100 Days, 100 Reasons G6 Football Matters

The Sun Belt Conference announced to the world on Sept. 10, 2022, that it was no longer at the bottom of the heap.

Three programs. Three roads. Three upsets. One Saturday.

Marshall went to Notre Dame Stadium — the first Sun Belt team to ever play there — as a 21-point underdog and won 26-21. App State went to College Station as an 18.5-point underdog and beat No. 6 Texas A&M 17-14. Georgia Southern went to Lincoln as a 21-point underdog, put up 642 yards of offense — the most Nebraska had ever allowed at Memorial Stadium — and won 45-42 on an 8-yard Kyle Vantrease touchdown run with 36 seconds left.

No non-autonomy conference had beaten two AP top-10 teams on the same Saturday since 2003.

Nebraska fired Scott Frost the next morning.

The Receipts

The Sun Belt collected $4.18 million in guarantee game checks that Saturday. Marshall got $1.25 million. Georgia Southern got $1.43 million. App State got $1.5 million.

They were paid to lose. They won instead.

Marshall’s Charlie Huff knew it was coming.

“In house, no disrespect to Notre Dame, in house, we expected it,” Huff told reporters. “Because we talked about this summer being a team that expects to win every time we touch the field.”

App State’s Shawn Clark didn’t pretend the programs were equals. He just pointed out that equality wasn’t a prerequisite.

“It means something to me to beat the No. 6-ranked program,” Clark said. “It’s two different programs. We don’t recruit at the same level. We don’t have what they have, but we have a lot of heart and we have the right kind of players in our program.”

What Made It Possible

That summer, Sun Belt Commissioner Keith Gill looked at his newly expanded league and said it plainly: “Now, this year, the best non-autonomy FBS conference just got better.”

The Sun Belt had added four football programs ahead of 2022 — Marshall, James Madison, Old Dominion and Southern Miss. Marshall, the team that just walked into Notre Dame Stadium and left with a victory, was in its first season as a Sun Belt member.

But the foundation had been built years earlier. The Sun Belt added Appalachian State and Georgia Southern from the FCS in 2014 and Coastal Carolina in 2016. App State had won three consecutive FCS national championships. Georgia Southern had won six. The conference wasn’t collecting castoffs. It was recruiting proven winners.

In 2020, two years before Statement Saturday, the Sun Belt beat three Big 12 teams on the first full Saturday of the COVID-delayed season. Billy Napier’s Louisiana team knocked off No. 23 Iowa State. Coastal Carolina beat Kansas. Arkansas State beat Kansas State.

“You can’t underestimate a Sun Belt Conference team anymore,” Napier said. “It’s become a normal thing. You put a Sun Belt team on your schedule, you better watch out.”

Statement Saturday proved it wasn’t a fluke. It was a pattern.

Why It Matters

In its first 14 seasons of football (2001-2014), the Sun Belt produced three ten-win teams and 25 bowl participants. Since 2014, the conference has produced 22 ten-win teams and 73 bowl participants. Its bowl winning percentage during the College Football Playoff era is .571 — trailing only the SEC.

In the four seasons since the 2022 expansion, the Sun Belt has posted 12 victories over autonomy conference opponents — starting with those three. It has led all non-autonomy conferences in bowl representation every year since. It set conference records for NFL Draft picks, Senior Bowl selections and Combine invitations.

Three years after Statement Saturday, James Madison — one of the four programs that joined the Sun Belt in 2022 — earned the No. 12 seed in the College Football Playoff. The Dukes went 40-10 in four FBS seasons with a .800 winning percentage that trailed only Georgia, Ohio State, Oregon and Michigan. They were the first Sun Belt team to reach the CFP and the fourth non-autonomy team in playoff history.

“The competitive difference between a lot of autonomy conference teams and the very competitive non-autonomy teams isn’t as much as maybe the average fan might think it is,” said Curt Cignetti while he was still coaching at James Madison.

Statement Saturday was the day the Sun Belt stopped asking for respect and started demanding it. The conference hasn’t stopped since.

They told you it didn’t matter. Here are 100 reasons it does.