Eff baby steps, Larry. That’s a mindset of playing not to lose, rather than playing to win. Sac State has been doing that for most of the past 40 years. Time to put all their cards on the table and strike while the iron is hot (or at least luke warm lol). See where it takes them.
Another thing not being considered is timing. Timing is everything. Sitting around waiting for the stars to align just perfectly is a recipe for failure and missing the proverbial boat.
What’s going on with D1 FBS athletics and realignment is unprecedented. But it’s happening now! This type of potential for change hasn’t come around often, if at all. Sometimes you just have to go all in when the opportunity arises, even if the timing isn’t ideal. Because you don’t know if/when there will be another opportunity.
In Sac State’s case, they are riding a 5-year wave of success and increased interest/attendance in their flagship football program. They are receiving unprecedented support from the city/KINGS/Sac-12. And possibly even the Sac Republic. Not reaching for the stars given all those circumstances would be shortsighted.
Lastly, wrt competing a couple steps up (as some have put it), the Hornets football program has beaten Colorado State and Stanford in recent years. And played close competitive games against Arizona State, Fresno State, and Cal-Berkeley. A few years before that they beat Oregon State and Colorado.
They managed to do the above despite being an FCS program with far fewer scholarships to offer and resources/facilities to draw in more talent. If/when on more equal footing, I like their chances of competing on a more consistent basis. Especially against the caliber of programs currently in the PAC-12.
I mean, it’s not as if they’d be going into a conference with Alabama, Georgia, Ohio State, or even USC. Basketball wise, it’s not like they’ll be in conference with Duke, Kentucky or North Carolina.
Gonzaga is a top level basketball program, but nobody else currently in the conference are known as world beaters. Football wise, Boise has probably enjoyed the most success and even they aren’t considered a dominant program. As stated earlier, just 30 years ago they were in the same conference that Sac State is in now. A decade later they were upsetting Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl.
There’s no reason Sac State can’t follow the same path.
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