We have heard the p-word mentioned time and time again during college football games this season. This season will go down in history as the first season where the entire landscape of college football was affected due to the scholarship limits being cut from 95 to 85 in 1991.
Since then teams like Rutgers and South Florida have had the opportunity to scoop up players that normally would be playing for Penn State, Florida, Miami and Florida State. Central Florida has emerged as a solid program in a state dominated by the "big boys." What do you think the players that are stars for Rutgers, USF and Boise State would be doing right now had the schollies stayed the same?
Sitting on the bench.
Back in the day a team like Nebraska would have signed the stud players playing on Kansas and Kansas State, Pat White would be a reserve DB on Alabama and Matt Grothe would be a 4th string QB for the Gators. Those ten little scholarships, over the course of 16 years, have enabled teams like Hawaii and Boise State to obtain talented players which would normally have gone to USC or UCLA for years of riding the pine.
Whether we, as fans of established programs, like it or not, parity is here to stay. Teams like USF are sleeping giants that woke up 16 years ago with a little help from the NCAA. The only thing teams like Nebraska and Florida State (struggling old guard powers) can do is adapt and change with the times or they may become forgotten programs like Minnesota.
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