Jump to content

MeanGreen61

Members
  • Posts

    6,602
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    5
  • Points

    0 [ Donate ]

Everything posted by MeanGreen61

  1. And we'd been in three conference with the Aggies ( Missouri Valley, Big West & Sun Belt).
  2. UT applications rise with on-field success 'Rose Bowl effect' is one of several factors behind record spring 08:59 AM CDT on Wednesday, April 12, 2006 By JAMES M. O'NEILL / The Dallas Morning News Yeah, you were pumped as you watched the Longhorns take the field at the Rose Bowl in January. And when they won? Burnt orange ecstasy. But that thrill of victory may have cost your kid a coveted slot in this fall's freshman class at the University of Texas at Austin. Call it the Rose Bowl effect. That – and a bunch of other factors, including the vagaries of the high school mind – has made UT-Austin more popular than ever for high school seniors this year. And that makes it much harder to get into. UT-Austin saw freshman undergraduate applications jump 14 percent to a record 27,326 this spring; 13,139 have been admitted. UT's experience illustrates a national trend, as more high school students apply to college – and apply to more colleges. For UT, that trend is exacerbated by this year's winning trip to the Rose Bowl and a 2005 college baseball title. "There's definitely a Rose Bowl effect," said Alice Reinarz, assistant provost for enrollment at Texas A&M University. "A lot of sports publicity typically gets your name out there, and it leads to increased application numbers. You've got more alumni wearing UT shirts, and high school students see that." Other factors But the sports publicity is only part of the story. For starters, the state's population is rising, and with the cost of some private colleges reaching $45,000 a year, even top high school performers are looking to UT-Austin as a solid lower-cost option. "We're seeing larger high school graduating classes, and more are selecting UT-Austin," said Bruce Walker, the school's admissions director. More students are also taking advantage of the state law that grants automatic acceptance to state universities for high school seniors in the top 10 percent of their graduating classes. And as enrollments rise, so does the number of top-10-percenters. David Oglesby, director of college placement at Jesuit College Preparatory School in Dallas, saw the trend firsthand. He said 22 of the school's 27 top-10-percenters applied to UT-Austin, up from 13 of 27 last year. "UT-Austin's prestige has gone up," Mr. Oglesby said. "Top students think, 'If I don't get into Duke or Notre Dame or Georgetown, I can still get into UT-Austin.' It's insurance for them." Elite private colleges are enjoying record applications this year, so even top students face tougher odds of getting into their first choice. At Jesuit, for instance, Jesuit-run colleges are a natural draw, and Boston College is the school of choice. But BC this year received more than 26,000 applications, a 12 percent jump and a record for the school. "The higher application numbers are an issue all over the country," said Wells McMurray, college counselor at Greenhill School in Addison. "There's anxiety out there. We're on the edge of a population boom." Statewide boom Selective colleges across Texas – both public and private – are seeing a record number of applications. Baylor University has gotten 21,402 applications, a 41 percent increase over last year. Southern Methodist University expects 8,250 applications, an increase of about 9 percent from two years ago. Rice University received 8,764 applications this year, a record for that school and an 11 percent jump over last year. Applications are up nearly 10 percent at the University of North Texas. Some of the increase is artificially inflated as students, feeling pressure, send out more applications. Where once applying to three schools seemed a safe bet, now students are applying to 10 or 15. Online applications, as well as the Texas Common Application, which allows a student to apply to multiple schools simultaneously, bloat the numbers. Not only is UT-Austin a respectable backup for top students – it's also a far cheaper alternative. Annual tuition at UT is $7,630 for in-state freshmen enrolled as liberal arts students. "Cost is definitely a factor these days," Mr. Oglesby said. "It's clear that up front, families are saying, 'This is what we can afford.' " Paula Barnhouse, a counselor at MacArthur High School in Irving, said that as federal aid has shifted from grants to loans, parents are leery of taking on the debt, pushing more top students to