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Not gonna lie. If we only score 35 pts in this game after what we saw last weekend out of Morris and crew - I’m going to be very disappointed.

I think it's great that our team honors Scout Team Players Of The Week. Had never seen this before. And I dig the name Kade Sink.

DENTON - While making his debut for the Mean Green on Saturday in Mobile, Alabama, junior quarterback Chandler Morris ripped apart the South Alabama pass defense en route to a 52-38 road win to open the season and earn American Athletic Conference Offensive Player of the Week honors. Morris helped account for UNT's first five touchdowns while completing 32 of 41 passes for 415 yards and three touchdowns. He also added a pair of rushing touchdowns to his ledger. His 32 completions and 415 yards were the most by any player in the conference in Week 1. The effort was the second 400-yard passing game of Morris' career (his first at UNT) and he became the 10th player in program history to pass for 400 yards or more in a game. Joining Morris on the weekly honors list was his top target on Saturday, senior wide receiver Damon Ward Jr., who set career highs with 12 catches for 230 yards. He also found the end zone twice, including a 54-yard catch-and-run touchdown late in the third quarter that gave UNT a cushion after South Alabama had closed the game to a two-point UNT lead. His 230 yards was one yard shy of tying the school record for most receiving yards in a season-opener. -- GMG -- https://meangreensports.com/news/2024/9/2/football-morris-named-aac-offensive-player-of-the-week

UNT was the only AAC team to win on the road, and the only AAC team to defeat an FBS opponent!

The Rice and CLT losses were embarrassing losses. The conference should dictate Rice to open up their gigantic pocketbook or get a pink slip. If they opened up 1% of their endowment to athletics, they could be on a P4 level in less than 5 years. Given we know those resources are there and they refuse to use them on athletics, then send them walking. Otherwise, why have them always limping around?

While you wait for them to crash, remember that they have been ranked and performed far better than we have in the short time they’ve been in existence.

Love the Scout Team guys. They are a very important part of the team, yet normally don't get much, if any recognition. I doubt any of them get NIL money and they play for the love of the game. Thanks UNT Football for recognizing them and hope they get a chance to play on the regular squad in the future. GMG...we are all in this together...beat ACU to move to 2-0!

My sister went to SFA. She was one of the first 2 women to graduate from there in the school of forestry. I’ve been there once to move her in. She took a photo while she was on the campus newspaper staff covering the flood of their then brand new basketball arena. The water was about 1 foot below the rim. Picture got picked up by the AP and went nation wide. Would have been about 1974 or so.

This would be like if we played Southern New Hampshire University or University of Phoenix online. It was an NAIA school that will probably have a documentary about it in a few years for being a diploma mill.

2. UNT also had a bad penalty that kept a USA drive going. UNT up 42-26 with about 2 minutes left in the 3rd quarter when UNT gets called for pass interference on 3rd and 8. Instead of 4th and 8 and possibly punting from their 27, USA goes on to score on that drive. 3. USA's first 2 point conversion attempt was to get the lead to 7 points. It made sense at the time, even if a bit early. An extra point made it a 6 point lead at 20-14 so there was no benefit to going for the extra point at that time, especially if it was going to be a shootout. Give credit where it's due. UNT's goal line defense held up. Even if you think they should have ran, Lopez is a dual threat QB and he was contained on all 3 attempts to the point that there were no lanes for him to scramble. The defense remained disciplined on all 3 attempts. We played an FBS program on the road. Not an FCS program at home like so many others did in week 1. I'm not going to downplay that.

I'm hoping we get a chance to see our two freshman QBs get some live game snaps.

I'll take the Robert Morris interception.

Baseball games stop selling beer in the 7th inning. That's why your dad wanted to leave. As for south alabama fans, it's likely because the beer ran out or their buzz was wearing off.

I went to the game so I am not sure how it looked on TV or online. If you are referring to design, the sideline brick is a lot like DATCU. However, if you are referring to color, not so much. Theirs is a much more red brick. Another thing I noted was that it emptied out at halftime like DATCU when the band parents leave. So, maybe their fan base is as jaded as ours. I was surprised because they had the lead. There were so many students leaving during halftime that I thought maybe they could go out during the halftime and come back in when halftime was over. I had to ask one of the security personnel if that was the case and they said "No. Once they leave, there is no return."

