After years of talking about having its own team, Kennesaw State University (KSU) gained yardage by hiring legendary University of Georgia (UGA) Bulldog Vince Dooley to assess support for a football program as head of an exploratory committee.
KSU draws 75 percent of its student population from Cherokee, Cobb and Fulton counties.
Dooley told the Ledger-News Jan. 9 that the committee he is heading will determine whether there is the financial, community and school support for a football team.
A beloved figure in college sports in Georgia, Dooley, who retired as UGA’s athletic director in 2004, will also spearhead athletics fundraising at Kennesaw State.
“KSU is the fastest growing university in the state, with 23,000 students,” he said.
The committee –– which consists of students, faculty, staff, alumni, business and community leaders, as well as friends and benefactors of KSU –– will provide a final report of its recommendations to President Daniel S. Papp in September.
During the next nine months, the committee will study the pros and cons of having a football team, such as how much it would cost; how much support exists; what facilities would be needed; what would be needed to maintain National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Title IX compliance; and how football would impact other athletics programs at KSU.
“The launch of the football exploratory committee is the next logical step in the progression of KSU’s athletics programs,” Papp said. “We are excited that a coach of the caliber of Vince Dooley has agreed to lead us through this process .... We are thankful to the committee members for their support and commitment.”
“The most recent polls show that Georgia is the fourth state in the union as far as supplying college football players, so that means there are a lot of students going out of state to get scholarships,” Dooley said.
Dooley said if a team is formed, it would play in Division 1 double AA, against schools like Georgia Southern and the new Georgia State University teams.
Dooley said, “2013 would be the earliest possible.” When asked if the team would be called the “Owls,” Dooley replied, “Well, that’s Kennesaw’s mascot.”
KSU currently is the state’s third-largest university, and recently became a member of NCAA Division I, collegiate athletics’ top tier.
On Dec. 1, KSU announced a partnership with the Atlanta Beat Women’s Professional Soccer team that includes the construction of a $16.5 million stadium on the campus, which also will be home to KSU’s women’s soccer program.
The 8,300-seat stadium, which will be ready in the spring, also conceivably could be used for football, Papp said.
In October, KSU opened a 14-acre sports and recreation park on 88 acres acquired recently by the KSU Foundation, which raises money for the university’s athletic capital projects.
“We are very excited at the possibility of having a football team at KSU,” said Norman Radow, chairman of the KSU Foundation. “I’ve seen Kennesaw State evolve from a local college just seven years ago, into a world-class university, with award-winning student residences, a new, state-of-the-art dining hall, and athletics facilities that would make any university proud. As I have said over and over, in everything we do for this university — we will want only the best.”
Once the Football Exploratory Committee’s work gets fully under way, the university’s constituents will be able to stay abreast of the group’s work through a public Web site that will be launched at: http://explorefootball.kennesaw.edu.
As UGA’s athletics director, Dooley was responsible for building one of the most successful programs in all of college sports, winning national championships in men’s tennis, golf, baseball and women’s gymnastics. During his 25 years as coach, he led the Bulldogs to the 1980 national championship title and six SEC championships. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1994.
“The potential of launching a football program from the ground up is an intriguing challenge to me,” Dooley said, “and I cannot think of a better place to do that than at Kennesaw State. This is an exciting place to be. This university is on the move.”
