Pac-12 set to add Boise, 3 other MW schools This is an interesting discussion. I do agree with Virginia Aggie that one of the reasons we struggle to put students in the seats is that most of them could care less about us playing teams like TAMC, Southern Utah and Utah Tech and even some of the Big Sky teams etc.
I recently saw a list of schools that play FCS Football and we have the largest student enrollment by far. We're right up there in enrollment size and academic prestige with our brother UC schools like Cal and UCLA but do not compete at the level of their athletics. I think that the only way we will ever have the students packing the football stadium and the basketball arena is if our level of competition goes up and we bring in schools that they recognize and feel that we should be competing with them.
The last thing I want to see happen is for Sac State to make the move before us. The greater Sacramento region is hungry for a big time, college athletics program and Sac has the advantage of being located right in the middle of a major population area. If they are ever able to build large, quality facilities for football and basketball and they move up and start playing against FBS football teams and major D1 basketball teams, we'll be stuck at the level we are at.
UC Davis has a huge presence in Sacramento with the ever growing, world class UC Medical Center in Sacramento and the ambitious, future development of Aggie Square will grow our importance and prestige in Sacramento region. Geographically, our location across the causeway makes it more difficult for us to entice UC Davis fans to make the drive to attend our games but playing against big name schools would definitely bring in more Aggie fans from the Sacramento area.