How i see it: why did UNT win: 1. because it has a great offense that worked continously and kept the shooting in the foot stuff to an absolute minimum 2. Because It got a special teams score 3. Because when USAs offense shot itself in the foot UNTs defense at times didn't let them off the hook (that is the best I can say about the defense) However looking at it from a USA perspective is enlightening I think. Why did USA lose? Most of it was on the coaches, not the talent or players. 1. Because in three consecutive drives early in the second half the playcaller gave up on the run after first down. That is not necessary against UNT. Yes UNT had missed assignments galore against the pass, but passes are always higher variance than running. And against this UNT defense, if you run it twice, chances are you'll get what you need to move the chains. you have two passes drop, your drive will stall. That is BBBBad in a shootout and resulted in them having to chase. 2. Because USAs Offense shot itself in the foot several times with untimely/unnecessary penalties that turned potential TDs into FGs and stopped drives. 3. Because they started chasing 2-point conversions unnecessarily early and kept coming up empty because they tried to pass in those short field situations. 4. Because they lost the only turnover of the game for a TD In summary I think that it was a great win by UNTs offense. Could hardly have done much more and since its never easy to win on the road, it oughta be enjoyed. However I am not so sure it will be all that predictive of the future games in the season. It was still a win that took a bit of luck and where the opponent probably has missgivings on the coaches game management. Take those coaches errors out and the winner becomes a total crapshoot here. I am really worried about what happens when a decent running offense tries to run the clock against this defense and gives the offense less rythm as i think such an offense might score almost every drive. However, I have at least hope that the backfield will be better once 3 DBs come back. one can only hope that this will then also allow to put more attention to defending the box against the run. While its not completely outlandish to think that might happen, I will not be holding my breath.

I don’t think it’s a matter of one person is right and the other is wrong. I think it’s funny to make a blanket statement that our offense is awesome because we scored 52 and our defense is trash because we gave up 38 without considering the opponent’s offense or defense. Based on their performances on Saturday, I don’t think Wyoming or Tech will tell us much about our offense. They both gave up over 500 yards and almost 50 points. Now, if Wyoming goes for 38 I’ll definitely agree that our defense is trash. They had 52 yards of total offense until their last drive of the game. Honestly, if SFA scores 21+ I’ll be pretty concerned with the defense. My point being, who you score 52 against matters, as does who you give up 38 against.

I do agree the defense played a bit better and seemed tougher compared to last year. They had timely stops in the second half, tightened up and kept fighting. However, they haven’t quite solved the poor tackling issues that plagued them last season. And, I don’t understand how this defense has three safeties…THREE…yet give up deep passes. The total yardage and points given up is quite disheartening since that’s all we saw last season. Would be nice to have some “comfortable “ wins, but the optics from the current defense suggests otherwise. It early, but I hope it’ll be proven wrong. I’ll gladly eat my words. If not, Caponi should never be allowed to step foot in Texas again.

I would like to see EM not run our QB. Seems unnecessary in this system.

The other thing that was terribly impressive about young Mr. Mercer was the fact that the C usually makes all the calls/adjustments for the line. Incredible performance in his first college game.

Interesting that Adeyi, Maclin, Rogers all had quiet days vs seemingly soft competition. Helps strengthen the idea that we aren’t missing them to hard. To be clear, I would still love having Maclin and Adeyi back. I think we upgraded at QB though.

Now that SMU is gone we can/should root for every team in the American when they are playing a team from the other G5 conferences.

Holy Cow - The weather is looking good. NOAA has this: Saturday: Sunny, with a high near 89. Saturday Night: Clear, with a low around 66. More to come on the Menu!

That was a HUGE win last night on the road!

We didn’t have a turnover, and I am not sure that has been emphasized enough. In that note, our one takeaway was on ST and not defense - and I think mostly their punter messing up. On a related note, our offense only score 45, not 52. But that should be enough to win games if the defense has a pulse. on another related note, our returners looked like they could be a weapon for us this year.

What about WARA ? Sounds like a radio station. “We’re stacking the hits back to back here on W-A-R-A !”

Yeah I'd root for UTSA in the playoffs. I'd root for UTSA against Alabama. I rooted for them against Texas a couple years back. Anything to validate the AAC, especially in its current form after Houston, Cincy, and UCF left. If we don't want to be CUSA 2.0, we need every big win we can get as a conference. What's that saying? You're only as good as the company you keep? Yeah, it applies here too.

Great win, the offense looked really good. the defense however needs a lot of work, particularly the poor tackling.