lower-cost public universities in their own state. UT-Austin received applications from 8,649 students in the top 10 percent of their classes this year – up 76 percent from seven years ago. The top-10-percent applicants made up 75 percent of all Texas students receiving acceptance letters from UT-Austin this spring. In 1999, only 46 percent of all Texas students accepted by UT-Austin were top-10-percenters. The shift creates a domino effect for students beneath the top 10 percent mark, making competition more intense for fewer remaining slots. To better handle the size of its freshman class, UT-Austin assigns about 800 students to an earlier summer session. Mr. Oglesby said that last year, to ensure even a summer slot, students needed to score around 1200 out of a possible 1600 on the SAT's verbal and math tests. This year, he said, 1250 seemed to be the benchmark. Another option UT-Austin also provides students who are not in the top 10 percent with another option, the coordinated admissions program. CAP allows them to attend a different campus in the UT System for a year, and if they maintain at least a 3.2 grade-point average, they can enroll the following year at Austin. Some who might have made it into the summer group at Austin a few years back are now being pushed into CAP. "It seems each year fewer are getting in who are not in the top 10 percent," said Pam Hill, a college adviser at Allen High School. "It's very, very competitive." In addition to the external forces all schools are seeing, some credit their own marketing and improvements as a cause for the increase in applications. UNT, for instance, has increased merit scholarships to attract more top-10-percent students, and it recently added dormitory space on campus for 1,500 more students. Of course, no matter how much marketing, campus construction and sports success a school engages in, there's always that wild-card element to application numbers in a given year – the whims of the teenage mind. "The behavior of high school seniors is unpredictable, and many factors determine where they apply," said Dr. Reinarz at Texas A&M, where applications stood at about 20,000, virtually unchanged from last year. Greenhill's Mr. McMurray agreed: "You get a student with gravitas who is well-regarded by his peers, and he decides to go to UT-Austin, and the other kids will say, 'Well, if he wants to go there, it must be good.' And so more are going to go." E-mail joneill@dallasnews.com
  3. San Francisco Chronicle article posted on the MUTS board by SpaceRaider BEHIND THE SCENES Football scheduling Colleges want the $$ without the L's Tom FitzGerald, Chronicle Staff Writer Sunday, April 9, 2006 Why is the Stanford football team opening next season at Oregon, never an easy place to play? Why will Cal have no byes on its schedule in 2007 and probably many future years? And why on earth is San Jose State playing at Tennessee in 2008 and USC in '09? The easy answers are money, money and money, but in the speculators' market that is college football scheduling, nothing is that simple. As spring practices continue at Bay Area schools, another sort of competition is going on behind the scenes, the struggle to book opponents who either pay well or are beatable -- preferably both. "The toughest thing for an athletic director to do is schedule football,'' said Steve Holton, who handles that task at Cal as deputy director of athletics. It's a little easier at Stanford because a long-term commitment to Notre Dame takes care of a third of the Cardinals' dealings outside the Pac-10. "Once we get things settled in the next year or so,'' said Scott Schuhmann, Stanford's associate athletic director in charge of football operations, "we'll have things pretty much booked up until 2014 or 2015.'' While Cal hunts for its fourth straight bowl and possibly a spot in the Bowl Championship Series, Stanford is trying to regain respectability. Meanwhile, San Jose State is in its second year of rebuilding under former Arizona coach Dick Tomey -- and his former Arizona schedule-maker Mark Harlan, the Spartans' senior associate AD. "When you come to San Jose State,'' Harlan said, "you put on a different pair of glasses than you had in the Pac-10.'' Football scheduling can help make or break the careers of administrators as well as coaches, although it's the coaches you're most apt to know about. The schedules are generally done with the head coach's blessing, but by the time the game is played, the coach and the official who booked it may be long gone. Schedules are typically done six to eight years in advance. And in the last year the rules have changed