Aquila_Viridis

They are outspending us by a significant margin, putting them in the range of AAC. We are not in the range. There need to be radical changes to NT's approach to sports if NT is not going to spend 50% more than we are now. I figure NT will not spend that, so NT please make radical changes, particularly so that money games are not necessary. I can understand not upping the spending, it would be 50% now and then 100% later to keep up, then more later. ODU will probably regret getting on the train.

It is a good point. It would take generations for any schools in the other BF places to develop the kind of following that let's say the Mississippi States and VTs etc. have for example. That latter group got a following because there is nothing else going on in the areas and they were in the big conferences when the big conferences grew into what they are. Big East was a legit conference when VT left. I'm not saying there is nothing the 'little' schools in tiny towns can do, but I am saying it has nothing to do with what NT should do. Yes I agree we have several good conference members for the future but some are in the other division. I would like for those to consolidate so we can stop playing the others, and also maybe bring in some schools. Under present circumstances*, I would like for a somewhat similarly situated set of schools with a similar spending mindset to say 'we're going to stick together and stop the madness'. Unfortunately the pickins are slim in the southeast US and about 0 in near mid/west. And I have to leave out OLD DU cause they already went mad. I don't think they're gonna be in our neighborhood for long. Here would be my preferred annual opponents from what is realistically available and not too far away from the others: SA, Charlotte, MT, FAU, UAB, GA State (and maybe Salabama). Obviously more are needed. Maybe if that core could get together we could get some others to come up or down. I don't want to include TX State or FIU; need other areas. EP just does not fit. *All that said, with proper fundraising we would not have to do something like this. There is plenty of money in the region. I think Danny Thomas (for St. Jude) said he would rather have one dollar each from a million people, than a million dollars from one person. NT's fundamental problem is it does not follow that idea.

Regional is BS. There's Friday night for that. SA is OK but otherwise we should get with the other lowlife city schools in CUSA and other conferences. That maybe in a couple decades has a chance of being interesting. With the leadership we have, there ain't gonna be no crowds. The best we can hope for is to get out of any games we have against big conference schools so we aren't always showing our rears to the world. Honestly, whatever it takes, please stop playing those games.

It doesn't matter to us anyway. We won't be moving up to the level of those schools this century no matter where they are. Realistically the best I can hope for is that we are always playing other schools that are comparable in fundamental ways and have a similar low level of commitment. Maybe after a while we can help build a conference that UCF and USF and maybe some others would WANT to join. It does not make sense for them to be playing East Carolina for example. Besides there really is no such place. I don't know what goals to expect anymore. Our administration clearly is not on board with finding how to come up with the kind of money that TT, etc. can come up with. Plus it is so much money now I don't think I can say spending it would make sense. But then let's find a rational set of opponents at this rational level of spending. I think that means schools in metro over 1 million people. There is not reason to be playing LT, USM or privates like Rice. Yes those are the better historical programs in our current conference but what's the point? That it MEANS something? No really it doesn't. I am more excited about beating San Antonio for example.

LOL! Those are good ones. What about Bodacious Green? I think it would be a hit with the stoner crowd, plus there would be possible sponsorship opportunities with an East Texas based BBQ chain.

Good. These places are in the middle of %^&#@! nowhere. They are so irrelevant to anything that NT is or ever should have been. I will take the GA States, MTs, UABs, Charlottes, ODUs and F_Us of the world over these any day. We need to affiliate more closely with peer public institutions in large metro areas.

This is a timely first. As it happens, yesterday on Walnut Grove Road here in Memphis I drove by a house flying an Old Dominion flag out in front of it. I had never seen one before. I have flown a North Texas flag before, but not these days. Still, even though my daughter wanted to go to college in a city (didn't happen), VA was one of the states on her 'preferred' list (didn't happen), and she could have got a scholarship there (did happen - War Eagle!), she would not go to tour Old Dominion; one reason cited was that the name had the word 'Old' in it. Well, they're never going to get past that. She wouldn't tour NT either though, despite the same positive factors. There was just too much impression of failure from sporting events attended over many years. (NT did have the distinction of providing the brochure with by far the largest footprint of any college we got such things from. It was well produced though.) As others have mentioned, it seems NT will get their plenty of students anyway, mostly the ones without much spirit. For the few that do, they have signed up for a difficult road. I don't think NT's going to be converted into anything else. At this point they just need to own the whole comedy thing and probably use the 'Green' thing to capitalize on the 'growing' marijuana industry. Instead of Mean Green, let's go with Funny Green, or Soylent Green...