On TV it looked a lot like our color brick and you also saw as much of it on the sideline as you do at DATCU. Fans leaving en masse at halftime is weird to me. Why did you bother to go if you weren't going to stay for the whole thing? It was a five-point game! This is just like when I was a kid and my dad would drive us from Richardson to Arlington to see a Rangers game and then he wanted to leave in the seventh inning. YOU DROVE A WHOLE HOUR TO GET HERE OLD MAN CAN WE JUST STAY TWO MORE INNINGS DAMMIT.

I think we beat UTSA this year but they still have some good talent at QB with transfer Owen McCown. Whether he works out is to be determined but I don't think this is when they crash completely. A great point. It's like having a pro sports team that won't invest in its facilities. Reminds me of the Washington Redskins/Commanders whose owner was forced to sell in part because he wasn't investing in the franchise. If you're not investing what you can then why should you keep benefiting? I guess the AAC really wants that market.

They had a 6-year starting elite QB. As soon as they don't have an elite QB or Traylor leaves then you will see a decline. It's like when we had Mason Fine. He left and we crashed. Having an elite QB, or not, will make or break your team. We've already seen it this season how Chandler Morris impacts the offense.

Went on the road to start the season with 70+ new players and brought home a W. That’s big time.

I know some on this board have always resisted calling UTSA a “rival” but I think everything you need is there. - Share a league and play annually (yep) - Close enough proximity to make games accessible for fans (yep) - Play games that have meaning (yep, often) - Genuine desire to beat them in, literally, everything (yep) - Feeling that we are just plain better than them as people and as a university (yep)

Completely agree! 5 point road underdogs that end up winning by 14! If we can stay healthy, going bowling would be the floor. GMG!

Did you forget about UTsa? Bc never.

10 of 14 AAC teams won their opening games. Two losses to P4s, and then Charlotte and Rice lost to FBS schools.

Best compliment from the South Alabama fan forum: Tiguar Posted on 116 mins, , User Since 142 months ago, User Post Count: 6601 116 mins 142 months 6601 "North Texas should have over 60 points. They had two touchdowns taken off the board because their wide-open dude slipped. If UNTs high powered offense is just so good that every team that plays them has to score 50+ to win, I’m excited to see them in the playoffs this year."

