TheTastyGreek

Well, there you go. Sucks, but obviously we have to buy out that game.

Agreed. If there's one thing we've consistently proven as a program, it's that an imbalanced home/away schedule is absolutely unacceptable. I just hope we don't end up with 5 football home games any time soon... I'd hate to see us have to buy out the SMU series.

No idea. After 6 straight years and talk on both sides about how everyone loved the series, I wouldn't be shocked if buyout language was pretty lax. Wasting money. Losing a great annual series. Taking a 30 minute "road trip" off the schedule. Being a guy who has at least four suits, I don't understand why he keeps going with Hearts.

Well, maybe the NT Daily is only expecting 4 guys to show up?

Embarrassing. Hopefully, whoever coaches us in 2014-15 has the sack to put them back on the schedule. Permanently.

The only reason the basketball forum has become such a chronically negative beating is because we had finally given a lot of people a reason to give a damn about basketball at our school. Ten years ago, I probably wouldn't have cared if we hired a bad coach and lost 20 games. Other than a half dozen guys that didn't include me, few people on the forum were really paying any attention. But we spent a decade watching this program turn into something worth caring about. Something worth getting emotionally invested in. Now we've got a guy systematically dismantling and disgracing it. People are pissed off about it. When they stop being pissed off, things will quiet down. And we'll be right back where we were for most of the past 100 years.