I don't know if this link will work but it is the publication that UMemphis made as part of their Big 12 push. I hope the link works. This is what a serious athletic department is doing to promote their program and build their connection with the region they represent. If you don't think they are serious, they hired TT's basketball coach away. Could you imagine NT doing something like that? Note that UM's full time undergraduate population is about 10,000 students less than NT. Shame. Here is a URL anyway: https://issuu.com/univofmemphis/docs/50576_athletics_viewbook?e=0/35346973

'Academics' is probably not the right word for the main rankings by which universities are compared, for people who are considering what college to attend. Those rankings consider many factors, and not the sports success of course. It is clear that they strongly agree with each other that NT is not a good choice for an outstanding student overall, though they do not consider the specific esoteric program where NT excels, for a very small number of students. Improving sports is not the only way in which NT needs to make fundamental changes. I completely disagree with the idea that NT is carrying out its rightful role. The population of the North Texas region is almost as much as the entire state of Virginia. The North Texas region deserves a GREAT public university. Any politician or administrator that has other ideas needs to move to another place. Unfortunately, NT's abysmal showing in these important (If you don't see this you have your head WAY in the sand.) rankings could be NT's way of mocking the rankings. Maybe we should change the mascot to a mockingbird! Chattanooga did it. The people of your mighty region should be ashamed that a poor little place like Memphis is kicking your ass when it comes to college sports. No they are probably not going to get in the Big 12 after the expansion news, but can sure make a much, much better case for it.

That is ABSOLUTELY untrue. All SEC schools are ranked far ahead of NT in US News and Forbes; NT is near the very, very far bottom. That is why it is so ridiculous for NT to try to pull off the Stanford band kind of thing.

Yeh yeh I get it. And I should have said 'GREAT university' instead of 'REAL university'. I haven't got to the point where I won't mention North Texas, but it has got to the point where my wife, who also got her degree there, gets mad when I mention North Texas to people. In SECland there is no other place you could mention and get more snickers. Because NT is the opposite of an SEC school. NT is larger than most of them, but they take football seriously. NT clearly does not aspire to be like an SEC school. But when you look at their extremism, then you could say they snicker because basically you are saying their way of life doesn't matter, and the snickering is a defense mechanism, like 'Surely you jest; football means everything!' But they are thinking, 'it must, because if it doesn't then I don't have anything left.' So I am going back to the idea that NT has football and basketball solely (and bravely!) to kick sand in the face of the big muscle guys. I'm not sure why NT would want to do that or why anyone would support it, but that's what you have. You can choose to support it or not. I wish I could say that I am committed to NT's role as a loveable smartass, but I am not. I want NT to get in shape and stop being an A-hole. Harry is probably right that it wouldn't take much evidence of NT turning it around for me to return my support, to NT's progress in a better direction. I don't expect NT to compete with schools from SEC and other big conferences, but I do expect for NT's football and basketball to exist for reasons other than to merely serve as a counterpoint. That was a really bad idea and whoever came up with it SHOULD be fired.

I have nothing against having a beer at a festival. I do have something against red shirts. Also it's not Christmas time. Well success can happen anywhere. Virginia was terrible in football for decades (and more recently went back to that). Similar to NT, it followed a leadership decision to de-emphasize football. Then George Welsh came along and we had several really good years. They have struggled with the commitment to football at their level too and so never beat VT anymore. VT has rabid supporters cause there is not much else in southwest Virginia. When I think about this it occurs to me maybe why NT doesn't stir up the community is cause then they would be accountable to the stirred up community. I don't know what you guys down there could do to stir it up for them. I would contribute to a fund to take out a full page ad in DMN or a billboard or something, that highlights the failures and says 'Aren't you people of this area ashamed of this? Don't you want to do something about it? Wouldn't you like to have a REAL public university right here in this area, that represents you?' Raising public awareness is not exactly something I am good at, but that is what needs to happen. I think a few people have bought off a major university really cheap. I have no idea what they are getting out of it; it's not winning. There must be some kind of misconduct involved. Maybe I should have contributed to the FireRV banner but I thought it was too specific. I don't necessarily want anyone fired but I would like for them to feel compelled to do some things they are not doing. On the other hand it is fair to say that no university that is taking sports seriously would have failed to make an AD change by now. It truly does sicken me. It should sicken you all too.