significantly. Beginning this fall, Division I-A schools will be allowed to play 12 games a year. Eleven-game schedules had been the norm since 1970. Additionally, I-A schools can count one win a year over a Division I-AA opponent toward bowl eligibility. Previously, the larger schools could count such a win only once every four years. That's why Cal will play Portland State on Sept. 16, Arizona will play Stephen F. Austin, and Arizona State will play Northern Arizona. It's also why San Jose State will play Cal Poly. A Pac-10 school will need only a 6-6 record to qualify for one of the six bowl games to which the conference is committed. Schools will need seven wins for bowl games with no tie to the conference. So a cupcake opponent can help. As long as it doesn't bite back. When Stanford lost three years in a row to San Jose State, Schuhmann remembers ruefully, "People were saying, 'Why are you playing San Jose State? Why don't you go play UC Davis?' " The Cardinal did just that last fall -- and lost 20-17. Another new development is that, as a byproduct of the 12-game schedule, each Pac-10 team will play a full round-robin for the first time since the league expanded from eight teams in 1978. The new format eliminates a built-in inequity. Playing just eight Pac-10 teams could be a boon or a blessing, depending on which school you avoided. Stanford didn't play Washington last fall, but if the Cardinal had beaten the Huskies, who were mired in a down year, they would have been bowl-eligible. Most Pac-10 schools had favored a round-robin even in the 11-game format, but USC, UCLA and Washington preferred to book bigger money-making games outside the conference. "We wanted a true conference champion,'' said Dan Coonan, who handled Cal's football schedules for three years before becoming AD at Santa Clara in 2004. "We didn't want to lose out on going to the Rose Bowl because we played a tougher team than somebody else played.'' Holton said that coach Jeff Tedford has "an A-B-C philosophy'' about scheduling. That is, each year he wants to play a school from the A list -- a BCS-caliber team from a major conference. He wants a B team from the Mountain West or the Western Athletic Conference. And he wants a C team, or, as Holton said, "somebody you think you have a pretty good opportunity to beat.'' With Tennessee and Minnesota this year and Michigan State and Maryland in 2008, "he's a little bit more A-A-C,'' Holton said. The timing of the games can be critical. Maryland, possibly wary of Cal's increasing stature, recently asked that the 2009 opener against the Bears be pushed back a week since Cal has a bye. Cal declined, not wanting to play Maryland and Minnesota in back-to-back weeks. Timing was a big issue in the 2008 Pac-10 schedule. The conference originally booked the Big Game on Nov. 29, but neither Stanford nor Cal wanted to play that day because its students will be off for Thanksgiving week. "It would have been a disaster for our fans,'' Holton said. As a result, the entire Pac-10 schedule had to be redone, putting the Big Game on Nov. 22. (Stanford isn't happy that the new schedule forces them to open at Arizona State.) Stanford officials take great pride in their series with Notre Dame, and the Irish, who host the Cardinal on Oct. 7 this year, are expected to contend for the national championship. But Lars Ahlstrom, publisher of the independent Stanford sports magazine The Bootleg, thinks that, since Stanford's attendance for the Notre Dame game has tailed off, "Notre Dame is getting more benefit (in recruiting and profits) from it than Stanford. "Notre Dame's (academic) standards are much closer to an average Division I school than to Stanford. Getting to play Notre Dame is great, but it's overkill to play them once a year. I'd like to see it every other year. There's a bunch of other interesting schools we could play, schools that have the same attitudes toward student-athletes.'' In that spirit, Stanford recently added Duke in 2011 and '12. The Cardinal also will play Northwestern in 2014 and '15, and are talking to Vanderbilt and Rice about future dates. Stanford isn't about to drop Notre Dame, though. The schools are booked through 2014, and Schuhmann says the series is both a money-maker and a recruiting tool for Stanford. "We have a national recruiting base, and Notre Dame is centrally located for a lot of people,'' he said. The game is always on TV, if only on a regional basis some years, and it's TV that puts the financial muscle in college football. It's often TV that dictates the schedule. Stanford agreed to open this fall at Oregon because it's a guaranteed