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Montana to FBS?

Green Cookie Monster

Green Cookie Monster

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Staff member
I'll admit, I'm not one to promote anything Grizzly, especially the yearly rumors of moving up. Well this year may be the year. TT on AGS has a long thread if you want an overview.

http://www.dailyinterlake.com/sports/local_montana/article_68549afe-3e0d-11df-881a-001cc4c002e0.html

http://www.anygivensaturday.com/showthread.php?t=69020

The oracles of football are predicting a massive shift in conferences and divisions within the next 3-4 years, not sure why its 3-4 years away though. Guessing it has to do with travel, expenditures, ect.

How does this effect Sac State?

Soon Montana State will be following as well. The Big Sky Conference will lose it's namesake members. Who is added? SUU, the Dakota's, affiliates like CP and davis?

Does the conference as a whole move to FBS? Other than PSU and Sac State plus the Montana's, no other school in the conference meets the FBS requirements. Maybe Weber too.

Does Sac State finally leave the BSC and join the BW and GWC? Add Portland and NAU and presto a nice regional travel friendly conference capable of being FBS eventually.

This hopefully will add some discussion.......what say you?
 
From what I've heard on CS, Texas Terror is about one fry short of a Happy Meal, if you know what I mean.

Your conclusions should the Griz leave make a ton of sense. The prob for UM is that they're likely in the same boat Boise was when they made the move: take Idaho with you or don't go. Look at the results: Boise is tearing it up, while other than some recent minor success, the Vandals look like they belong in D-II. It may be the same for the Kitties. I think that the Griz could eventually compete in FBS, but it will take time.

As far as replacements, well, I'd think PSU and Weber become the flagships, particularly Weber. Given our success in WVB, we're probably on the next tier, particularly if our expected football improvement pans out. I would love to get Cow Poly and the Manure Pile (make Causeway actually mean something), but that would entail them taking a step down for all other sports because Fullerton won't take an associate member. I loathe the idea of bringing in the UXDs and the Cr@pbirds, but you're probably right about that. One might also consider Utah Valley as well. Another sucky choice. Potential D-II callups might include W Washington and Southern Oregon.

Conference bump-up? Possible if everyone wants to push infrastructure. No conference that I know of has ever done that since the original I-A/I-AA split back in the '70s. That's probably the only feasible way for Sac to do it before somewhere around 2020. The only other way would be a WAC membership, banking on our extant associate membership there. The Griz could probably pull the MWC if they wanted to. I still question the sanity in moving up, though. Conference bump-up or WAC, we get the same result: a shot at a cr@p bowl game with no legitimate chance at a title. In FCS, we have as much chance at a national championship as anyone else and don't have to cover deficit spending to go to said cr@p bowl.
 
Green Cookie Monster said:
I'll admit, I'm not one to promote anything Grizzly, especially the yearly rumors of moving up. Well this year may be the year. TT on AGS has a long thread if you want an overview.

http://www.dailyinterlake.com/sports/local_montana/article_68549afe-3e0d-11df-881a-001cc4c002e0.html

http://www.anygivensaturday.com/showthread.php?t=69020

The oracles of football are predicting a massive shift in conferences and divisions within the next 3-4 years, not sure why its 3-4 years away though. Guessing it has to do with travel, expenditures, ect.

How does this effect Sac State?

Soon Montana State will be following as well. The Big Sky Conference will lose it's namesake members. Who is added? SUU, the Dakota's, affiliates like CP and davis?

Does the conference as a whole move to FBS? Other than PSU and Sac State plus the Montana's, no other school in the conference meets the FBS requirements. Maybe Weber too.

Does Sac State finally leave the BSC and join the BW and GWC? Add Portland and NAU and presto a nice regional travel friendly conference capable of being FBS eventually.

This hopefully will add some discussion.......what say you?
Click to expand...

Montana can't afford the move, they need to add two additional sports as well as have the ability to provide scholarships for them, not to mention the facility upgrades for those added sports and salaries for coaching and support staff.

They may be banking on sellouts to cover the costs, but what happens when they go 1-11, 3-9 or 2-10 the first few seasons? They lose revenue due to fans not going to games. Sure, they could raise ticket prices, but their fans already pay a premium FBS price for an FCS product, who is going to be willing to pay more or how many of their "mountain people" fans will have the ability to do so?

They have absolutely NO media market to speak of, they MAY get 1 or two regionally televised games a year. Outside of Montana, no one cares about Montana.

Montana will never, at least not in their first five years, have a home OOC game unless they pay an FCS to come to their house. They will become what they say is beneath them, a team that takes paychecks to get slaughtered.

I can go on, and on, and on...

:x :x :x :x :x :x :x :x :x :x :x

Of everything we discuss here, this is my least favorite topic, however, I feel compelled and become obsessive about posting on it. :x
 
Given that it’s the offseason and these “Montana to FBS” threads are on every board right now, I’m still thinking it’s a long shot and UM will stay where they are (although it sounds like some of UM’s administration is hell bent on making a move). According to UM administration (and this is what I gathered from CS.com) the options they had for the football team to stay out of the red (they sell out every game so I have no idea how they are in the red in the first place) is to either move down to D-II or move to FBS. They went on to state the rising expenses and high costs of out of state scholarships were the driving force in the budget “problems”. Many of the UM posters think this is all just a ploy to force the fan base to support a move to FBS. However they want to make a move is fine; but there are obvious flaws in the reasons they are promoting a move. On one of the CS.com threads, Herky called them out on the fact that they severely underfund all of the other programs other than football and basketball, AND that UM currently only meets the MINIMUM amount of sponsored sports for FCS. So unless the rules change on a minimum number of sponsored sports, UM will need to ADD 2 funded sports in addition to the additional 22 scholarships needed at the FBS level. (Not to mention the facilities travel expenses, and coaching salaries of the additional sports that will need to be funded.) The UM posters never responded with any plan to address this issue so I have no idea what they think will happen regarding this.

