It must be a difficult week for longtime University of Memphis football fans wondering about the long-term future of the program.

It wasn’t long ago — 2004 to be exact — that Louisville, Cincinnati and South Florida were battling for the Conference USA title. Louisville went 11-1 overall, 8-0 in the league and finished sixth nationally. Cincinnati went 7-5, following a 5-7 finish a year earlier, and South Florida was stumbling to a second straight 4-7 season.

Memphis was on roll, earning its second straight bowl bid for the first time in the program’s history.

Three years later, it’s quite a different story.

By putting significant money into their programs, Louisville, Cincinnati and South Florida earned invitations to the Big East, a BCS conference, and are reaping the rewards. While Louisville has struggled to a 3-3 start, the Cardinals were a consensus Top 10 pick at the beginning of the year and have become a national program. Cincinnati, a program not unlike Memphis during its C-USA tenure, is unbeaten and ranked 15th nationally. And South Florida is the early season Cinderella, cracking the top 10 for the first time.

Ten years ago, who could have imagined a Louisville-Cincinnati football game being one of the nation’s top matchups.

With a new on-campus stadium and new state-of-the-art practice facilities, South Florida’s C-USA opponent Saturday, Central Florida, is positioning itself to follow Louisville’s, Cincinnati’s and South Florida’s blueprint.