TV game. ESPN, in particular, has taken an active role in getting nonconference teams together. It was ESPN, Coonan said, that got Cal and Tennessee interested in each other. "We already had Minnesota on the (2006) schedule, but Jeff's not ducking anybody. He realizes the exposure of a game like that.'' Fresno State would quarrel with the no-ducking part of that statement. Cal hasn't scheduled the ambitious Bulldogs since they beat Cal at Fresno 17-3 in 2000, during the disastrous regime of coach Tom Holmoe. FSU coach Pat Hill promises he'll play anybody anywhere -- e.g. Oct. 21 at LSU -- and Berkeley is just three hours away. But if Cal is going to play an A school, it would prefer to play someone other than Fresno, even though it is Tedford's alma mater. Part of the reason is that Cal has too much to lose and too little to gain by playing Fresno. "Four years ago, we could have brought in 30,000-40,000 Fresno fans,'' Holton said. "But now with our season-ticket sales, we've shrunk that (visitors' allotment) down.'' He said, "Cal people will regard Tennessee as something special,'' implying that they wouldn't feel the same way about Fresno. San Jose State has often played major national players, too. Unlike Fresno, it generally has had little chance of beating them. Under Tomey, the program is still willing to play the big boys (like Tennessee and USC) but less willing to travel far every year to do it. It asked out of 2007 and '08 games at Kansas State, although it will pay a "substantial'' penalty if it doesn't play the '07 game or can't find the Wildcats a suitable replacement, according to K-State senior associate AD Jim Epps. And a Division I-AA school won't do, he said. A so-called "guarantee game'' at a school like Kansas State can bring in $400,000 to $500,000. Tennessee -- thanks to a 104,079-seat stadium -- can offer as much as $800,000 to visiting teams. That's enticing for an athletic department like San Jose that needs all the money it can grab. But losing is costly, too. "We're trying to build a winner,'' Harlan said, "and part of that is building revenue streams that are based on people coming to your home games and on corporations and general donors buying into that. When you're sending your teams to (major conference) opponents, your record is not as good and people don't want to come to your games.'' In other words, the schedule-maker is trying to perform a broken-field run with two goals -- money and victories -- that are not always found in the same end zone.
  4. days until KICKOFF ! Come on FOOTBALL !
  5. Football season opens against SMU 12-game schedule features national champion Texas By Michael Neglia Staff Writer April 11, 2006 The Mean Green football team will battle Southern Methodist University in its home opener in the upcoming season. The program finalized its 2006 schedule Tuesday when it announced the team will be playing at University of Akron on Sept. 23. The schedule has been extended to 12 games for the first time since the 2003 season, and the Mean Green’s non-conference schedule is daunting to say the least. NT begins its regular season on Sept. 2 when it travels to Austin to face the defending national champion Texas Longhorns. On Sept. 9, the Mean Green hosts SMU in an effort to rekindle an old rivalry between the two regional schools. The two teams last played on Sept. 12, 1992, when the Mustangs defeated NT 28-14. The Mean Green have an all-time record of 3-27-1 against SMU. The following week, NT plays at Tulsa, another difficult game. Tulsa just finished its best season in 14 years with a mark of 9-4 with a bowl victory over Fresno State. The Golden Hurricanes plastered the Mean Green last season 54-2. After its game against Tulsa, NT plays at Akron, a team that finished 7-6 last season and received a bowl bid, losing to Memphis 38-31. The Mean Green then opens Sun Belt Conference play against Middle Tennessee and Florida International at home before going to Arkansas State to play the defending conference champions and Troy. NT plays its last non-conference game of the regular season on Nov. 4 when it hosts Louisiana Tech, a team that beat the Mean Green 40-14 last season. NT finishes the season against Sun Belt foes Louisiana-Lafayette and Louisiana-Monroe on the road with a home date against Florida Atlantic sandwiched between the two contests. While the team seems to have improved since last season, its non-conference schedule is tough with three conference winners including the national champion. For them to be successful in any of those games, NT will have to play spectacular, or else no one will know the team improved.
