men’s basketball

Boston College-Notre Dame

Clemson-Georgia Tech

California-Stanford

Duke-North Carolina

Florida State-Miami

Louisville-SMU

NC State-Wake Forest

Pitt-Syracuse

Virginia Tech-Virginia

Source: wralsportsfan.com