Gonzaga is another example of how sports can lift the entire university to another level.

Long Beach has had the opportunity a few times to do the same: during/just after the Tarkanian era; during the Seth Greenberg era, and again during the Fab 5 era under Dan Monson. The football program was VERY good in the early-mid 1980s. These opportunities were all muffed or not sustained. University leadership ran from Tark's success. A bad coaching hire was made after Seth left, compounded by hiring a highly competent and realistic AD, who was made a risk adverse caretaker by the university president, Bob Maxson, who improved the school's academic reputation tremendously (he made LB the academic flagship for the CS system). If only he pushed the athletic department to do the same. Alas, he had the bad taste of Tark at UNLV in his mouth and he avoided envelope pushers in athletics, even though he was 100% behind the teams and highly accessible to the student body. The last opportunity was bungled by letting MBB become stale, hiring Andy Fee, failing to make necessary alterations to the Pyramid and hiring Joan Clowney.

I believe LB's hat is out of rabbits.