Virginia and Virginia Tech now know the road ahead in the ACC, and the two in-state rivals will cross paths twice in the regular season - first Jan. 30 in Charlottesville, then Feb. 23 in Blacksburg.
Those dates sit at the center of a league slate that was fully unveiled Wednesday afternoon, with the ACC releasing all 162 conference games after announcing opponents on May 28. Game times and TV designations are still to come, but the framework is set, and both programs have a clear picture of what awaits in 2026-27.
For Virginia, the schedule is loaded with marquee moments. The Cavaliers get Virginia Tech and Duke on back-to-back Saturdays at home, with Duke coming a week after the Hokies visit.
They also land a pair of Big Monday games: Louisville on Feb. 15 and Duke again on March 1 at Cameron Indoor Stadium. That second meeting with the Blue Devils comes after the two teams finished 1-2 in both the ACC regular-season standings and the conference tournament last season.
Virginia’s conference grind opens Dec. 29 at Clemson and ends March 6 at home against NC State. In between, Ryan Odom’s team will see a demanding stretch that includes home games against Notre Dame two days before Louisville and Florida State two days before the trip to Duke.
The Cavaliers also put together a bold nonconference schedule to go with it. With Sam Lewis, Johann Grunloh, Chance Mallory and first-team All-ACC selection Thijs De Ridder back from a second-round NCAA Tournament team, Virginia will face Arkansas in Washington, D.C., UConn at Madison Square Garden and Kentucky in the ACC/SEC Challenge. Each of those opponents reached the 2026 NCAA Tournament, with UConn falling to Michigan in the national championship game.
Virginia Tech’s schedule has its own late-season squeeze, especially at home. The Hokies finish their home slate with three former national champions in an eight-day stretch: Virginia, North Carolina and Syracuse. They open ACC play a day after Virginia, hosting Louisville on Dec. 30, and wrap up the regular season March 6 at Georgia Tech.
The Hokies’ nonconference list includes Iowa, Ole Miss, West Virginia and Central Florida, with Ole Miss in the ACC/SEC Challenge the only one of those games set for Cassell Coliseum. Amani Hansberry, Ben Hammond and Tyler Johnson are the names leading a roster trying to get Virginia Tech back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2022.
There’s also a small bit of scheduling symmetry that stands out: for the first time since 1992-93, both Virginia and Virginia Tech will play Old Dominion in the same season. The Monarchs visit Virginia on Nov. 17 and Virginia Tech on Black Friday, Nov. 27.
The ACC Tournament will run March 9-13 in Greensboro, North Carolina, marking the 74th edition of the event and the 30th time the city has hosted it.
In Other News...
James Franklin Brings One Intriguing Trend Into Virginia Techs In-State Tests
James Franklin arrives in Blacksburg with a track record that should matter to anyone watching Virginia Techs in-state slate. As a head coach, he has gone 11-3 against opponents from his own state, and the last time one of those teams beat him came back in 2016 against Pittsburgh. That history includes some eye-opening results along the way, from his Vanderbilt days against Tennessee to repeated success against Penn States in-state rivals.
Now Franklin gets a new version of that challenge at Virginia Tech, where the schedule is quickly moving from a tune-up against VMI to a more relevant test against Old Dominion and, soon enough, the Commonwealth Clash with Virginia. For a coach still settling in with the Hokies, those games will say a lot about how quickly his formula translates to the kind of regional matchups that can define a season in Blacksburg. [Read more 🡒]
Cal Faces A Week 2 Quarterback Concern It Cant Ignore
Week 1 of the 2026 ACC quarterback watch gave Virginia Tech a little to file away, even as the conference spent much of the opening weekend sorting out who looked ready for the early grind and who still had work to do. The review of league passers leaned heavily on who had already been tested against Power Four defenses, which made the Hokies own signal-caller part of a broader conversation about how quickly the conference hierarchy can shift once real opponents show up.
The bigger intrigue now is Week 2, where several ACC quarterbacks are headed into matchups that should say more about where they stand than opening weekend ever could. With the top eight quarterbacks in the league already being sorted and upcoming opponents lined up across the conference, Virginia Tech has a close eye on whether its own passing game can climb with the rest of the pack before the schedule starts tightening up. [Read more 🡒]
Virginia Techs Offense Faces A Real Test Against Old Dominion
Virginia Techs offense opened the season with plenty to like, piling up 619 yards and showing a balanced attack that looked in sync from the start. Quarterback Grunkemeyer settled in quickly in his debut, moving the ball efficiently while running back Overton handled the early scoring burst with two rushing touchdowns in the first quarter. Wide receiver Brown also gave the Hokies a steady big-play target, finishing with six catches for 109 yards and a touchdown.
The challenge now gets more interesting with Old Dominion coming to town, because the Monarchs already showed they can make life uncomfortable for an opponent. Their opener featured a strong defensive performance and a knack for creating extra possessions, the kind of trait that can test how clean Virginia Tech really is when the game tightens up. For a Hokies offense that looked explosive out of the gate, this is a chance to find out whether that rhythm travels against a defense that has already shown it can force mistakes. [Read more 🡒]