Next September McNeese State’s football team will wander back to the Sunshine State for the first time since it dropped more than half a hundred on South Florida.

The Cowboys, who were there to pick up a nice check from the Bulls, got much more than South Florida ever bargained for that day.

The 53-21 thumping back on Labor Day Weekend of 2013 was an impressive showing for McNeese.

Not as much is expected from a points standpoint when the Cowboys head to the University of Florida to play the SEC’s Gators, though the check will be much larger for sure.

It’s the classic David vs. Goliath with every bump and bruise the giant puts on little Davey paid for in dollars for the smaller program.

Most of these games end in a paddling with the little schools, especially those on the Football Championship Subdivision level, are left shouting “Thank you sir may I have another.”

But their bank accounts find them welcome beatings.

McNeese will be well compensated for its journey to The Swamp on Sept. 9. The Gators will be the SEC team McNeese has ever played, joining LSU.

The Cowboys have played both current SEC members Missouri (Big 12) and Texas A&M (Southwest) before they joined. But, will the Gators be the last SEC team the Cowboys play might be the bigger question?

The Cowboys are set to play at A&M again in 2024 and Athletic Director Heath Schroyer says he is working on getting back on the LSU schedule in the near future.

Nice hopes but that might be tougher to do moving forward.

With the SEC adding Texas and Oklahoma in 2024 and the league considering — likely leaning toward — playing nine and maybe even 10 conference games in the future, games against them will be harder to come by.

And so will the checks that accompany them.

McNeese will get roughly $500,000 for the games against Florida and the Aggies. However, A&M may have to back out of one of its nonconference games by 2024. That could mean the Cowboys are on the chopping block.

While for 2024 that might be a bonus with McNeese taking the half-million dollar buyout and getting and extra home game that date, the future may not be so kind.

Schroyer has said he has not heard a word about future games being bought out, but he is concerned about those games in the years to come.

“Schools like us need those money games to survive,” he said.

It is one of the reasons why McNeese officials talk so openly now about trying to get to the next level (Football Bowl Subdivision) so that the Cowboys are playing on a more even financial field.

FBS schools get much, much more to play the Power Five schools and thus are less likely to be bought out.

In other words, McNeese wants to get to the level where it controls much more of its own purse strings. Now that I not the case.

It is easy to understand why big programs, or the television networks that fund them, want to do away with the smaller games. McNeese brings fewer eyes to the television screen than say maybe a program like USC or Michigan.

And TV executives want ratings and now they want more of a return on their billion-dollar investments.

No question it will take some of the romance out of the giant upsets like the one Appalachian State pulled off at Michigan that propelled the Mountaineers into the national spotlight and up the college football pecking order.

It wasn’t long ago that App State was playing McNeese in Cowboy Stadium.

It might also cost McNeese the games like the one when they tore open South Florida which was a BCS team at the time, if you can remember those days.

Maybe these games won’t go away and the Cowboys will somehow be able to keep cashing in on playing the big boys, but it doesn’t seem likely.

That means it is more important than ever they make sure to take care of themselves, because in the world of college athletics, nobody else is going to do it.

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Jim Gazzolo is a freelance writer who covers McNeese State athletics for the American Press. Email him at jimgazzolo@yahoo.com