All 17 ACC teams took the stage in Charlotte, NC for 2026 ACC Media Days.
This coming season marks the SMU Mustangs’ third in the ACC, and the Mustangs needed no time to adjust. In 2024, they qualified for the conference championship game and College Football Playoff. In 2025, they were alive for a second-straight ACC title game appearance until the last week of the regular season.
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With a 14-2 conference record through two seasons, head coach Rhett Lashlee didn’t label SMU as a “blue blood” but referred to his team as the ACC’s “new blood.” With quarterback Kevin Jennings, offensive tackle PJ Williams, and middle linebacker Brandon Booker by the coach’s side, here are storylines that arose from the Mustangs’ trip to Charlotte:
Jennings’ Heisman campaign
Two days before SMU took the stage for ACC Media Days, Lashlee held a media availability in Dallas to announce the university would be naming its new recovery center after quarterback Kevin Jennings — an unprecedented honor for a current student-athlete.
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Lashlee has not been shy about his devotion to his fifth-year quarterback, who has stayed loyal to SMU despite significant interest from outsiders every transfer portal cycle. The head coach wore a “Jennings for Heisman” t-shirt at ACC Media Days — in an effort to land the Mustangs their first Heisman Trophy since Doak Walker in 1948.
“We’ve been promoting Kevin this week a lot, and deservedly so,” Lashlee said. “I think his stats speak for itself, when you start returning ‘power four’ quarterbacks, nobody has a better winning percentage of guys that have started for at least two years. He’s got the third most wins returning in the country, fifth in passing yards, fifth in total offense, fifth in touchdowns in returning ‘power four’ quarterbacks. In the ACC, he’s first in returning passing yards, first in total yards, first in wins, first in winning percentage as a returning quarterback. It’s not just what we think, there’s actually evidence in two years to back it up.”
Jennings suffered an ankle injury in a 48-45 overtime loss to Baylor in Week 2 last fall. The quarterback battled through the lingering injury throughout the 2025 campaign and still produced the eighth-most passing yards in the FBS (3,641) and 26 passing touchdowns on a career-high 66.1 percent efficiency. Lashlee believes a healthier, more experienced Jennings can take it one step further to the Heisman ceremony in New York.
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“He’s healthy now. So we’re excited to push him,” Lashlee said. “We know it’s a team and a player. We have to win, play well all year. If we do, there’s no question in our mind he’s one of the best players in America.”
Jennings is of quieter nature, preferring to let his game, teammates, and coaches partake in the promotional talk. When asked about the preseason Heisman campaign captained by Lashlee, the third-year starting quarterback affirmed it helps him from a confidence standpoint.
“It definitely boosts (my confidence) a lot,” Jennings said. “All the things he said on the stage, it truly means a lot. The confidence he has in me helps me have confidence in myself, honestly. Knowing my head coach has confidence in me like that goes a long way.”
Offensive tackle PJ Williams left a memorable quote when talking about Jennings’ value to this SMU squad.
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“KJ is one of the guys I respect most on the team,” Williams said. “He’s a great guy, great family, great background. I treat him like I would treat my sister. Like if someone’s messing with Kevin, I got his back regardless. Anyone touches Kevin, Kevin’s on the ground, I’m like, ‘Kevin, who touched you? Where did it come from?’ I’m his personal protector. I want to protect him at all costs. He’s the value of our team.”
SMU has how many coordinators?
SMU operated under incredible stability in the first four years of the Rhett Lashlee era. During those four years, Casey Woods was the team’s only offensive coordinator and Scott Symons was the team’s only defensive coordinator. That continuity translated to success as SMU claimed one conference championship, qualified for two conference title games, secured a College Football Playoff berth, produced a 38-16 record, and finished ranked over that timespan.
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However, change comes for everyone, and SMU must replace both coordinators this offseason Woods accepted a head coaching position at Missouri State and Symons a defensive coordinator gig with the Dallas Cowboys. However, the Mustangs did not appoint a single offensive coordinator nor a single defensive coordinator. Instead, Lashlee is employing a committee approach to both sides of the ball.
“I’m just not good at making decisions,” Lashlee joked.
