Nine years ago, Renu Khator became president of the University of Houston with an ambitious plan to transform it from an undistinguished commuter school into a “nationally competitive university,” as she likes to put it. In addition to hiring noted faculty, undertaking major construction projects and doubling research spending, she also strove to have the kind of big-time football team that students, alumni and the city could all rally around — and which could reinforce the sense that Houston was a university to be reckoned with.
Houston was then in Conference USA, one of the lesser athletic conferences.