“Maybe we usher in a new era of athletes who set a good example for other college athletes and students,” Beam said. “How good would it be if there was a college football program that practiced what it preached?”

After football practice on a weekday last month, quarterback Josh Woodrum and wide receiver Pat Kelly acknowledged that playing at Liberty was different from the experience at other Division I programs.

“When a fellow student stops to tell you she’s going to pray for you Saturday, it’s not because she’s worried for your safety,” Kelly, a senior, said with a chuckle. “It’s a good thing.”

Woodrum, a freshman, does not harbor dreams of playing Alabama or Southern California before he leaves Liberty, but he says he expects to see the day when his successors will.

“We have too much to offer college football — a spiritual college environment and a following that could stretch into living rooms everywhere,” he said. “We’ll get there. And, you know, we’ll give them a good game.”

Since 1990, Bill Carr, the principal of Carr Sports Consulting of Gainesville, Fla., has advised and counseled more than a dozen major universities on the transition from lower-level football to the top tier. Of Liberty, one of his latest clients, Carr said: “They are a quantum leap ahead of any other school we’ve worked with. Liberty is the best prepared and has, by far, the most resources. It’s simply a matter of time until they get there.”

Liberty at Notre Dame? Liberty at Louisiana State?

“Hey, I never thought I’d see Boise State in the Big East Conference,” Carr said. “Virginia Tech was on the outside looking in for a very long time. Now they are a bona fide member of the Atlantic Coast Conference. It’s a volatile time. Anything is possible. People make their own place now.”