Kennesaw State athletic director Milton Overton envisions a January bowl game against a brand-name opponent on national television. He pictures the Owls, who this fall begin their transition from FCS to FBS, winning this game.
“That’s what I want to do,” Overton said in an interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “And that’s what’s going to happen. I don’t know exactly what the time frame is to get there. But, man, I tell you what, if we do that within that first five years, that would be extraordinary.”
Beginning its ninth season since kicking off in 2015, Kennesaw State faces a litany of challenges and hurdles as it makes the jump to FBS. A lack of confidence does not appear to be one of them.
“We’re going to be good,” Overton said last week in an interview in his office in the school’s Convocation Center. “We’re going to land at a good place no matter what.”
Less than an hour later in his own office, coach Brian Bohannon held the same ambition. After amassing a 68-24 record at the FCS level with three Big South Conference titles and four playoff appearances, the only coach in school history had reason.
“To me, you don’t do this unless you want to win the conference and go to the conference championship and have a chance to get to a bowl game, have a chance to get in the College Football Playoff, all those things,” he told the AJC. “Well, why else would you do it? What are you playing for, to be second? That’ll be our goals, no doubt about that.”
After a highly successful eight-season launch at the FCS level, Kennesaw State starts its pursuit of more – more exposure, more prestige, more money. The Owls will play this coming season as an FCS independent with no opportunity to compete in the postseason before joining Conference USA and the gilded environs of FBS in 2024.
Founded in 1963, the school whose enrollment (about 45,000) now rivals Georgia’s and that fielded the only basketball team in the state to play in the men’s NCAA Tournament this year continues to churn.
Internally, a lot has shifted, too. Bohannon lost both of his coordinators and his head strength-and-conditioning coach. Grant Chesnut had been his offensive coordinator and offensive-line coach since the start, as had Jim Kiritsy as head strength coach. Both now are at Navy.
In the transition, Bohannon also scrapped the triple-option offense that he had learned under former Tech coach Paul Johnson in favor of a pistol offense. Bohannon said he decided early last season to make the change because new NCAA rules that prohibit blocking below the waist anywhere outside of the tackle box made it too difficult for his offense to operate effectively. Bohannon describes himself as “passionate” about the triple-option scheme, “but we had to do it,” he said. “It was a no-brainer.”
Breaking the news to his intractable mentor was a less simple task.
“I’m like, Coach, we can’t do it,” Bohannon said. “He’s like, Well, y’all can run more counters. I’m like, Coach, we just can’t do it anymore.”
His new offensive coordinator, Chris Klenakis, coached Colin Kaepernick at Nevada and Lamar Jackson at Louisville. New defensive coordinator Nathan Burton was an assistant at Tech with former coach Geoff Collins. New strength coach Alex Derenthal was hired from Georgia State.
This season, with no championship or playoff to pursue, Bohannon will aim to redshirt most or all freshmen and likely other players with redshirt seasons available to save them for the start of FBS play. He also shifted practices to the morning. The program is about halfway between the shift from the FCS scholarship maximum of 63 to the FBS max of 85.
“The guys that have been with me know, if you want to change something, now’s the time to do it,” Bohannon said. “I’m in that mode of just, Hey, if it makes sense and we think we can do it, let’s try it. We’ve been here for a while, and sometimes change is good.”
Even with no trophy to chase, Bohannon said that his team had the best offseason and best preseason camp that he has led in four or five years after last season’s 5-6 mark, the team’s first-ever losing season.
Because of last year’s results and a desire to break from internal issues that contributed to the record, Bohannon said that players have committed to “doing the things that have won here. I don’t think they’ve thought two seconds about, necessarily, what this year is.”
Kennesaw State had hoped to play in the ASUN for one final season, but the conference chose to keep the Owls out for football (though the other Owls teams will compete in ASUN for one more school year). The team had to scramble to form a nine-game schedule that includes recognizable opponents such as Furman, Tennessee-Chattanooga, Tennessee State and Tennessee Tech, but also more unfamiliar ones such as Lincoln (located in Oakland, California) and Virginia University of Lynchburg.
Kennesaw State will start Conference USA play in 2024, though it won’t be bowl eligible until 2025.
It is all part of a much bigger metamorphosis. In proving itself at the FCS level, Kennesaw State positioned itself for the leap to FBS and all that it entails. The athletic budget will grow from about $27 million to $32 million for the 2024 season as new money flows in – more TV money, increased revenues from playing guarantee games against power-conference opponents and increases in ticket prices and sponsorship dollars.
The TV money will increase from less than $200,000 annually to more than $2 million from Conference USA, according to Overton. The guarantees to play a road game against a power-conference school as a fellow FBS member can be $1-2 million, whereas FCS opponents are paid in the neighborhood of $400,000. (Conference USA has a TV contract with CBS Sports Network and ESPN.)
The opportunity for nationally televised home games is one plus. The money is a much bigger benefit.
“I feel more comfortable that we’ll be able to operate in our mission (of providing scholarships for athletes) in a very tough market because we’ve done this, if that makes sense,” Overton said.
It comes with a cost, of course. Kennesaw State will have to pay for more scholarships. Bohannon’s staff figures to expand. The school will expand Fifth Third Stadium from its capacity of 8,300. (The Owls averaged 5,626 last year at home. The NCAA requires a rolling two-year average attendance of 15,000, though schools find ways to address that, such as having corporate sponsors purchase discounted tickets and then distributing those.)
Other facilities could get a look. The football offices are in an office park just off of campus, and the practice field is about a mile away from there.
The cash register rings. Overton has plans for creating new revenue streams, even the possibility of developments not unlike what the Braves have with The Battery Atlanta.
“We’re not there yet, but I think that, long term, that’s kind of where we’d like to head,” Overton said.
It is a familiar journey. Georgia State jumped to FBS in 2013 followed by Georgia Southern in 2014. The Panthers have played in five bowl games in their 10 seasons in FBS (in their first FBS season, they weren’t permitted to play in a bowl), the Eagles five in eight. As FBS teams, Georgia State (Tennessee) and Georgia Southern (Nebraska) have both upset big-name power-conference opponents on the road. Perhaps Kennesaw State’s day is coming, along with that January bowl-game win that Overton has in his sights.
“I think we’re moving beyond the ‘best kept secret’ and ‘sleeping giant,’” Overton said. “The giant’s awoke and aware of who we are, so now we plan to compete with the best.”
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