TIgreen01

This, too.

This. Period.

Kid is likely a genius. Parlayed a good season at UNT to a paid backup role at maybe the best academic institution outside the Ivy League. Thought he had already graduated and was working on his first masters while he was here last year. He’s using the system to the fullest. No problem with that at all, and good on him.

Against Tech and Memphis, the only two teams we’ve faced that have winning records, the defense was a liability. I’d agree that we have progressed from last year, but last night they lost us the game. To say that they are closer to a title defense is sarcasm, right? Closer in terms of improving from absolute garbage to just plain garbage?? …and yeah, I know you were just trying to respond to the original post and are the only one following directions in this thread. 🙂. I’ll stop.

So you’re saying we graded well?😉 When Memphis needed to move the ball, they did. Their offense seemed to be better with some game pressure on them. We badly need someone that can actually get home on a blitz, or at least get the Qb out of the pocket. Shipley being out didn’t help. Anyone know what’s going on there?

Exactly. Anytime we scored or took a lead, Memphis did whatever it wanted. That’s what I took away. Tulane will likely do the same.

Morris’ are both lighting it up. Defense is trying to set fire to the house underneath them. 🤮

Wow. On that 10/15 video he looks like he's beaten mentally. That's not a good look for the program or anyone in that building to have him get on video looking like he's quit. His MO was always, from high school on, that he was going to out recruit his opponents. Those Gilmer teams he had were as loaded as a 3A HS team can get. Then he had serious talent sprinkled throughout his roster and especially at the skill positions at UTSA until this year. NIL and free transfers have killed him. Instead of reloading, he seems to be taking it personally. My question is why was he not able to reload? Are his connections still mainly or only at the high school level?

Right. And all those things were there last year too. Only worse. And we were competitive then somehow through all the mess. I am beginning to expect it. This feels very much like an Art Briles Baylor team to me. Not necessarily in the schemes, but in the wild swings; periods of alternating dominance or ineptitude and just wildly entertaining, edge of your seat games every week. We’re not as good as those teams yet, but it seems like it’s building.

Looking a little deeper, Memphis' 4 FBS wins are against teams that are 1-5, 1-5, 1-5 and 2-4. They've beaten North Alabama, Troy, Florida St, MTSU and South Florida. FSU is having one of the all-time train wreck seasons for them. USF was expected to be decent coming into the season but they have massively underperformed. The only team Memphis has faced with a winning record was Navy, who put up 56 points to beat them. Memphis' defense looks scary on paper, otherwise. They've completely shut down almost every team's running game, with the exception of Navy who put up over 350 on the ground. Our schedule lines up pretty close with theirs. We've beaten exactly zero teams that have a winning record and got annihilated by the one that did. I think this is a toss-up game and if we find a way to win it, then we roll into Homecoming with a ton of momentum and probably a great crowd to help the team out.

I don't get the pessimism. Last year's UNT team nearly beat Memphis and Tulane. I think we're better than we were last year and both of them are not quite as good. I expect that we should compete in both games and have a chance to pull out wins. Army is another story just because their offense is so different you never really know what to expect going in. Either way, we're going to be able to score on all three of these teams. It'd be nice if we could get a RB or two back from injury so we're still not playing our 4th and 5th stringers. We'll need to be able to run the ball better against all three teams if to do nothing more than give our defense a break.

I never doubted. 😂

Game

If every single 3rd and long you fake the blitz and drop into coverage…what’s the point of faking the blitz. Just get into position. Or freaking blitz every once in a while

I do like the “Charmin Ultra soft” as the official nickname for our defense.

Tom Herman is out coaching us. That is all.

This. We need to win consistently and we need continuity. Since I've been following, nothing about the UNT athletic program ever transcends a class of players or one coach and sustains into the next set of players or coaches. We did that to ourselves by knee-jerking our coaching hires with a 180 degree opposite coach (or schematic philosophy) every time we ran someone off. We cleared out long-time, loyal, assistants and others who would stick with UNT. I didn't much care for the Eric Morris hire when it was announced. However, this is the first time in 30 years that the AD has actually given us a chance to carry forward momentum from one staff to the next and build some continuity...and more importantly, an identity. Now we need Morris to continue to win. And if he doesn't, keep guys like Pat Cobbs around, and any others like him who just love the school, want to be here and are doing a good job. As others have said, we absolutely need alums who bleed green to be the backbone of what we do. We can't allow outsiders to come in and wipe out everything to start from zero with "their people". There has to be a balance. Mosely did the same thing by making sure we kept Hodge around when Mac left. It's a really positive sign that this AD understands what it takes to build a program. Something we've never actually done in the almost 30 years I've followed.

Finding good workers has always been a thing. Limiting hiring options can exacerbate this issue and lead to stats that look more out of whack than they actually are. Where I'm at we only hire out of an intern pool. Not my favorite thing in the world, to be sure as we partner that with an "almost" ban on experienced hires. However, when I entered the workforce contract-to-hire was a big thing. Essentially the same concept, but allows you to get a feel for the new employee and vice-versa. If it's not a fit, you can cut bait early without a huge investment in time and resources on both sides. Programs and processes like this exist and have existed for as long as I can remember to combat getting stuck with bad fits or people who aren't going to be productive in your organization. Covid messed a lot of this up, for a variety of reasons, and what you're seeing now, 4 years on, is a correction, not a sign of a generation gone wrong. But you guys carry on with all the psycho-babble. It's entertaining.

Agree. But we get kicked in the balls more than most. So I get those trying to play prevent defense, too.

Is it just me or are we rotating more players across the front 7, and especially along the dline, than we did last year? Just trying to keep up with all the numbers moving in and out the first few games was a challenge. Dline visibly looks bigger than last year, as well.

If Morris stays healthy he could be the most sought after QB in the country this offseason. Maybe the competition level curbs some of that? Until the rules change, getting one year of him is what to expect of someone playing at this high a level. Then it comes down to Eric Morris. He’s got to be getting noticed as one heckuva QB whisperer. QBs are gonna flock here to play for him, as a result. As to the original question, Morris is in his 5th season of college football and his best strengths, IMO, are his grasp of the offense and quick, accurate release. He’s a smart player and has the talent to match his rating coming out of high school. I would have loved to have seen Fine in a 5th year and not wasted in a bad offensive scheme change his final season. I’ve been around since the mid 90s, just missing Maher. Fine and Morris are the best that I’ve seen. Gotta let the season finish before I’d pick a winner.

For how this game started to now is an amazing turn. That 96 yd wr screen going for a td turned the game and we’ve blown the doors off of them since. Defense gave up yards early, but didn’t break and kept us in the game. Really pleased with the improvement there in the last two weeks. The 3-4 is here to stay.

Last week’s unis were my favorite since we debuted the icy white. Put the son of worm of the helmet and it’d be uniform nirvana for me. I don’t care much for the all black or gray unis. They look cool in these photo op spreads for social media, but bland in person and on tv in game. Obviously, the point is to look cool on social media, so I guess I can live with it for one week.

Sound advice. Judging from the one 'pissed' vote my post got, I guess the utsa lurkers didn't like my opinion. Oh well...either way, you're absolutely right. All we can really do from the outside is guess at what's really happening. I don't put much stock into pod casters, though. I think too many of them are 1) biased fans/alums, 2) obviously being played as tools or 3) just looking for clicks.

The only solution is contracts. For both sides. Especially for the really big boys, if the Saban Georgia story is right. When some state governments are willing to get involved there will never be a level playing field until everything is above board. Contracts will get that done.