Commitment is Western Kentucky. More on that at the end of this post. What we have right now is architecture. I still defend Darrell Dickey. I think Coach Mac has done more than anyone should have reasonably expected so far, though I am a little concerned with our recruiting under him. I don't think (though I may be wrong) I called for Dodge to be fired until he was in his 3rd year. I criticized him pretty heavily up to that point, but I don't think I said RV ought to fire him. I understood the Benford hire, I praised it at the time. When people started talking about "Sweet 16 or bust", I tried to point out that postseason success as a sole measure of achievement is foolish. When people knock our program for never beating ranked teams, I try to point out what that means, and why almost nobody from the mid major ranks ever beats ranked teams, particularly on the road. I am not a person with unreasonable or outrageous expectations. The best thing for North Texas, not just as a basketball program, but primarily as an institution of education and integrity, would be for Tony Benford's association with it to be terminated, as soon as possible, voluntarily or not. Yesterday would have been better than today. Today would be better than tomorrow. Tomorrow is better than September, September would be better than January, January would be better than April. This year would be better than 2 years from now. But that's not going to happen. We aren't going to pay off roughly one and a half million dollars to get rid of the guy. We lost our shot at the brass ring last year. Next year, we'll struggle, because we have so many new players learning to mesh and play D-1 basketball, and doing it against CUSA competition instead of the Sun Belt. The year after that (assuming we aren't replacing another 6 or 7 guys then), maybe we'll push .500... And obviously, we can't fire the guy when the team is showing improvement. That gets us to year 4 out of 5 on the contract, and maybe midway through or at the end of that season, we might get a new coach. That's just how it's going to be. Benford isn't going anywhere anytime soon. We're going to have to sit here for years and watch our basketball program lose any and all momentum we put together over the last decade. It's hard, hard, hard to build a program in any sport, but primarily so in the 2 main men's sports. Once upon a not-too-long ago, we were pretty decent at football. Now, less than a decade after our last bowl appearance, there are only 5 schools in D-1 football that haven't made a bowl since our last appearance. UNLV, Washington State, Tulane, Eastern Michigan, and New Mexico State. Everyone else that was full D-1 last year, including half a dozen teams that weren't D1 when we were bowling (or flat out didn't exist at all), has been in a bowl since our 2004 New Orleans Bowl appearance. We made a godawful hire in football, and holding on to that guy for 4 years has allowed us to see 116 other schools make at least one bowl game since our last one. It's going to happen in basketball, too. Western Kentucky is committed to success. Not architecture, though success has allowed them to finance some nice architecture, too. That place doesn't accept being terrible at everything. Western Kentucky won a national championship in 1-AA football back in 2002. Their Defensive Coordinator got promoted to Head Coach, then led them to a #8 and #11 ranking. He oversaw their transition to full D1 football. They signed him to a 6 year contract extension in January of 2009. 10 months later, they realized he wasn't the man who could lead them to FBS success, and they fired him. Less than a year after giving him a big extension, they got rid of him. And, looking at what they did under Taggart, it looks like they made the right call. In basketball, Western Kentucky hasn't gone more than 5 years between NCAA Tournament appearances since the 1950's. And, back then, some schools preferred the NIT over the NCAAs. If you count NIT appearances, the last time WKU went more than 5 years without an appearance was during the Great Depression. Western had a coach who, in his first year, led them to an NCAA tournament win. Almost the Sweet 16, if not for a Gonzaga buzzer beater. Ken McDonald won 21 games the next year. The year after that, his team went .500. And that .500 season was so unacceptable to that school, McDonald had to take a $100,000 pay cut to keep his job. Then, they fired him halfway through the next season anyway. McDonald won them an NCAA tournament game. Almost two. Never finished a season under .500. And he didn't even get to finish the 4th year on his contract. That place refuses to be awful at sports. Here, we have a tiny fan base and limited resources. Even though WKU is smaller and in a small Kentucky town, they don't have to worry about either. Since before World War 2, no student who attended 5 years at WKU has gone without a team to celebrate. Here, we have sock puppets from the athletic department scolding fans for being pissed off that we're terrible at both of the major men's sports. There, they don't have the excuse of apathy and a small donor base. Because for over 80 years, every Hilltopper who put in a full 4 years had something to cheer for. And in the periods where they didn't get it while on campus, it happened the year before or the year after. There are no dark decades or generations of limited to zero fan base growth like what's happened at North Texas in the same period of time. WKU doesn't have to wait and hope for a Boone Pickens gift. They have 80 years worth of consistent commitment and sports success. We have 4 bowls in a half century, and most of our fans crap on whatever that success was worth. We have 3 NCAA appearances in our entire school history. WKU has 4 NCAA tournament wins (not appearances, but WINS) since our 2007 appearance. That's a place that has given their students and alums a reason to give a damn about sports. With very short and very minor exceptions, we haven't done that here. To sit in the equivalent of my two seats at Diddle Arena, I'd have to pay $1500 per year. Meanwhile, at the Super Pit, we couldn't give away tickets in our row. If Tony Benford were coaching Western Kentucky, he'd be at risk of getting fired midway through the upcoming basketball season. When they screw up a hire (Kilcullen, McDonald) they don't spend the next 4 years justifying the decision process. That's how they've run that program for generations, and that's why they don't sit around wondering how the can tap their market or interest their 100k+ alums within a 30 minute drive of campus like we so often do. We can't be terrible at everything anymore. We were decent at football, then we were pretty damn good at basketball. If football doesn't make it to a bowl this year, it's going to keep getting uglier and uglier. It's been 15 years since we sucked at everything, all at once. And it looks like we may be in for another year of it. When people are complaining, at least they're engaged. I spent most of basketball season not posting. I've pretty much stopped doing any maintenance on the basketball recruiting forum, because based on how we're handling players and scholarships, that forum may as well be Grindr for guys who can dunk. Benford is here. He's not leaving any time soon. And I understand that. I don't expect him to go anywhere until late 2015 or early 2016, at the soonest. Unless we get ourselves in some sort of trouble, and wind up with an out to fire him for cause. We're stuck. We're f---ed. And it's probably going to take so long to change course, that we'll have a football-style reclamation project for our next coach to walk in and try to fix. I'm 32 years old. And it looks like it's going to take a miracle, sooner or later, for me to see us in the NCAA Tournament again before I turn 40. Whenever it happens, (if it happens?) I just hope we haven't gone on sanctions in the meantime.

Disruptive force. Real feel for the game. Hungry athlete.

And Oral Roberts has some recent basketball success. Not exactly Southwestern Academy of God, even if we were going head to head with them for this guy.

Well, as we all learned in Hot Springs, it's important to have extra suits to change into in case you shit yourself. Babies do that a lot, so I'm guessing they'll have several reserve suits standing by.

Are you sure he's not going to use them to feed his babies?

Relax, everyone. With the time zone issue, Southwestern Assemblies of God doesn't get anywhere near the media coverage or inflated reputation of Northeastern Assemblies of God. Some say their location and potential makes Southwestern Assemblies of God a sleeping giant... But I think we may have a shot at winning this battle.

He's gone. Like those self-immolating Buddhist monks. If you missed his angry departure, remind me to explain the next time we see each other. I also miss that guy.