Linebackers coach Maurice Crum Jr. and cornerbacks coach Rickey Hunley Jr. — both entering their fifth season on Lashlee’s staff — were appointed to co-defensive coordinators. Crum will oversee playcalling duties for the defense.
“We’re able to look inward and find the best, so to have someone like Maurice Crum and Rickey Hunley Jr. sitting there — Rickey Hunley has been with Scott Symons for 10 years,” Lashlee said. “Incredible success together defensively and at SMU, they’ve changed the culture of defense at SMU, and he’s been a huge part of that. Maurice Crum, who has been with us the last three years, was a two-time captain linebacker at Notre Dame, has been a coordinator at other places. Those guys, they get what the identity of our SMU defense is. I think those guys have done a fantastic job taking what we’ve done, carrying it on, and then put their own personality on it.”
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It gets even more complicated offensively. Lashlee assigned the co-offensive coordinator tag to three different assistants — wide receivers coach Rob Likens, offensive line coach Garin Justice, and quarterbacks coach D’Eriq King.
“Rob Likens has been with me since my two years at Miami,” Lashlee said. “He’s incredible. He already had a co-OC tag, kept that. He’s doing some other things for me from a chief of staff role and other things as an associate head coach that is really vital to me. It allowed us to take Garin Justice, who has been fantastic. He had a co-offensive title already, and then D’Eriq King, who is a fantastic young coach — you can ask Kevin (Jennings) about D’Eriq. He’s a rock star. So now to have our quarterback coach and o-line coach in lockstep and our receiver coach, who also is doing a bunch of other things, and Rob and Garin and I have been together for now — we’re going on our seventh year. D’Eriq played in our system. There’s a lot of continuity. Rarely can you say we changed our coordinators and feel like it was a smooth transition. For me, I didn’t feel like we had new coordinators this spring.”
Comparisons to other conferences
Lashlee opened his media day press conference congratulating the Duke Blue Devils for winning the 2025 ACC Championship Game. The Mustangs controlled their own destiny for the ACC title game heading into the final week of the regular season; however, they fell victim to a 38-35 upset to California after allowing a last-minute touchdown, and their spot instead went to eventual ACC champion Duke.
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But Lashlee’s comments about the matter involved more than a congratulations. He stated Duke (8-5 at the time of selection) belonged in the College Football Playoff over Sun Belt champion James Madison (12-1 at the time of selection) as the fifth-highest ranked conference champion. The Blue Devils won the ACC, but dropping non-conference matchups to Illinois, Tulane, and UConn ultimately barred them from landing in the 12-team field.
“We all know they easily should have been in the playoffs,” Lashlee said. “When you win the ACC the way they did and who they beat, they should have been in instead of a team from the Sun Belt. But hopefully things get learned and that doesn’t happen again. We should have been a two-bid league. But congratulations to Duke on what they did. Really, really incredible.”
The Sun Belt wasn’t the only conference to take a stray at ACC Media Days. Lashlee further demonstrated the merit of the ACC by reiterating its positive record against the SEC in 2025.
“When you start looking at where we are as an ACC, I think our league has never been better or healthier,” Lashlee said. “So often we say, ‘Well this league is the best league because of what they did in the past.’ Then, let’s look at the past and be honest with ourselves. Last year we went 8-6 against the SEC.”
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Lashlee further dove into this point, implying a bias exists in preseason metrics such as ESPN’s Football Power Index (FPI) and strength of schedule — metrics which typically favor SEC programs over ACC teams before a single snap is taken.
“I think what our league has done — 8-6 against the SEC last year and 7-4 in the postseason against ‘power four’ opponents… We play more big non-conference games than any other league; yet at some point these FPIs and all these algorithms you think will catch up to that reality,” Lashlee said. “Whenever some of y’all figure out how we can have preseason strength of schedules and power rankings before anybody has played a game, y’all let me know. But I think our league’s in a great place. It’s top to bottom. It’s healthy. Two years ago we got two teams into the first 12-team playoff. This past year we should have had two, as I said, and one of our teams played for the national title. So I think we’ve continued to solidify ourselves as a national title contender. We’ve won three in the last 15 years. Only three leagues can say that. So our league is in great place.”
