If there ever was another university that was almost a mirror image of Cal State Fullerton it would be Georgia State University. In a landmark announcement set to be delivered during a press conference on April 17, 2008, Georgia State officials are expected to announce the university will field a NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision Team as early as 2010. This expected announcement begs the question, “If Georgia State can start a football team from scratch, why can’t Cal State Fullerton bring Titan Football back?”
(Please read the news item on msn.foxsports.com and ESPN.com for the full details of Georgia State University’s expected announcement.)
UPDATED: Georgia State to Kick Off Football Program in 2010 courtesy of the Colonial Athletic Association official website.
For the sake of comparison, let’s take a look at Georgia State against Cal State Fullerton. Information was gleaned from both the Georgia State Wikipedia page and the California State University, Fullerton Wikipedia page for the purposes of comparison.
Cal State Fullerton exceeds Georgia State’s student enrollment by over 10,000 students yet both schools offer about the same amount of student housing. Both schools have long time been considered “commuter schools” due to the shortage of on-campus housing. Both schools are in heavy urban areas and both campuses are “land locked”, meaning the campus acreage can not expand beyond the current borders. Athletically, GSU fields 17 Division 1 teams while Cal State Fullerton has 13 teams in both men’s and women’s sports. With so many similarities how is it that Georgia State will be playing college football in two years yet Cal State Fullerton’s Titan Stadium sits dormant during the football season? The blueprint is there and thanks to Georgia State, Cal State Fullerton could be playing football once again if we can follow the lead of Georgia State.
Here is how they did it:
Georgia State’s athletic program completed a feasibility study that looked at the interest and potential cost to add a Division I-AA college football team. The feasibility study included a survey in which the majority of the students, faculty, staff and alumni expressed their support for this addition. The study included the various financial costs involved ranging from the renovation of a local stadium in Atlanta to the complete transformation of the current sports arena to a football and basketball arena.
In April 2007, Georgia State held a pair of town-hall meetings on the subject of football, in which students, alumni, and faculty were able to comment on the addition of football. At this time, it was stated that if football were to proceed at Georgia State they could play at the Georgia Dome.
Later the same week, Georgia State announced that former NFL coach and native Georgian Dan Reeves was to assist with the study of football, and to help with fund raising for the sport.
On October 19, 2007 the Georgia State University Mandatory Student Fee Committee unanimously approved a proposal from the Athletics Department for an $85 per semester increase to support football, additional women’s sports and a marching band program.
Of course Georgia State and Cal State Fullerton are not carbon copies of each other but the similarities are quite close. Ultimately the current Cal State Fullerton students will make the decision if Titan Football will once again return to Fullerton.
Now that you see that it can be done at Georgia State, does this change your mind if Cal State Fullerton can bring back Titan Football?
Whenever news on the effort to bring back Titan Football has appeared in local media, typically the articles appear in the sports section. A recent article reporting on the progress of this effort appeared in the Orange County Register, this time in the News and Education section. Reporter Marla Jo Fisher included an update on the Long Beach State push to reinstate football along with information regarding the ongoing efforts to revive the defunct Cal State Fullerton football program.
