That was just cold, hard lack of vision by way of elite-ist snobbery from the people running things at VT at the time. They thought the ACC was the pinnacle, looked down their nose at the SEC from their ivory tower, and VT has been paying the price for it pretty much ever since. There's no speculation about it. Anyone that knows anything knows the back channel invitation was there, and that it was rebuffed. The AG, and any future AGs can say whatever they want, and they will, because posturing and looking big and strong is part of the job in the WWE Monday Night RAW era of politics we're living in now. FACILITATING conference realignment is one thing, but we have seen time and time and time again that politicians have next to nothing in the tank when it comes to the ability to HALT conference realignment. Also, I highly, highly doubt this will ever come up in the context of UVA leaving VT behind. It will be the other way around, if anything. UVA is somewhat of a unique case...it doesn't need the TV money, which is a drop in the pool to them in the grand scheme, and otherwise has next to zero interest in the factors that are driving conference realignment.