Last Thursday, I had a few rapid-fire reactions to the FanDuel 2026 win totals for a trio of College Football Playoff hope teams. In the interest of keeping the content engine humming, I plan to make this a conference-by-conference, recurring segment on Three-Point Stance CFB.
As promised, here are three rapid-fire takes on win totals for a few ACC teams.
Cal - 6.5 wins
The Cal Golden Bears had an incredibly busy offseason. After moving on from head coach Justin Wilcox, former Oregon DC Tosh Lupoi signed up to be the next head man in Berkeley.
Recruiting your own roster in the transfer portal era is arguably just as important as acquiring new talent. Lupoi pulled off an early slam dunk by retaining freshman phenom quarterback Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele AKA “JKS.”
JKS was dynamite in Year 1, throwing for over 3,400 yards and 18 touchdowns with an offensive roster devoid of talent. He possesses some incredible passing touch, and with better wideouts, should look every bit the part of one of the more fun sophomore quarterbacks in college football.
Other key acquisitions include former Washington running back Adam Mohammed and former Rutgers standout receiver Ian Strong. The Bears also brought in some intriguing offensive linemen, in the form of South Dakota’s Jacob Arop, as well as a few others.
I really like the over 6.5 wins for Cal in 2026, for a few reasons.
JKS is back in the fold and should take a big step forward with better receivers, a solid run game and hopefully better offensive linemen.
There’s no way the defense won’t look better under Tosh Lupoi’s control. Lupoi won’t have Oregon-level talent in Year 1, but he’ll make this group significantly more sound.
At the time of writing, Cal only has one ranked team on its schedule—17th-ranked SMU. The Bears avoid the likes of Miami and Duke, and get home games against UCLA, Clemson, Virginia Tech, Stanford and Pitt.
There are still questions about how much of a step forward the offensive line takes this season. But I think I can see seven, maybe eight wins on this schedule.
If you’ve got some money to throw around, I don’t hate the idea of stashing some cash on Cal over 6.5 wins.
Florida State - 6.5 wins
Let this sink in: Vegas is projecting that Florida State will have roughly the same amount of wins as a Cal team with a brand-new head coach. What a world we are living in.
I’ll keep this short and sweet. I would probably take the under on Florida State’s win total.
On a very simplistic level, how often do coaches have back-to-back disastrous seasons and flip it around in Year 3? Mike Norvell is on incredibly thin ice (buyout money be damned), and I refuse to believe that the Seminoles will be able to wash the stink off two straight disappointing seasons.
Former OC Gus Malzahn retired. Former quarterback Tommy Castellanos is gone, making way for former Auburn signal-caller Ashton Daniels. The Seminoles did acquire the services of former Texas running back Quintrevion Wisner, but I’m not sure that combo of Daniels + Wisner does it for me.
Playing the schedule game, Florida State could very easily start 0-2 after opening the season with losses at home to 17th-ranked SMU and a road tilt at Bryant-Denny Stadium against Kalen DeBoer’s Alabama. Florida State also has tricky games at 14th-ranked Louisville and 8th-ranked Miami in back-to-back weeks in mid-October, along with games against what should be a decent North Carolina State team and Florida to close out the regular season.
I’m simply not buying the Ashton Daniels hype, nor do I think Norvell has the magic elixir to flip things after back-to-back bad seasons. It feels like the writing is on the wall for Norvell to be fired as long as the boosters can eventually get their shit together and string together that buyout money.
Give me the under 6.5 wins for Florida State.
Louisville - 7.5 wins
Louisville could very easily start the season 1-2 with early losses to No. 9 Ole Miss and 17th-ranked SMU, and still rattle off five or six-straight wins to close out the season.
Last season, the Cardinals were fine, but never hit the high note some predicted after bringing in former USC quarterback Miller Moss. This year, in all likelihood, it’ll be former Ohio State backup Lincoln Keinholz as the main man under center.
On a very simplistic level, I trust Jeff Brohm to win football games.
Some of my optimism about 2026 Louisville is vibes-based. But some of it is heavily reliant on that schedule.
After those two tough tests against Ole Miss and SMU, Louisville’s schedule is as follows:
vs. Wake Forest
at NC State
vs. Florida State
at Syracuse
vs. Stanford
at Georgia Tech
at UNC
vs. Pitt
at Kentucky
Wake Forest, Syracuse and Florida State feel like wins. There aren’t many obvious losses after the Ole Miss and SMU tilts. And it’s not out of the realm of possibility that Louisville rattles off five or six-straight to close out the season.
In Jeff Brohm We Trust. Give me the over on 7.5 wins for the Cardinals.
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