  6. New Orleans Bowl likes its new date Playing on Friday, Dec. 22, 'benefits' postseason game Tuesday, April 11, 2006 By Ted Lewis Staff writer The New Orleans Bowl no longer will lead off the bowl season. But to local organizers, that's a good thing. This year's game will be played Friday, Dec. 22, giving the bowl the first weekend time slot in its six-year history. "It was nice being the first bowl, but it's more important to grow the event in New Orleans," said bowl executive director Billy Ferrante, who worked out the new date with ESPN, which will televise the game. "This benefits the hospitality community because people are more inclined to travel towards the end of the week. "More importantly, it should help us entrench ourselves in the local community because Friday night is a more natural night to get out than a Tuesday. That's our best opportunity for growth, and playing on Friday night gives a big leg up in that department." The New Orleans Bowl, matching the Sun Belt Conference champion against a Conference USA team, has been the first bowl game of the year since its inception in 2001. But because of its early date, particularly in 2002, 2003 and 2004 when it was played on the second Tuesday in December, it ran into conflicts with final exams and fans had difficulty making a mid-week trip before the Christmas holidays began. Last year's game was played Dec. 20 in Lafayette because of damage to the Superdome from Hurricane Katrina. Sun Belt commissioner Wright Waters, who put together the bowl and served as its first executive director, said the move should prove beneficial. "The TV numbers have been good because we were the first bowl game, but the closer you can get to the holidays, the better," he said. "This eliminates the practice conflicts we had with the high school championships and sometimes the Saints and especially the conflicts with exam schedules. There are a lot of positives all the way around." While the bowl has the date it sought, it does face other challenges. Wyndham Hotels, which signed a title sponsorship agreement in 2004, dropped it last year when the game was moved because it has no properties in Lafayette and now is out of the picture altogether. Ferrante said he was optimistic about finding a new title sponsor. "We have a financial model in place that allows us to operate without one," he said. "But having a sponsor allows us to put some finer touches on the game and eventually take it to a different level." Also, the bowl faces recertification later this month. The game was granted conditional approval last year, even though it has had problems meeting the NCAA minimum average attendance requirement of 25,000. Last year's game between Southern Mississippi and Arkansas State drew 18,338, but Ferrante said because of the circumstances the NCAA had indicated it would be granted an exception. With the New Orleans Bowl set for Dec. 22, the GMAC Bowl on Dec. 20 in Mobile, Ala., becomes the first bowl game. The Fort Worth Bowl had occupied the Friday night slot being taken by the New Orleans Bowl. That game will be played Dec. 23. http://www.nola.com/sports/t-p/index.ssf?/...73691711400.xml
  7. UNT's schedule & Spring Prospectus are posted.
  8. Football - April 8, 2006 Spring Game Notebook: New turf will be reality MT Media Relations MURFREESBORO, Tenn. - One of the biggest cheers of the day came in the Blue Raider locker room before the Blue-White Spring Game kicked off at Floyd Stadium. Prior to his team taking the field, Head Coach Rick Stockstill told his players this would be the last time they would run onto the artificial turf in its current state, adding the Blue Raiders would be playing on a new synthetic surface beginning this fall. "In our pregame talk, I told our team about the check presentation that would occur before the start of the game and the players started cheering and just would not stop," said Stockstill. "That tells you how important this is to them and how appreciative they are to our donors and administration for helping make this happen." Two donors joined President Sidney McPhee and Director of Athletics Chris Massaro prior to kickoff to make a sizable contribution to help offset the cost of the new playing surface that will be installed in time for the season opener against Florida International on August 31. Mark and Anita Pirtle and Joey and Debbie Jacobs contributed $100,000 each toward the project. "This will be the last game played on this turf," said Massaro, igniting a unison roar of support amongst the Blue Raider faithful in attendance. Details regarding the start date of the installation and when the project would be completed will be forthcoming.
