The Waffle House/Bojangles Index

If you grew up in ACC Country like I did, there are a few things you take for granted. Great barbecue, tasty tomato sandwiches, friendly neighbors…and of course, a Waffle House or Bojangles right down the street. From Blacksburg to Atlanta, Tallahassee to Raleigh, we certainly never had to think about where to eat late at night or at 7am before the festivities got started.

The call might be a glowing yellow sign, open 24 hours, and featuring a giant, laminated menu and unlimited coffee. Or perhaps it was Bo-berry biscuits or an 8-piece chicken with dirty rice. When you are at either, you feel like you are home.

So when I decided to create an ACC Travel Guide website, including these two only felt right.

For every stadium in this oddly-shaped conference, I listed the driving distance to the nearest Waffle House and the nearest Bojangles with a direct link to them on Google Maps. Because Southern college football and those two institutions grew up together, and how far you have to drive from the stadium to reach one is indicative of how far this conference has stretched from its roots.

What the numbers say

At the top of the list, everything is right with the world. Georgia Tech fans can walk half a mile from Bobby Dodd Stadium and be seated at the midtown Waffle House before the traffic clears. I’ve eaten there and it’s a great one. Clemson, Virginia Tech, Florida State, and NC State are all within a couple of miles of both chains. NC State is actually closer to a Bojangles than to a Waffle House, which feels right given Bojangles’ North Carolina roots. These are towns where a game day runs on sweet tea and a Cajun filet biscuit, the way God intended.

Drifting lower on the chart, the conference's old northern frontier shows itself. Pitt fans have a 25-mile drive for their hash browns, which is inconvenient but survivable. Syracuse, Notre Dame, and Boston College fans are living a different life entirely: 122, 153, and 292 miles respectively (and another 216, 260 and 211 miles for Bojangles biscuits). Boston College's nearest Waffle House is in Scranton, Pennsylvania. That's a road trip in itself.

And then there's the far end. Stanford's nearest Waffle House is 712 miles away, in Goodyear, Arizona. Cal's is 728. The nearest Bojangles to both is in Carlin, Nevada, which was worth a chuckle. When your conference brethren need to drive 8-9 hours into the desert to snag an All-Star Special, the phrase "Atlantic Coast" is doing a lot of work.

Why this matters (sort of)

I kid the newcomers, but there's a message under the syrup. The ACC now runs from Chestnut Hill to Berkeley, and the fan experience varies wildly from town to town. What's waiting outside Memorial stadium in Clemson is nothing like what's waiting outside Memorial Stadium in Berkeley. That's why traveling fans need a local's guide. The Waffle House/Bojangles Index is a joke that happens to be true: the further your team travels from the conference's old footprint, the more you need to know before you go.

That's the whole reason ACC Road Trip exists. Every one of these 18 towns has a full playbook: where to eat, where to drink, where to stay, and what you can't miss. The free Game Day Cheat Sheet is at www.accroadtrip.net.

And to the Cal and Stanford fans headed east this fall for a conference game: welcome. Order the hash browns scattered, smothered, covered and chunked. You've earned them.