Not in 2007. Late signing period started on April 11th in 2007. 3 seniors graduated in 2007: Calvin Watson, Rich Young, and Kendrick Davis. 3 transfers that year: Harold Edwards (April 11th) Michael Sturns (May 19th) Jonathan Jackson (May 21st) Signees: Ryan McCoy (April 11th, announced ineligible August 10th) Adam McCoy (April 25th) Tristan Thompson (April 28th) Josh White (May 15th) George Odufuwa (May 24th) Kedrick Hogans (August 17th) Dez Willingham (August 23rd) So, at the end of the day on the first day of signing period in 2007, we had 3 open ships remaining (3 seniors + Edwards meant 4 open, Ryan McCoy signing left 3 open) 2 ships open after April 25th (Adam McCoy signs) 1 open after April 28th (Tristan Thompson signs) Full on May 15th (Josh White signs) 1 open on May 19th (Sturns leaves) 2 open on May 21st (Jackson leaves) 1 open on May 24th (George Odufuwa transfers) 2 open on August 10th (Ryan McCoy declared ineligible) 1 open on August 17th (Kedrick Hogans signs) Full on August 23rd (Dez Willingham transfers) --------------------------------- I think the last time we had 4 open scholarships after the first day of late signing period was 2003. Not sure about that one, but if it happened, I'm pretty sure that's the most recent it could have been. It also bears noting that when we added 6 new guys in 2007, we had Wooden, Quincy Williams, and Harold Stewart (and Howerton) in the paint, and Ben Bell and Colin Dennis at the 1 and 2 guard positions. Mangrum was returning as a sophomore, but we announced in October that he would be redshirting due to his surgeries. Basically, we needed one starter out of the group of Josh, Tristan, McCoy, and Dez Willingham. This year, we have Coleman returning (?) and two high school signees that play power forward. One apparently barely played due to injuries, and the other was a backup on his high school team. HOPEFULLY, we've yet to add whoever our starting posts will be to the roster.

Everyone back to your corners, red or blue (not that I see color, mind you...) and we'll pick this up again when the next Tony Mitchell draft analysis/projections come out and get a new thread.

Lengthy bans coming for anyone who mocks the campers.

Dark cloud: potentially lose some of our late recruits to clayton state?

Strange... You'd figure, what with us being on the cusp of a big, triumphant turnaround here, that he'd stick around another year (2 years tops, right?) and take over here after Benford gets a bcs offer. Given how much better we're going to get with the new system in place, this seems like an odd choice.

Compare and contrast to a Monday night practice/scrimmage in October. People noticed. People cared. People stopped showing up.

February 21st vs. Florida Atlantic. Players are being introduced, maybe 90 seconds before tipoff. Announced attendance? 2,522. And it looks like 60-75% of them are in the parking lot, on the highway, or invisible. Last year, a Thursday game against ULM on the 16th of February had an announced of 3,810. And the actual attendance was a lot closer to that figure than this year's FAU game was to it's announced. I know we're losing at least 6 season tickets in my section alone (not me) because of this season. And I know a lot of people who didn't bother to show up to a lot of games because of the way our season turned out.

I think this is why every death thread should start and end with "BIH, P."

And I think something like a boycott or player mutiny was the final straw and led to Matt Kilcullen (WKU's public beta test of Ken McDonald) getting fired by the Hilltoppers. Say what you will about their goat tendencies... Those people know how to protect and maintain their basketball program. More concerned with saving the program than saving face.

Ken McDonald, Western Kentucky. Attendance collapse, club member complaints, and reduced giving led to him being forced to take a pay cut in order to come back for an additional season. They spent a lot of effort selling the concept of a "Team Reset", and McDonald basically had to do a public "I Suck" tour in the media, where everyone knew and wrote about the fact that he had agreed to a $100,000 pay cut to avoid getting canned in the offseason. Then, halfway through the next season, they fired him outright anyway. And that was a guy who had won an NCAA tournament game (a Gonzaga buzzer beater away from a Sweet Sixteen).

