CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) – Ahead of its Saturday date with No. 10 Alabama in Tuscaloosa, change has come to the top of Florida State’s athletic department. Football coach Mike Norvell will still be calling the shots for the Seminoles this weekend but FSU fired his boss, athletic director Michael Alford, on Monday, a move that only cranks up the heat on Norvell’s seat.

Norvell is in his seventh season at Florida State. Four of them have seen the Seminoles post losing records. He led the team to a 10-3 record in 2022 and a 13-1 mark in 2023, when an injury to starting quarterback Jordan Travis led the College Football Playoff Selection Committee to leave FSU out of the four-team field. Since then, Norvell’s club has gone 8-18, including 3-14 in ACC play.

This season, Florida State failed to impress in its season-opening 34-17 win over New Mexico State. It followed that up with a home loss to SMU in its ACC opener. After that 27-24 defeat, Seminole fans eschewed their famed Tomahawk Chop for a chant calling for Norvell to be fired.

Instead, the axe fell Monday on Alford, FSU’s sports chief since 2022. Norvell will be hard-pressed to avoid a similar fate, especially with games against ranked foes Alabama, Virginia, Louisville and Miami in the next five weeks.

Here’s a look at who else is down and up in the ACC.

Who’s Up?

Wake Forest: Quarterback Gio Lopez, the North Carolina transfer, helped lift the Demon Deacons to a double-overtime road win at Purdue on Saturday, moving Wake to 2-0 on the season. They opened the year with a convincing 38-16 home win over Akron and have gone from trendy pick to be a tough out to a possible ACC title game contender. How for real is Jake Dickert’s team? We’ll find out the next two weeks as they host Miami and visit Louisville.

Duke RB Nate Sheppard: Maybe the Blue Devils’ best offensive player didn’t bolt Durham for Miami (and a big bag of cash) this offseason. With all due deference to Darian Mensah, Duke’s offense has been humming along just fine riding running back Nate Sheppard. He leads the ACC with 374 rushing yards through two games, has scored three touchdowns and is getting 6.3 yards per carry. Saturday, he carried the Blue Devils to a major road win over Illinois.

Pittsburgh’s defense: Central Florida, behind James Madison transfer QB Alonza Barnett III, put up 73 points in its season-opening win, albeit over FCS foe Bethune- Cookman. Then, Saturday, the Knights mustered just seven points – a fourth-quarter score with 2:51 to play – in a 12-7 loss to Pittsburgh. The Panthers’ defense held UCF to 206 total yards and a 4 for 13 showing on third down. Pitt leads the ACC in run defense, having given up an average of 23.5 yards per game on the ground, so far.

Who’s Down?

Syracuse: Steve Angeli was an ACC Week 1 darling after throwing three touchdown passes in the Orange’s rout of New Hampshire. Freshman running back Shavane Anderson scored a trio of times as well and, suddenly, it looked like perhaps prognosticators had undervalued Fran Brown’s team. But a 21-18 home loss to Cal, one that saw Angeli toss three interceptions and Anderson average just two yards per carry smacked the shine right off that Week 1 win.

Clemson’s offense: Okay, to be fair, no one was all that high on Clemson’s offense coming into the season and a sad 10-point showing in the 51-10 opening loss to LSU didn’t change that. But the schedule gave the Tigers a break in Week 2 – a home date with Georgia Southern. How did that go? After starting quarterback Chris Vizzina threw a touchdown pass and an interception, he exited the game with an injury. Freshman Tait Reynolds replaced him and Clemson didn’t find the end zone again, winning the game on the strength of five field goals. Reynolds may be the future for the Tigers but, in the present, they’re going to be leaning on their defense.

Georgia Tech QB Alberto Mendoza: Oh brother, where art thou? When Indiana let Alberto Mendoza – the younger brother of Heisman Trophy winner Fernando Mendoza – walk in the offseason, maybe that should have been a sign. The younger Mendoza transferred to Georgia Tech where he’s thrown two picks and just one touchdown pass. The Yellow Jackets are the ACC’s only winless team at 0-2.