That's too bad. They have a long and proud football history. D2 football is all but dead in the west.

https://www.sacbee.com/sports/college/article215103170.html

(See my earlier gripe on the Sacramento Bee...this article is taken from the Modesto Bee. If I were a newspaper journalist I would be updating my resume everyday, and looking at a career in long haul trucking or the exciting world of allied health careers.)

Too bad about the 'Jacks, but as BlueGoldAg noted, D2 football is on its last breath in the west. I recall a few years ago that Humboldt had a game at a small school in Montana* and travelled by bus. As it is now they are in a conference with at least one Canadian team and the conference schedule is made up of home AND away games against all other conference members. Humboldt even played a team from Mexico within the last couple of years. With the Jacks dropping football the GNAC will be down to four teams - Central Washington, Western Oregon, Simon Fraser and Azusa Pacific. Azusa Pacific is an affiliate member for football only and as of 2019 will be the only D2 football team in California.

(*Small school in Montana may be redundant.)

Gender equity is about the numbers of bodies on the field, court, diamond, track or pitch, not the number of sports. That is why football is such a killer in the numbers game. I would assume that HSU might be able, heck, might be required to add some men's sports such as baseball or golf. Maybe equestrian.

OK, this from the HSU athletic website and I'm done for awhile:
http://www.hsujacks.com/news/2018/7/16/general-university-announces-football-decision.aspx

Think of the voices we had just a few decades back, wanting to keep us DII, non scholarship... some ever brought up DIII ... delusional.

We were the last to move out of the FWC ... thank goodness we did!

And if I recall correctly the GNAC made a strong pitch for us to join them. Want to play two games with Simon Fraser and two with Azusa Pacific every year? Then scramble for games with Northwest Nazerine and club teams from Mexico.

So sad....will any of the DII GNAC football teams survive????

This is terrible news. Davis High has a kid that’ll be playing there (FS, Jack Hoal). Wonder if he’ll transfer or end up up going JC and eventually transfer.

His dad is the coach at Yuba college, so it wouldn't surprise me if Jack went that way.

Is there a way to find the conferences that we've been in? I started during the DI era. Which conferences did we play in DII and for which years?

Far Western Conference for decades, then Nevada and others left. FWC became the NCAC, these are all DII era.

I believe we joined 1 or 2 diffetent football conferences as west coast DII football died.

Far West Conference 1925-81
Northern California Athletic Conference 1982-1992
American West Conference 1993
D-II Independent 1994-2003
Great West Conference 2004-2011
Big Sky Conference 2012-Present

http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/ucda/sports/m-footbl/auto_pdf/2016-17/misc_non_event/2016Guide.pdf (Pp. 40-44)

AWC, DII Indy, and GWC all D2 football conferences?

As I recall the AWC was UCD which was still in D2 and a few teams like Slack, Poly, Southern Utah and maybe Northridge that had all made the move to D-1AA. That might have been the reason that the Ags only stayed in the conference for one year. The conference died when Slack, Southern Utah and Northridge went to the Big Sky. Davis went D2 Independent, which was of course not a conference.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_West_Conference

The Great West was purely a conference of convenience for teams in the midwest and west coast in need of a football league of some sort. Like the American West, it died as teams found homes in more traditional conferences.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_West_Conference

This all harkens back to the early ‘90s when it was first proposed that we go D1. There was a meeting in 194 Chem to discuss this issue. I was there. Many young profs (and many older Ag Profs) were stridently against this because it could take funds away from academics. The proposition failed. Then in the late ‘90s the issue was raised again in a meeting in Young Hall. I was there. In attendance was: Jim Sochor, Bob Williams, Deanne Vorshachter, and many other UCD world class coaches in favor of moving up to D1. Again, the proposition failed. The most ardent opponents repeated the old refrain that the move would take money from academics and would degrade academic performance of the athletes. Today, the history has proved all of the detractors wrong. We are much better now than then both as a university and in sports. Academic achievement is up. Diversity is up. Research spending up. Our visibility as a university is up. Too bad it took so long, but we did it!

Well said...firmly held, old beliefs often create tunnel vision and an unwillingness to consider other options and that can slow down progress to a snail's pace. I'm so glad that we are apparently beyond all those biased opinions assuming that high caliber athletics and outstanding academics are incompatible with each other.

Was the dropping of programs the primary reason we went DI? Who made the call to finally move up and how did that go when it had failed twice? Such a shame for HSU and DII football in general.

Thank you everyone!!!!

I believe part was common sense. I thought it was a gradual move with first partial scholarships. Greg Warzecka and Larry Swanson were in the process, Pam Gill probably the last to join in. Guessing. I believe the new facilities were important, and Vanderhoef eventually came around.

In our DII years I never heard anyone suggest a possible league we join, just an ocassional reference to DI.

If I had the time I would love to write a book about this subject. I agree with Movie that common sense did finally prevail, but not without much pain and controversy. Starting about the mid ‘90s a different kind of student started coming to UCD. They were tired of seeing their HS friends at Berkeley and UCLA rooting for nationally ranked sports teams whereas UCD was a complete unknown in national sports. A different kind of faculty was coming to Davis as well. I will mention only Kimberly Elsbach, but there were many others, who knew that D1 sports could be compatible with academics and were brave enough to speak out about it. So I don’t think it was the dropping of programs that made the difference as much as that the students wanted the change. Recall the FACE initiative? This was a very controversial proposal that would actually have the students pay for athletic upgrades, but included a new Health Center, swimming complex and other non athletic projects. FACE passed by a mere 51%; the academic senate voted it down 827 to 556. It was very controversial also because the fees ($100+ per quarter) did not kick in until the students who voted for the fees had graduated! I believe that the Regents later passed a resolution forbidding such a vote again. But, again common sense prevailed and Larry Vanderhoef pushed forward with the change to D1. I think the academic senate finally caved in to the move because the students were paying for it not sponsors or advertising revenue, sources it felt would “corrupt the ICA department.” The fact that students carry the greatest financial burden of the UCD D1 program is still highly unusual and controversial, if not unheard of. I do not know how UCSD plans to finance its new D1 program, but I bet its not like we do it. (Sorry, Looks like I have begun my book!!)

I would buy and read your book. Just sayin.