If all you respect is NCAA tournament wins, then there's nothing to talk about. I don't think that's a valid way to evaluate a program playing in a conference as low in the pecking order as ours is. And, obviously, we don't have any yet. If you're claiming to be realistic, be realistic about where we are as a program relative to the schools you seem to want to see us competing on a level against. And look at where those same programs were when they were at our stage of development under JJ. It's a little unfair to diminish our development over playing openers, holiday games, and schedule fillers against no-names and non-D1s while pointing at schools like Gonzaga beating ranked teams. Gonzaga under Dan Fitzgerald feasted on a steady diet of Western Montana, Eastern Oregon, Whitman, Warner Pacific, Western Pacific, St. Martin's, Carroll, Idaho State, Whitworth, Lewis-Clark State, Central Washington, Montana Tech, Alaska-Pacific... AND Houston Baptist, SWAC schools, UT-Arlington, Sam Houston State, and others you're specifically pointing at as meaningless wins. Gonzaga under their Johnny Jones played THE SAME SCHOOLS. Or worse! Then Monson comes in, and he steps up their scheduling. Whitman, St. Martin's, Eastern Washington, Concordia, Chicago State, UALR, South Alabama, and UT-Pan American. 2 years later, Monson is gone and Mark Few takes over. He knocks the cream puffs off the schedule entirely. Few only plays powerhouses like UT-Pan Am, Eastern Washington, Montana, Monmouth, Northwest College, Prairie View, Eastern Oregon, Arkansas Pine-Bluff... By Few's 4th year, Gonzaga had been to 4 straight tournaments, including an Elite Eight and 2 other Sweet Sixteens. And he was still padding the schedule with Eastern Washington and a Hofstra team fresh off a 20 loss season. When Steve Fisher took over at San Diego State, they filled out their schedule with games against Riverside, High Point, Florida Atlantic, A&M-Corpus Christi, Norfolk State, Indiana-Purdue Fort Wayne (not to be mistaken for relative powerhouse IUPUI), Troy, Monmouth, Point Loma Nazzarene, Maryland-Baltimore County, Seattle-Pacific, Campbell, and, obviously, Eastern Washington. Ten years into his tenure, they were still scheduling games against Pomona-Pitzer. Utah State under Stew Morrill? Simon Frasier, Whitworth, Western State, Montana Tech, Colorado-Colorado Springs, Idaho State, Riverside, Centenary, Whitman, Hawaii-Hilo, Arkansas State, Fort Lewis College, Indiana-Purdue Fort Wayne, Lewis & Clark College, UALR, Middle Tennessee, Montana-Western, Southern Utah, and some SWAC fun. This year? Non conference games against Western Oregon, A&M-Corpus, Utah Valley, and Idaho State. All those programs were built the same way JJ was building us. And nobody thinks Gonzaga sucks because they pulled themselves up by racking up a few wins a year against SWAC schools, no-names, and sub-D1s. That was what they did to get themselves to where they are today. The difference between JJ and Dan Fitzgerald is that Johnny could win conference tournaments. Every year, every major class of recruits, we were inching and clawing our way up. What we did is HARD TO DO, and very rare. What we did here could have been the foundation for a real, sustained basketball program. Something on par with those other schools who you seem to be comparing us to in minimizing what we did accomplish. Wins over ranked teams... I mentioned 5 teams by name. Between us making the tournament in 2007 and JJ leaving after 2012, can you guess how many road wins (the only type of games we've had the opportunity to play) they had against ranked teams? Gonzaga had one in 2008-09 in overtime against #25 Tennessee. Memphis won one in 2009... At Gonzaga. Utah State won one in 2011 against #23 St. Mary's. BYU won one in 2011... At San Diego State. San Diego State won one in 2011 at #23 Arizona, another at Gonzaga in 2010. If you take away the games they played against each other, those five programs combined for a grand total of three road wins against top 25 teams in five years: against Arizona, Tennessee, and St. Mary's. None ranked higher than 23rd. Our games against ranked teams over that period? Versus #6 Kansas, #18 Texas A&M, and #5 Texas. Here's what I know: In almost 100 years, we never had a run like what we did here for 6 years in a row. In almost 100 years, we had one NCAA tournament appearance. JJ got us two, and tantalizingly close to two others. JJ was recreating the road map for a long-term strong basketball program. And he was doing it in a conference that (other than WKU, occasionally USA, and ULL when they have the resources to cheat) treats basketball like a freaking joke. Not the Mountain West, or the WAC of the late 90's, or the WCC where everyone pours all their resources into basketball. The fact that he didn't get us 15 years down that path in 10 years isn't a valid criticism, in my opinion.