By Brian Murphy, WRAL

Charlotte, N.C. — The path from one of college football’s lesser leagues to a richer, more prestigious one has been well worn in recent years.

But none of the lucky few — like Utah and TCU and, more recently, Houston and UCF among others — have made the climb quite like SMU, which begins play this fall in the ACC.

“What is unique is none of those other schools were pronounced dead 37 years ago and have been on a decades’ long journey to return to the upper echelon of college athletics,” SMU athletics director Rick Hart said Monday at the ACC Kickoff in Charlotte. “The emotion of it, the magnitude of the moment, the opportunities that this brings institutionally, to the community, to the athletics department, it’s hard to put into words and measure.”

The Mustangs were long-time conference foes with Arkansas, Texas and Texas A&M and others in the Southwest Conference. But the renegade league splintered in the early 1990s, not long after SMU was handed the “death penalty” by the NCAA for repeated infractions by its highly ranked football program.

Arkansas left for the SEC. Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech and Baylor bolted for the new Big 12. SMU was left to wander along with rival TCU, Houston and Rice.

Three leagues and more than three decades later, SMU is back in a power conference. The ACC voted in September to add SMU, located in Dallas, to the league along with Pac-12 stalwarts Cal and Stanford.

The West Coast pair agreed to reduced payments from the ACC’s media rights deals. SMU, so eager to get the call and equipped with well-heeled donors, agreed to take nothing from the ACC’s media rights deal. Still, the Mustangs will be better off financially with money from other ACC sources than in the American Athletic Conference, their former home.

The athletics department reported raising $159 million in the 2023-24 fiscal year, most of that after accepting a spot in the ACC.

“It’s changed a lot,” SMU coach Rhett Lashlee said. “Our enrollment’s up. People want to go to a school that has a big-time athletic program in a big-time conference. Our recruiting has changed. Our season tickets more than doubled. We’ve set records and they more than doubled what we did a year ago.”

Dallas is activated, Lashlee said, expanding a fan base beyond just alumni of the private school with an enrollment of about 7,000. SMU’s first ACC game is Sept. 28 at home against Florida State.

“I can’t even try to imagine what it’s going to be like,” Hart said. “Bonkers comes to mind,” Hart said.

The “death penalty” cost SMU two football seasons — and a whole lot more. SMU did not field a team in 1987 or 1988. Then the Mustangs endured 18 losing seasons out of the next 20.

But since 2020, SMU has posted five consecutive winning seasons. The Mustangs, 24-4 at home since 2019, have been ranked in four of them, including last season when they finished 11-3 and No. 22 in the nation. All three losses were to schools from power conferences, including a poll loss to Boston College.

“It’s a jump,” said Lashlee, entering his third season as head coach. “We’re moving up a weight class. We’re going to learn a lot about our program, where we stand. We’re excited about that. But I do feel like we can compete. I’ll be very disappointed if we don’t.”

Lashlee said the biggest adjustments will be having enough depth along the offensive and defensive lines, one reason he brought in 13 transfers in the trenches, and playing higher competition week after week. SMU plays BYU and TCU in the weeks before Florida State with Louisville right after. SMU plays at Duke on Oct. 26, its only game against a Triangle school.

“We’re going to gain a lot from being in this conference, and I also think we’re going to add a lot of value to the conference,” Lashlee said.

It’s been a long road back for a program with a proud history. The Southwest Conference doesn’t exist anymore. The Western Athletic Conference, SMU’s next stop, barely does. Houston and TCU got back to the Big 12. The Horned Frogs made a national championship game.

“We were on this stage many years in the Southwest Conference — won over 11 conference championships, three national titles, had a rich history and tradition,” Lashlee said.

“To have had that and lost it, now to have it back, I don’t think there’s any question our school and we believe our program right in the heart of Dallas belongs on the national stage. We’re humbled and grateful for the opportunity to be back.”

Source: wralsportsfan.com