http://www.championshipsubdivision.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=14389

The big issue I noticed is in the UM administrations reasons for making a move to stay in the black was related to out of state scholarships. Since the state of Montana isn’t exactly a “hot bed” of talent, their dependence on out of state athletes will only INCREASE with a move to FBS thus adding more expenses to the budget. I think the UM administration is severely overestimating the amount of money they will get at the FBS level (bowl money, TV money, etc) and are inflating it to justify a move. The other issue I won’t go onto much is the political aspect of UM leaving MSU and how big of a hurdle that would be.

Now what happens to the FCS landscape if they move is another question. I would like to see a “southwest” regional all sports conference emerge. My speculation is it would look like this:
  • • Sac State
    • CP
    • “the farm extension”
    • PSU
    • NAU
    • SUU
Of course this is all dependent if the administration at CP and “the farm extension” would ever have the balls to have its non-football sports travel outside the state of CA for conference match-ups. The minimum 6 members are present so football would get an auto-bid. Also NAU has been a long time Big Sky member so I don’t think it would easily part ways with the likes of WSU, ISU, and EWU.

If the BSC didn’t dissolve and tried to fill a void, I would hate to see the BSC adds the UXD’s as the travel would be a complete nightmare and do nothing but add travel costs to the budget. Therefore due to the regional proximity of SUU, I would have to think they would get an invite.
 
SA, I hate these threads too but started it b/c it could effect Sac State in a few years and I am tired of bashing the no videocamera on the turf install.

One thing Montana doesn't have is a large student body and a student body that pays high fees to support sports. Funding will have to come from an outside source. NMSU, Idaho, LA Tech are all in a media wasteland, so I don't think that will be a key decision in them being added to a FBS conference.

They will have to add two womens sports but that could be negated by conference money provided by the FBS conference they join. But travel would be even more going to Hawaii, Ruston and Fresno regularly. They also don't have key sports like baseball, softball and gymnastics. Football pays the bills at Montana, what happens when they go 3-8 and have 13,000 show up for a home game? Not only is football negatively affected but the whole department.

Do I think the BSC is divided, yes, you can't have Montana and its football program playing schools like ISU, EWU and UNC that average 5,000 fans a game and remain successful.

W/o baseball, softball and gymnastics the chance of Montana being invited by the WAC maybe moot.
 
Boise State doesn’t sponsor baseball. I don’t see what sports are sponsored as being an issue at all. The only issue regarding which sports are sponsored is meeting the minimum number of sports for FBS. If BSU and another school (or two) does go to the MWC, I don’t see how the WAC wouldn’t invite Montana…or anyone else to fill the void. A few posters on CS.com think the WAC is more inclined to invite a Texas FCS to bridge the geographical gap to LaTech.
 
SDHornet said:
Boise State doesn’t sponsor baseball. I don’t see what sports are sponsored as being an issue at all. The only issue regarding which sports are sponsored is meeting the minimum number of sports for FBS. If BSU and another school (or two) does go to the MWC, I don’t see how the WAC wouldn’t invite Montana…or anyone else to fill the void. A few posters on CS.com think the WAC is more inclined to invite a Texas FCS to bridge the geographical gap to LaTech.
Click to expand...

True, BSU does not sponsor baseball, but I beleive that they would prefer a member that did. As you know, Sac is an affiliate member

Montana would have to sponsor the WAC's core sports, I beleive (could be wrong though) gymnastics is one of them and Sac is an affiliate in this as well.

I see La Tech going CUSA before a Texas team is brought into the WAC. La Tech has no business being in a conference that offers no regional competition. Their fans have to fly to road games or take very long drives, it just doesnt work. Bringing in a school that is within less than a days drive to most schools in the conference makes way more sense both financially and logistically.

Montana has no business in the WAC, they would be just another La Tech/Hawaii.

The Montana admin is just trying to get people ready for whatever decision they make, and they think that going FBS may be an option. But, as their feasibility study said a few years ago, financially, it is too big a burden financially. They are walking a fine line, they can't even keep up with non-revenue producing sports' facility maintenance and upgrades i.e. tennis.
 
I am not sure if Montana will move up or not, but there will be big changes in college football in the next 3 to 5 years.
 
Green Cookie Monster said:
SloStang said:
I am not sure if Montana will move up or not, but there will be big changes in college football in the next 3 to 5 years.
Click to expand...

What happens in 3-5 years?
Click to expand...
The rumors are the Big East, Big 10, and possible the Pac 10 will expand to 12 teams (or maybe even more). Basically schools unhappy with their current conference or that want to better their conference affiliation will be jockeying to get into a “stronger” conference. This will result in the non-BCS conferences getting raided by the BCS conferences which will domino into the non-BCS conferences inviting FCS schools “ready” for a move to FBS to fill the voids. I think the consensus is the WAC is the most vulnerable to being raided (BSU, Fresno St, and imo Nevada could possible be raided by the MWC depending on what happens with the Pac 10). I am guessing the Sun Belt is in a similar situation. The moratorium on FCS to FBS moves will be lifted in 2011 so FCS move-ups can join a FBS conference then…hence the next 3-5 years.

Add in the fact that BCS reclassification occurs in 2012 and the stage is set for dramatic changes regarding conference alignments. Boise State to MWC would dramatically help that conferences’ bid for a BCS qualifier spot.
 
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