MOBILE, Ala. – Even though Chandler Morris was making his first start for the Mean Green on Saturday at Hancock Whitney Stadium, he's been a known commodity in major college football for a while. Second-year UNT head coach Eric Morris knew what he had under center, and if there was any outside doubt, the junior from Dallas emphatically erased it by torching the South Alabama defense for 415 yards and three touchdowns in a 52-38 season-opening road win. "We knew it. We'd seen it in practice," Eric Morris said. "His poise and savvy is something else, and he got into his fourth and fifth reads a lot of times, which is really impressive. They were really scared of our vertical passing game so they were putting a lot back there. He did a good job of taking what the defense gave us." There were no big chunk plays, but Morris was surgical in his dissection of the Jaguar defense, completing 78% of his passes (32-for-41) on the night. The main beneficiary of Morris' night was senior wide receiver Damon Ward Jr., who put his name in the UNT record books with 12 catches for 230 yards and two touchdowns. Ward's night marked the fifth-most receiving yards in a game in program history and was one yard shy of matching the most in a season opener. "He's just a playmaker," Chandler Morris said of Ward. "I knew that in camp. I knew he was a guy who we were definitely going to get the ball in his hands early and often, and I knew he could make plays for me. He made some great catches and he bailed me out a few times. Getting the ball to 10 different dudes, that's what I'm maybe most proud of after that win is just that we have 10 dudes in that room who can do it." The second-year head coach said he immediately gave Ward a big hug amid the locker room celebration and told him, "That's why you came back." "I'm super proud of that kid," Morris said. "He could have left (after last season). I'm so proud when a guy comes back for the right reasons and goes out and shines like that. That was great to see." Now, Morris has the first season-opening win in his tenure and just the third road win to open a season since 2009. The Mean Green are now 1-0 heading into their home opener next Saturday at DATCU Stadium against SFA, set for a 6:30 p.m. kickoff on ESPN+. "We talked about doing things the hard way and about being scrappy and being gritty and believing in one another," Morris said of the difficulty of opening a season on the road. "We knew adversity would strike at some point today, but we have to trust one another and fight for four quarters. I thought we did a remarkable job doing that and went out and finished a football game." QUICK HITS The Mean Green win puts the all-time series at 2-0 in UNT's favor, with the last meeting coming in 2012 in Denton, when the Mean Green won 24-14. The win puts the Mean Green at 45-59-3 all-time in season openers. UNT is now 5-0 under Eric Morris when leading after three quarters and improved to 2-6 in the Morris era when trailing at half. UNT's captains for the game were Roderick Brown, Ridge Texada, Chandler Morris and Damon Ward. The Mean Green entered the season with 77 newcomers, which is the most in all of FBS. Thirty-six of the 77 newcomers are transfers. There were 11 players who made their first starts for the Mean Green. There were seven first-time starters for UNT on offense: Chandler Morris, DT Sheffield, Larry Moore III, Oscar Hammond, Landon Peterson, Ma'Kyi Lee and Blair Conwright. There were four first-time starters for UNT on defense: Terrell Dawkins, Jayden Hill, Brian Nelson II and Alphie Guillory. UNT was outscored in the first half in seven of its last eight games of 2023, while outscoring its opponents in the second half in six out of the final eight games. That trend continued in the 2024 opener. The 38 second-half points scored by UNT ranks second in program history behind 40 second-half points vs. WKU on Oct. 31, 2009. UNT scored a touchdown on the game's opening possession, something the Mean Green accomplished only twice last year (at FIU, vs. Temple). UNT's 52 points is the most in a season opener for the Mean Green since scoring 57 against Houston Christian in 2020. The 52 points is the most in a season opener against an FBS opponent, besting a 49-0 win over UTEP to open the 1978 season. UNT's 28 third-quarter points ties for the fifth-best in any quarter in program history and the second-highest total in the third quarter, when they last scored 28 points at UTEP on Sept. 10, 1977. The 446 passing yards for UNT is the seventh-most in a single game in program history. The game's opening touchdown was a 2-yard run from QB Chandler Morris to cap a 5:18scoring drive. The Mean Green had just three scoring drives in 2023 of more than five minutes, with the last coming vs. Temple on Oct. 14, 2023 (5:52). Junior QB Chandler Morris (Dallas, Texas) finished 32 for 41 for 415 yards, no interceptions and three touchdown passes. Morris made the first start of his UNT career and the 10th of his collegiate career. Morris eclipsed 400 passing yards for the second time in his career and first time at UNT, becoming the 10th player in program history to pass for 400 or more yards and it marked the 14th time in program history a player has thrown for at least 400 yards. Morris is the fourth UNT quarterback since 2000 to throw for 300 yards or more in his starting debut, joining Giovanni Vizza, Austin Aune and Chandler Rogers. His 415 yards is the third-most passing yards by a UNT QB in a season opener and the most since Mason Fine's 444 against SMU in 2018. Morris is the sixth UNT quarterback since 2000 to throw for three or more touchdown passes in his first start for the Mean Green. Morris' 2-yard touchdown run with 9:37 left in the first quarter capped the Mean Green's first drive of the season and was the seventh rushing score of his career. Morris' 3-yard touchdown pass to Damon Ward Jr., with 12:43 left in the second quarter was the 17th of his career and first at UNT. Morris' 25-yard touchdown pass to Blair Conwright with 13:23 left in the third quarter was the 18th of his career and second at UNT The completion was the first between Morris and Conwright since Nov. 6, 2021, when the duo was at TCU and Morris threw for 461 yards against Baylor and was named National Player of the Week. Morris' 1-yard touchdown run with 10:14left in the third quarter put UNT up by two scores and was his second rushing TD of the day and eighth of his career. Morris' 54-yard touchdown pass to Damon Ward Jr., with 3:36 left in the third quarter was the 19th of his career and third at UNT. Ten different receivers caught passes for the Mean Green. Junior RB Ikaika Ragsdale (Las Vegas, Nevada) finished with 45 yards on 14 carries and a touchdown to go with three catches for 20 yards. Ragsdale's 3-yard touchdown run with 8:28 to play was the 13th of his career and his first since Dec. 17, 2022, against Boise State in the Frisco Bowl. Senior WR Damon Ward Jr. (Beaumont, Texas) finished with 12 catches for 230 yards and two touchdowns. Ward Jr.'s 230 yards is his first 200-yard day, the third time in his career to eclipse 100 yards and a new career high. Ward's 12 catches is a new career high and he is the first UNT receiver with 12 catches since Rod Burns at SMU in 2021. Ward's 230 yards gives him the fifth-most receiving yards in a single game in program history. Ward's 230 yards is the most receiving yards in a game for a UNT wide receiver since Jaelon Darden's 244 against Charlotte on Oct. 10, 2020. Ward's 230 yards is the second-most in a season opener in program history behind Scott Ford's 231 against ACU in 1992. His 3-yard touchdown reception with 12:43left in the second quarter was the 11th of his career. His 54-yard touchdown reception with 3:36left in the third quarter was the 12th of his career and second of the day. Senior WR Blair Conwright (Lubbock, Texas) finished with one catches for 25 yards and a touchdown. Conwright's 25-yard touchdown catch with 13:23 left in the third quarter was the sixth of his career and third at UNT. Junior WR DT Sheffield (Corinth, Mississippi) finished with seven catches for 74 yards. Sheffield's seven catches is a new career high, breaking his previous high of three at Washington State. Sheffield's 74 yards is also a new career high, breaking his previous high of 19 at Washington State. C.J. Garnett's blocked punt return touchdown with 2:40 left in the third quarter was the first for UNT since Dominique Harrison's on Oct. 19, 2019, against Middle Tennessee and was the first non-offensive touchdown for UNT since Ridge Texada's pick-six against FAU on Oct. 1, 2022. Senior DB Jayden Hill (Gahanna, Ohio) finished the day with a team-high nine tackles, including two solo stops. Senior LB Jordan Brown (Huntsville, Texas) finished the day with six tackles, including two solo stops. Redshirt freshman CB Taylor Starling (Dallas, Texas) finished the day with a career-high six tackles, including three solo stops, and a half-tackle for-loss. Sophomore DB Evan Jackson (Houston, Texas) finished the day with five tackles – all solo stops – and added a pass breakup and a QB hurry. Senior DL Roderick Brown (Forney, Texas) finished the day with three tackles, including two solo stops, and two sacks. His second-quarter sack was the eighth of his career and his first since Oct. 15, 2022, against LA Tech. He added his ninth career sack in the fourth quarter. Senior CB Ridge Texada (Frisco, Texas) finished the day with two tackles, including a solo stop and a pass breakup. Already the program leader in career PBUs, Texada's one on the day gives him 25 in his career. Texada now has 29 passes defended (PBUs + INTs), which is tied for second on UNT's all-time list with Nate Brooks (2015-18) and Royce Hill (2008-11). Redshirt freshman kicker Kali Nguma (Mission, Texas) went 7-for-7 on extra points and 1-for-2 on field goals, making a 30-yarder in the final minutes, in his UNT debut. https://meangreensports.com/news/2024/8/31/football-morris-ward-lead-way-in-win-at-south-alabama

