University of Idaho President Chuck Staben was home with his family in Boise on New Year’s Day when he got an angry message from an alumnus.
“Are you watching the Rose Bowl?” it read. “That’s the sort of experience Idaho had before you made your awful decision.”
Almost two years after Staben announced that the Vandals would no longer compete in college football’s top division, and a month after the school won its final Football Bowl Subdivision game, the angry messages haven’t disappeared. Neither has Staben’s conviction that lower-stakes football is the right thing for his school.