Sports fans can be so fickle. Fair-weather Raiders fans jumpedoff the bandwagon quicker than Paris Hilton’s sex tape spreadaround the Internet.

“Expert fans” took away Jeff Garcia’s startingjob because his backup had two quality starts, despite the factthat Garcia has put up numbers comparable to Joe Montana and SteveYoung over the past few years.

That same ignorant community has already decided, without anyfact or thought behind it, that Sacramento State should get rid oftheir football program.

In other words, “We don’t really know what’sgoing on. Mainly because we don’t know too much about thetopic. We do like sports and all, but we heard that we aren’tvery good and we think that football might be taking away a lot ofmoney from other sports.”

“Oh yeah, and I sort of remember a story in the SacramentoBee about how Sac State should get rid of football, so it must betrue.”

Well forget about it.

Pay no attention to the rumors.

Ignore the sensationalist stance on what was simply just acrappy 2-9 season.

Football isn’t going anywhere.

Other than a few pessimistic voices, there is nothing tosubstantiate dropping Sac State’s largest athletic draw.

“There has been no discussion, nor is there any intendeddiscussion about cutting football,” Sacramento State AthleticDirector Terry Wanless said. “Football is a vital part of theinterest of this university.”

University President Alex Gonzalez knows first hand from hisdays at Fresno State what a strong football program can do for acollege. His mission to bring Sac State more campus life and toditch the title of a commuter school, would be aided by a strongathletic program.

And football, despite what anyone wants to think, is the onlyway to create a strong athletic program. Especially since footballis played in the Fall, just as students are reacquaintingthemselves with our campus.

Sports are too often overlooked by the arrogant intellectualtypes as fluff 8212; no more important to a university than sodamachines.

But sports are just as important as anything we learn incollege.

Isn’t a university about uniting a small community? Or isthat just for major colleges on the East Coast and in the Midwest,where belonging to a college means something more than”taking care of classes.”

I can almost hear their critiques now: “What’s thepoint of spending all this money on a sport that no onesupports?”

Well, Sac State invests a ton of money on our theatre programand I don’t remember the last time our latest Hornetproduction led by “Lil’ Billy Broadway Dreams”outdrew even our worst football game.

My point isn’t that we have a bad theatre program. Infact, we have a great theatre program, yet they still have troubledrawing huge crowds.

A good program… not drawing big crowds. Maybe we shouldget rid of it?

We put money into a multitude of different programs within theuniversity, whether it be theatre, or our arts and musicprograms.

So why is football any different? It’s an investment forthe students and local community.

The cost of that investment is often misrepresented.

Football earns $325,000 in revenue directly from ticket salesand game guarantees. The majority of Sac State’s $360,000marketing revenue is tied to football and all fund-raisingcapabilities through the Hornet Club will be tied intofootball.

Football is not making money, and it probably never will, butonly a handful of college programs are profiting off ofathletics.

The football factor in Hornet athletics is not that big of adeal in terms of cost versus revenue. And to factor in that we arecurrently on the low end of ticket revenue compared to thepotential market is even more promising.

Head coach Steve Mooshagian has always preached that we cannotexpect attendance until fans see consistent success. This pastseason was a disappointment, but it was a rebuilding year in whichthe team lost its starting quarterback.

Next year the team returns with arguably three of the topoffensive players in the Big Sky with Ryan Leadingham, TyronneGross and Fred Amey. Mooshagian will also have a completeoff-season to build his program through recruiting and the hiringof new coaches.

The potential for success in terms of a win-loss record isthere. The potential for community support is huge.

The president aspires to make us the flagship university of theCSU system, and football can help create that image.

Football, whether you like sports or not, is key and it’snot going anywhere.

Will you be crying on the sidelines if football is cancelled?Email [email protected]