A hundred-mile bus ride to the closest international airport.
Then, a roughly 2,600- to 2,700-mile flight cross country.
Ah, logistics in the super-expanded, 18-team Big Ten Conference.
Those logistics are the backdrop for Penn State's trip this week to face Lincoln Riley's USC Trojans -- the two programs's first meeting as conference brethren.
And with James Franklin revealing his team is departing Thursday for Saturday's 3:30 p.m. ET kick-off, he also is sharing why he believes it is necessary for the State College Regional Airport to do some lengthening after being asked about his team's travel plans.
"So, the second part of your question is a big part of us leaving on Thursday is we cannot fly out of State College," Franklin told reporters in his Monday press conference. "That was a big part of our discussions with the Big Ten when all this thing (expansion to the West Coast) got started.
"Not only are we one of the most northeast schools, but based on runway length, size of plane, weight of plane, fuel on plane, we can't get out of here unless we would stop for fuel. So with that, we've got to fly out of Harrisburg."
After hosting UCLA last weekend, which also would have faced some logistical challenges for its cross-country trek, Penn State also has upcoming travel to more traditional Big Ten residents Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Worth noting, also this weekend Ohio State travels to Eugene, Oregon, to face Dan Lanning's Ducks; that's also a lengthy flight of more than 2,000 miles.
But the Buckeyes don't need to bus 100 miles to be able to fly out West without stopping to refuel the plane, and that's an element Franklin thinks needs to be addressed with the local airport.
"To me, that's one of the things I think we have to discuss is increasing the size of the runway here and the size of the airport, for a lot of reasons... for the university, for the community, for businesses, for the athletic department, and for us now that we've decided to make this move as a Big Ten," Franklin said. "To me, that's something that we need to do for a lot of different reasons.
"That's a big part of it is you're talking about adding another two hours to your trip on top of the flight, and I think the flight is already five-and-a-half hours or whatever it may be. That's pretty much a full day. So that's one of the big reasons for leaving Thursday."
With the Big Ten now hosting a membership roll of programs nearly 3,000 miles apart -- Rutgers is more than 2,900 miles from Oregon; approximately 2,800 from Washington and in that general range for UCLA and USC -- Franklin believes more conversations are needed about travel demands and plans.
"Feel good about our plan, but that's a big reason why [the move to depart on Thursday], and that's something that I think we're going to need to look at addressing moving forward because it does change things for us compared to a lot of other teams in our conference," Franklin said, "that either even if they are northeast, they have an international airport and things like that within a short distance from campus.
"Kind of got the double whammy. It's the distance as well as the airport."