Stewart Mandel says that even though Virginia Tech has "upgraded" to the ACC (if you can call America's best basketball conference an upgrade), their football bandwagon will have quite a bit of room on it after it's last three seasons.

For political reasons, University of Virginia president John Casteen staked his expansion vote to the inclusion of his in-state rival. The good news, the ACC felt, was that it was getting a budding football powerhouse.

After last season, however, you'd be hard-pressed to find many observers still willing to throw Tech into that category. The Hokies, therefore, enter 2004 with something to prove: that they can still compete with the big boys.

You can call the decision political if you want, but I view it more as financial. Contrary to what Mandel and other sports writers like to believe, state colleges are not exactly separate entities. Both Virginia Tech and the University of Virginia are run by the same people and funded by the same taxpayers. Quite frankly, state officials weren't too thrilled with Tech being left behind in the Big East. With the Big East's TV contracts and BCS affiliation in flux, doing so could have cost the Commonwealth of Virginia millions of dollars a year. State officials simply used their ACC influence (their University of Virginia vote) as a bargaining chip, and rightly so. I would hope that Virginia Tech would have done the same thing for UVA. Sure, they're in-state rivals, but there is still a level of co-dependence between them.

I'm not so sure that the pre-2004 ACC was any tougher than the Big East. But even if Virginia Tech's bandwagon does suffer because of their membership in the new and improved ACC-super conference, so what? The real fans will still be there. I remember the days when Tech sucked. They didn't just suck, they sucked bad. I attended every home football game when Tech was 2-8-1. I sat in the stands while the Chokies blew a 42-21 fourth quarter lead to the mighty Scarlet Knights of Rutgers. (We lost 50-49). I remember the embarrasing homecoming loss to Temple. Temple! I remember when we cheered for first downs and called for Frank Beamer to be fired. (The same Frank Beamer who has deservedly joined the ranks of the million dollar coaches club.)

Of course I'm hoping that we never get that bad again, but if it happens, so what. None of that matters to me. Like a mother who loves her son no matter how ugly, rotten, or stinky he becomes, I will love them just the same. Whether they go 11-0 or 0-11, I am a permanent fixture on the Virginia Tech bandwagon. If I have more legroom and a better view this year, that's fine with me.