  9. MAC board post says Ohio is dropping their 9/16 game at UL-Lafayette for a 1-game deal at Rutgers. Isn't it a little late to be dropping games ? Looks like the Cajuns lost a pretty good home game & now gotta find a sub Thread from MAC board http://www.ncaabbs.com/forums/mac/phpbb/vi...pic.php?t=32783
  10. Seems that Dallas Baptist applied for and failed to become a CUSA baseball member. Who woulda thunk ? Article http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll...379/1097/SPORTS "They applied to enter as a baseball school only," said Palmer, one of three coaches who voted to allow the Patriots' entry. "I'd vote for them again." The proposal was turned down by a 6-3 vote during a fall meeting of the baseball coaches and never was forwarded to the board of athletic directors or the conference for consideration.
  11. Looks like the NO Bowl will be heading back to New Orleans if this is not wishful thinking. Refurbishing of the Superdome seems to be on schedule as a Monday nite game for the Saints is scheduled for September 24th. ARTICLE http://www.theadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll.../604070331/1006
  12. Here's one that's been around a while Deep.
  13. Shhhhhhhh. He's our secret weapon
  14. Question E. Personally I'll refer to you as UL-Lafayette or Louisiana-Lafayette until the name is legally changed.
  15. Letter I received today had a different, but very good, simple design. North Texas..................Mean (new Eagle) Green ......................Athletics Phone number & address,e-mail, etc at the bottom.
  16. On-line thru official site. http://www.meangreensports.com/ViewArticle...0&ATCLID=264881
  17. Multiple choice. Take your pick 1. to fasten or unfasten with a zipper 2. energy, vim, vigor. 3. to move with speed or energy. 4. to add vitality or zest to.
  18. Not sure. '47 or '48 Sam Houston or SFA
  19. From the Zips board. 2006 Football Prospectus http://gozips.cstv.com/sports/m-footbl/spe.../032206aac.html
  20. DRC article Football: North Texas releases schedule Mean Green fill 12th game spot with MAC’s Akron 09:28 AM CDT on Wednesday, April 5, 2006 By Brett Vito / Staff Writer North Texas added a little zip to its schedule in the form of a game against Akron on Tuesday, when the Mean Green released their 2006 schedule. UNT’s 12th game will be played at Akron on Sept. 23 and marks the beginning of a four-game deal with the Mid-American Conference. The Mean Green will play a MAC opponent at Fouts Field in 2007 and 2008 before playing a team from the conference on the road in 2009. UNT’s game against the Zips was part of a pair of scheduling deals that were announced in conjunction with the release of the Mean Green’s schedule. UNT also finalized a deal with Rice to play a home-and-home series in 2008 and 2010. UNT has stated its intension to develop more regional rivalries and reduce the number of high-dollar contract games the Mean Green play on the road. UNT officials saw their 2006 schedule as a step toward that goal. The Mean Green’s game against SMU will be the first of a home-and-home series between the Dallas-area rivals, who have not faced off since the 1992 season. “It is increasingly important for us to develop regional rivalries with teams such as Rice,” UNT athletic director Rick Villarreal said. “Our fans appreciate the ability to travel to games within a reasonable proximity and have a better association with teams from the state of Texas like Rice and SMU.” UNT will also play regional foes Tulsa on Sept. 16 and Louisiana Tech on Nov. 4. The Mean Green will face Tulsa on the road and Louisiana Tech at home. They will take on defending national champion Texas in Austin on Sept. 2 in their season opener before facing SMU in its home opener a week later. UNT will face Middle Tennessee in its first Sun Belt Conference game of the season on Sept. 30 at Fouts Field. The Mean Green went 2-9 last season, ending a string of four straight Sun Belt Conference titles.
  21. Yea they've really done zip to improve/add any athletic facilities haven't they? Adding a home-home series with Rice along with the one's with Tulsa, Louisiana Tech and SMU plus a 2-2 deal with another conference (MAC) is really a bummer isn't it? Firing squad at dawn?
  22. Maybe a better question is why isn't ANYONE talking to him ? Is there a reason !
  23. If only the Germans hadn't bombed Pearl Harbor
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue. Please review our full Privacy Policy before using our site.