Discipline and execution is a big part of football. As been noted by some on here, the defense stepped up and held together especially in the second half. Those early 3-and-outs early in the second half were huge. So, some credit is deserving for them. USA coaches also probably saw how potent and efficient the offense was. Because of that, they may have felt they needed to be as close as possible to get it within one score. So, I don’t believe the coaching was poor on their part, just how effective our offense was. That and timely stops on D…1-0.

it all about the money, not sure how much he got but he wont be playing pro ball.

Amazing

Probably a really good former P4 caliber QB

When we hired Coach (Spencer) Leftwich's son to be our O line coach......I was hoping for the best. If he was as good as his Dad.....that would be awesome. But, he was awfully young....and not very experienced. But man........what a debut. Without his best lineman (Gabe Blair)....and loses another great lineman (Jett Duncan) early in the game. We had a true freshman (Tyler Mercer) who played probably 90% of that game at center....y'day. So kudos to Coach Leftwich ....what a debut. https://meangreensports.com/sports/football/roster/coaches/cutter-leftwich/826

We’re going to scare some peeps with our offense for sure. Now our D needs some consistency for sure. But a win for the American is an awesome thing and even UTSA beating CUSA today was good for the league. Beat SFA GMG

He didn’t start for North Texas in game 1 either, ULM probably had the same thought last season. https://ulm.forums.rivals.com/threads/update-on-notable-players-who-left-ulm-after-2022.11511/ Can only see the first post but you can imagine their glee when he didn’t start and also stunk it up when he did see the field against Cal. I bet Chandler Rogers is wiping his tears with twenties. Whether he plays another down ever, you cannot turn down that kind of money at his age.