Not a systemic failure?! You forgot the coach before that, and the one before that who after some success fell into the toilet, and the one before that, and the one before that... This is not about Trust, it's about Hope, and there really is no reason for either except for maybe to achieve occasional, brief and fleeting instances of success. That's not enough. If you are a betting man, this is not a good bet. We're spending more than before, but well less than Old Dominion and comparable to the UABs of the world, which killed their program and is in a county that went bankrupt. At this point NT sports is for me like 'The Kramer' from Seinfeld, it sickens me yet I can't look away. I guess the difference is that I'm not buying The Kramer anymore.

I disagree it is small stuff. It points out how the program has been let to fester to such point that NT can't make anything out of something that other programs use as a big opportunity to maintain excitement for their program.

I figured this 'news' was going to be a joke. Oh well I guess nothing should be a surprise after Portland State. How we can get some QBs to NT who are both (1) good enough to help NT win games, and (2) crazy enough risk takers to bet their future on NT; is an absolute mystery to me. For such person(s) though, there would sure be a big opportunity. 90 was right we had great defense during bowl wins, but regardless we aren't going anywhere without outstanding QB play. This spring game thing though points out why it would be so unlikely for us to get any. It's %#@^&* hard out here for an NT fan.

Even with all the institutional garbage, if we could just get and develop a really good QB it would change everything. You saw what happened when we had an average QB who sort of finally figured it out and also really took it upon himself at some key times. I have zero expectation for the coming season. I can't even explain why I follow this madness at all anymore. But anyway one would hope for the 2017 season. I don't really expect that to go well either but at least there is a chance.

As good as treating the symptom would be, RV is only a symptom. The root cause is failure of leadership at higher institutional and governmental levels. How do you change that? Lawsuit for misappropriation of the public's resources? Civil unrest? The institution is so painfully ineffective that surely some digging would turn up all sorts of improprieties, beyond those very significant accounting issues that were already discovered. My suggestion is they find a way to get people on their side and show they can develop reasonably winning sports programs. Otherwise the sports in particular is literally waving a flag by which more people can figure out, that there is something ridiculously wrong with the way they conduct themselves, for such a large institution - in such a rich locale - to be so hapless, in sports and in other respects such as the rankings as I've mentioned before.

At this point I don't care who NT plays as long as long as they win most of the games consistently each year. We have no foundation of winning. There is no quick fix for it. Other programs are throwing ridiculous amounts of money. Memphis up here is paying a basketball coach $3 million a year. I am about at the point where I agree it has got so out of hand we should get off the train. There are hundreds of universities. I don't care which ones we beat. We should have our programs to a point where we don't need a million bucks from a huge drubbing. If that means we can only consistently beat the dregs of the world, let's only play them. 90 your dreams cannot come true. And believe me I am very very upset about that too but it is the reality. With things going the way they are, a lot of other programs will eventually come to the same point.

Yes. I am not renewing for the second year. They found my threshold! (But remember, I live about 8 hours drive away and kept them for several years.)

If we could get in MWC, should go for it! Worked for TCU.

Maybe the problem is that we don't really have any Powers That Be?

You guys are delusional if you don't think those rankings matter and don't reflect the actualities of the schools. While you could argue about the differences between universities that are only a few places apart, when you are talking about the difference of say 450 places, like I think is roughly the difference in Forbes rankings, you know there is a substantial difference and basically no comparison. It is no better in the US News rankings of National Universities as they call it. It is important for us to recognize where we really stand. Even so, NT does have a lot to offer and has done a lot for me. I guess I am just saying we need to forget about SMU and what they do and focus on what we each can do to help NT be a better regarded institution than it is now. Bad as our athletics are, it is possibly the least of our worries as NT supporters. I think it is just another symptom of some fundamental problems.

I live in the nearest metro to Jonesboro which is about an hour and a half away. There is a lot more of their merchandise in stores than used to be. Of course it is still overshadowed by all the SEC schools' stuff but there is a noticeable difference. Also I see the red wolf head on cars now and people wearing it. That is a very tiny school by the way in terms of student population, I mean when compared to NT or Hog Heaven for example.

When I went to NT and even for a long time after, I thought that, outside of the Ivy League schools, pretty much all colleges were regarded about the same in terms of their effectiveness at carrying out their non-athletic missions. That cluelessness is a big part of how I ended up at NT. The reality is that SMU is on an entirely higher plane than NT as an institution. Regardless I care about NT and want to help NT ascend. Then I think about Rice which is on entirely higher plane than SMU as an instiution, and wonder how do their people let their program slum around with us. Clearly they just absolutely do not care. So I guess we're in good company.