Is it better to be a big fish in a small pond or a tiny plankton in the ocean? IMHO Montana should take a good look at the nearby University of Idaho and stay firmly put where they are. Idaho made the move "up" after sustained success in FCS and has been mostly abysmal ever since.
Montana probably believes they can be Boise State and maybe they can. I applaud them for wanting to be better, but much like hell, the road from FCS to FBS is paved with good intentions and more abject failures than successes. For every Boise State there is the entire MAC and Sunbelt conferences and plenty of other schools that should have stayed put.
I'd bet that even some Marshall fans miss the SoCon days every now and then. Winning is a heck of a lot more fun than losing and losing is what most schools that go to FBS get plenty of experience with. The deck is stacked so far against schools from non-BCS leagues that it's almost impossible to sustain long term success. I also argue that you can get more exposure for you program during a deep FCS playoff run than you can by making one of the low tier bowls. With the playoffs you can get 3-4 nationally televised games and you have a chance of winning a real championship.
Montana says they are staying put for now.... but I'm thinking they are going to watch the further realignments and see how things shake out... They've got it made in FCS but if App and Villy end up leaving, I'd put money on them jumping out as fast as possible.
(11-10-2010 08:21 PM)ETSU-07 Wrote: [ -> ]I'd bet that even some Marshall fans miss the SoCon days every now and then.
You would have to loooooooook really hard to find one. Marshall left IAA at the right time. The SoCon is a much weaker conf. than it was in 1996 even. And the TV exposure is almost non existant.
The National Championship Game is watched by mostly die hard fans of FCS (I watch it if I have the time). The ratings of the NCG only beat out 1 bowl game last year and that was the Humanatarian Bowl (Idaho and Bowling Green).
For the most part IAA at the time helped Marshall rebuild its prgram from the Nov 14, 1970 plane crash. And I would say for the most part that most Marshall fans wouldn't take back the time in IAA, but you won't find any that wish we were still there.
Is Montana making the right decision by staying were they are. Right now I would say yes. If they moved up now they couldn't survive, their athletic budget is only 7.23 million a year. The lowest budget right now in IA is 13.8. And Montana is scaling back, come next year they are cutting 2 football coaching jobs and 1 in every other sport. They are also scaling back 200,000 in scholarships over the next 3 years.