The Sacramento State Hornets (also Sac State Hornets) is the team that represents California State University, Sacramento in Sacramento, the capital city of the U.S. state of California, in intercollegiate athletics.
The school fields 21 teams including men and women's basketball, cross country, golf, rowing, soccer, tennis, and track and field; women's-only gymnastics, beach volleyball, volleyball, and softball; and men's-only baseball and football. The Hornets compete in NCAA Division I, and are members of the Big Sky Conference. The men's soccer and women's beach volleyball teams play as affiliate members in the Big West Conference, the baseball team plays as an affiliate member in the Western Athletic Conference, and the women's rowing team is an affiliate of the American Athletic Conference.
Nickname
The Sacramento State official team nickname is the "Hornets."
History
Division II and Division III eras
The university has achieved multiple national championships as a Division III and Division II school. The school has also been a National Runner-up 8 times including Softball in 1989 (D-II), Women's Volleyball in 1979 and 1989 (D-II), Baseball in 1988 (D-II), Women's Track and Field in 1981 (AIAW D-II), Men's Cross Country in 1979 (D-II), Football in 1964 (CDN), and Men's Basketball (1962 CDN). Prior to AIAW softball division classifications, the softball team played in two Women's College World Series in 1976 and 1977.
Move to Division I and FCS referendum
In November 1986, then-university president Donald Gerth, influenced by an athletic advisory board study, announced a five-year plan to elevate the program to the Division I level. The announcement, which included a reinstatement of the Hornet tennis team, upheld a student election which doubled student-activity fees from $13 to $26 per semester in order to finance the move, providing a more than $175,000 boost into the athletic budget per semester.
Then in 1995, following a reported $1.1 million deficit stemming from elevating the program up to the Division I-AA level (today known as FCS), Sacramento State students voted to raise their fees from $5 to $45 per semester to keep Hornet football, with 62 percent of voters supporting the increase.
Discussion of move to FBS level
During 2010–2014 NCAA conference realignment, there was speculation that the Hornets' Athletic department would like to move the football team to the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) due to the population base of Sacramento (ranked 20th-largest in college sports), the (enrollment) size of the university and the attractiveness of recruiting in the Sac-Joaquin Section.
During realignment, the WAC had shown interest in adding Sacramento State as a member. To make the move to the FBS, however, the school needed to add an additional sport for women in order to meet the criteria of Title IX, and also needed to fund a new sports complex for men's and women's basketball and volleyball because their arena was inadequate for FBS-level sports and severely outdated (with a crowd capacity of 1,012 people). Sacramento State was unable to fund a massive facility upgrade for their athletic facilities (including basketball/volleyball, football, baseball and softball among others) in order to move to the FBS due to economic reasons and resistance from students and faculty members because of increasing tuition and overall cost. To become an FBS member, the football program would have been required to have an attendance average of 15,000 each season and the athletic department needed to increase overall funds for their athletic programs. On June 6, 2011, Big Sky Commissioner Doug Fullerton announced that "We're in a better place than the WAC is," marking an end of fan and community attempts to move to FBS-level sports during that period.
Sports sponsored
All varsity teams representing California State University, Sacramento compete in the Big Sky Conference except baseball (Western Athletic Conference), gymnastics (Mountain Pacific Sports Federation), rowing (American Athletic Conference), and women's beach volleyball and men's soccer (Big West Conference).
Baseball
The Sacramento State Hornets baseball team is the varsity intercollegiate baseball team of California State University, Sacramento. The team plays its home games at John Smith Field.
Notable baseball players for the Sacramento State Hornets include: