The Fake Lonnie Finch

Yeah, he did...which is why he was being recruited as a QB and not an athlete. And, it's why, if Dodge is half the coach people think he is, his son will never see the field as a starting QB as long as Vizza is here.

He rarely looks past the first receiver. Even when he scrambles, he is still looking at his first option throughout the play. From that video, it's easy to see why Mack Brown was recruiting him as an athlete and not a QB.

The pants look...nevermind...maybe someday we'll come back to our senses and quit acting like a school desperate for attention/changing unis/logos every other year. The Under Armor logo everywhere screams high school.

Case in point - a "fan" who overlooks four bowl trips because of two games. So, I guess you'd trade wins over Tulsa and Middle Tennessee State for a win over an OOC more often, and no bowl trips? Sad. And, by the way, greenminer and I agree on alot more than you know about. He's actually a poster who can address issues logically. We've had a few conversations in messages. He's not a DD-flamer. He appreciates what happened here and wants success in the future. The difference between fans like me and greenminer and you, is that we accept success when it is here. We don't shove it out the door or dismiss it over a couple of bad seasons. In other words, we're not spoiled.

Fair enough, but some other Sun Belt teams hung well with OOC foes as well: FAU on lost to Hawaii by 7 in 2004 or 2005 FIU stayed pretty close to Kansas State a couple of years ago, and almost upset South Florida and Maryland last year. When they were in our conference, Idaho almost upset Arizona in Tuscon, beat San Diego State and Washington State, and hung in there with Oregon State once. Do I need to go on? Troy beating Brad Mith-led Mizzou? I mean, every school in the Sun Belt has hung on (and I mean kept the game within 14 points - two scores) against a bigger school in a bigger conference. The point is, even after hanging in with big guys, and occassionally beating one or two, they still came back to the Belt and couldn't beat DD-coached teams. You don't luck into 26 game conference win streaks and four conference titles. Those coaches and players on our 2001-2004 teams worked hard and played well. Too many people here put on blinders to what success we had. I can't because I sat through losing to the Sam Houston States and Missouri States and McNeese States back in the early 90s. I mean, we were having Division II Abilene Christian on our schedule back then. In 1991, Nevada beat us 72-0. It was bad football! DD gave us good years, success far beyond being demolished 72-0 by the likes of Nevada. It's sad that some people can't just accept it.

This is where we get lost in the shuffle...no one at UNT knows how to play the political game to our favor. We're just sitting around waiting to be told what to do instead of gathering those UNT alums in politics or with political connections and being aggressive about what we want and/or need. It's really, really sad. Maybe even pathetic. Look at where DKR-Memorial Stadium is in Austin. Do you seriously think the UT brass would let the DOT tell them to move their stadium for an I-35 expand? I doubt it. But, Texas alumni are more politically savvy and active than UNT alumni, so.... I guess we wait and get told where our stadium can be.

Moving bleachers in isn't rocket science, for sure. But, it also isn't paying for a demolition and a rebuild. School are constantly renovating and adding seating. It's not as expensive. And let's face it, even with the best seat at Fouts, you are still far away from the action. We've all been to nearby road games - Baylor, OU, TCU, and Sun Belt foes. There's just much more "game" atmosphere when you're closer to the game. Our end zone seat are ridiculously far away. I don't even know why they bother to charge money for them. What they should do is just give those seats away fo' free to local church and high school groups. At minimum, we might get some concession and souvenir money if a few of those folks buy a coke and hot dog and maybe a hat or t-shirt. Surely, we couldn't make any less than we make on those seats now. If you've been up to Tulsa, you can see that they were pretty land restricted. So, they took what little land they had on the west side of the campus and built a new tennis center, a track facility, a soccer field, and a softball field. All pretty nice. Then, they went to work at "renovating" Skelly. There was nothing else they could do. But, they knew they had to do something. I was in law school at TU from 2000-2003. They were really bad from 2000-2002. They were so bad that people were talking of dropping down to I-AA. I mean, the school has less than 3,000 undergrads and no one really came to the football games anyway. Anyway, they did what they could do with their crappy, aging, high-school-like stadium. We have the same problem, so I say we do the same thing. The only thing I'd change, though, is to do the Fouts renovation before building all of the minor sport facilities.

To say that any Sun Belt team had talent that was "far superior" to any other Sun Belt team is absurd. It's as far-fethced as anything I've ever read here. Every Sun Belt team was saddled with 1- and 2- star players with an occassional 3-star guy mixed in. Most of the teams were making the jump from I-AA just like we did - or in FAU and FIU's case, starting from the ground up. To say any one school had a leg up on the other is ridiculous. Also, our Sun Belt foes played the same people year in and year out that we did. They took their lumps from SEC and Big 12 teams, then came back to play each other. It wasn't rocket science. Same schools, over and over, year in and year out. Yet, no one else could put together the streak that DD did. No other coach in our crappy little conference could do it. Take it for what it is worth. All I know is that, when I was a student here from 1990-1995, we didn't have jack for a football team and were a losing program even at the I-AA level. Under Dickey, that changed for a bit, and at a higher level. It wasn't luck.

Amazing. I mean, seriously. For them, a school with that much money and no one anywhere can think of, or buy, something better. For us, a school that claims to be artsy and creative.... Amazing.

Hooray, our helmets have that cheap, FAU look now. I fear the next thing will be the high-schoolish placing of some sort of stickers on the helmet. Please, God, no - but, I fear it will be. So chintzy. NOTE TO AD: Please no stickers, please. It only works for Ohio State because they have nothing but a silver helmet and they put "buckeyes" on it. We don't have a plain helmet - although, you've done your best to make it that way with the crappy white offering. We also don't have the ridiculous sticker tradition. Do not begin it, please. If we are going to be I-A, can we at least act I-A?

Again, just renovate the stadium we have now: -Build a new facade/wall around the whole stadium where the crappy chain link fences now stand -Eliminate the track and move the bleachers in where the track is now -Build a separate track facility down in the area between beer barn and the stadium, etc. -Kill the crickets It's not rocket science. We don't need to build a $50 million dollar structure that no one sits in like they have at SMU. If SMU, in the heart of Dallas, can't even fill up Ford, there's no way we'd fill up a new stadium. It's a complete waste of money to do a completely new stadium from the ground up. Do what is possible, and quit f'n around. It's no less than amazing that we have stayed I-A. It's like Larry, Curly, and Moe oversee our athletic department.

Refresh my memory, but didn't UNT have its top running back and wide receiver during the Dickey Era - Patrick Cobbs and Johnny Quinn? I think so. Check your media guides when they arrive. You'll also see Cobbs, running back, listed first in career all-purpose yards, and Quinn, receiver, listed second. DD wasn't wide open, though. He just happened to coach the best running back and wide receiver in UNT history. Probably happens to alot of coaches just out of pure luck, though, right? Just like plenty of coaches luck into four consecutive conference titles. They're so easy to win.

As pointed out in yesterday's thread about these rankings, it has nothing to do with 2007. It is ESPN's ranking of the programs from 1997-2006. It is not a prediction of the 2007 season.

Green

He wasn't in the dorm, he was in the parking lot. The shooting occurred in the dorm. Reg saw Parks as he was walking out of the dorm. Parks only did three months in jail for the shooting...then finished his career at the University of Houston. Zarak Peters finished at Texas A&I.

Why would the CUSA care if the Sun Belt got a better bowl contract? It doesn't make any sense. They're already tied into the New Orleans Bowl, so combining with the Sun Belt does nothing in addition for them except to make an already big conference bigger...and more unwieldy. Troy and Louisiana State are already within reasonable travel distances of current CUSA members. It makes far more sense that the CUSA would take them instead of combining with the Sun Belt. The WAC already tried to build a super conferece with over a dozen teams. It didn't work. CUSA will not go the same route. In reality, the Sun Belt wouldn't fit into any CUSA change at all, except to lose Troy. CUSA already has a dozen football playing member schools. Even adding Troy in the Eastern Division and Louisiana Tech in the Western Division is tenuous at best because it makes for a 14 team conference. Both make plenty of sense geographically, but at some point it becomes too unweildy. If they add anyone, they practically have two conferences within a conference.

Reg had injury issues even before he transferred here. The highlight of Reg's collegiate career - he's the guy OU cornerback Jerry Parks handed his gun to in the dorm parking lot after shooting offensive lineman Zarak Peters. Reg said he had just come back to the dorms and saw Parks. Parks just handed him them gun. Crazy. Reg walked up on the incident that brought Switzer down at OU. He hadn't even signed with OU yet and was visiting his brother. Wish Reg had been healthy here. I was a student when he transferred. He was a great tailback at MacArthur. DMN on Finch signing with OU way back in 1988: MacArthur running back Reggie Finch, The News' top area football recruit and Offensive Player of The Year, said Sunday he will sign a letter of intent with Oklahoma when the national signing period begins Wednesday. Finch, who rushed for 1,533 yards and scored 117 points as a senior, would join his brother Lonnie, a junior defensive back, at OU. But Reggie said a factor in his decision was Sooners coaches not taking for granted that he would follow his brother to Oklahoma.

No school would possibly leave a conference with multiple bowl tie-ins to come to our conference. Insane. Why did this guy even write that? Most likely is that Troy State goes CUSA along with Louisiana Tech. They regularly hang with the big name non-coference foes and occassionally knock one off. But any CUSA school coming down to the Sun Belt to compete for one guaranteed bowl spot? Very doubtful. It's all about money and we don't have any in our conference.

I think playing the OU game first will help us. Both OU and SMU have experienced O-lines returning. OU has great receivers and a host of tailbacks, but a new QB. And, they host Miami the next week, so they won't want to give too much away on offense. So, I'll bet they run alot in a pretty vanilla game plan against us. SMU also has an experienced tailback and a good QB, but not many experienced WRs. I'd bet they run alot as well simply because they'll have to be successful there early in the season as the QB and new WRs get on the same page. Our lack of starting experience along the defensive line will be tested, then, right off the bat. If you buy the idea that the OU players are better than the SMU players, we'll have already seen a better, stronger running game by the time we hit Ford Stadium. Although OU might pound us and eventually wear us out, I doubt SMU will. As posted elsewhere, I think an upset of OU comes down to special teams plays, blocked kicks, long returns, burying them with deep punts, and the like. Their overall speed and strength is too much right now to expect to walk in there and fight with them toe-to-toe. SMU is different. If we can stop the run consistently, we've got a good chance to beat them again.

Gee, I thought nothing positive happened on or off the field while Darrell Dickey was here.

The SMU D-line only returns one starter; two return at LB, three in the secondary. They open the season with Texas Tech, another team that runs a spread offense, so they will see the same offense two weeks in a row. If we have a budding run game, it will show against SMU's young D-line. If we can't dent them running, there may be problems. What remains to be seen is whether SMU can defense a spread offense better this year than last year when Tech beat them 35-3. As for the SMU offense, their O-line is very experienced, returning four starters and going two deep with upperclass reserves. Their receiver corp is shaky with one guy moved from corner and another from running back to fill in for graduation losses. So, it's doubtful they'll throw with much success against anyone early on. The flip side is they have an experience tailback to go behind the experience O-line. If our D-line, LBs, and strong safety can't make heads or tails of the run game, they could ball control us to death. Should be a close game, as emmit predicts. It could go 24-20 either way. The x-factor will be special teams. They've got a return guy who was leading the nation with 37+ yard per kick return last year before getting injured about halfway through the season. Containing him would help us maintain momentum after scoring drives.

Wikipedia can be altered by anyone unless a moderator steps in. Obviously, an idiot North Texas "fan" did a hatchet job on the coach who took us to four consecutive bowls. Nice. It really does show what type of people follow our program...sadly. Coach Archie: You guys did a great job. I went to UNT back in the early 90s and we were horrible. Many of us who post here do appreciate the success Coach Dickey and his staff brought to the school. We'd have loved to have had it years ago when we were in school. Best of luck to you all always.

Paul Hartsfield

Houston's Art Briles ran a camp earlier this month at Plano High. UTEP is having a camp Monday at Arlington Bowie. It's fine by the NCAA as long as the hosting school's coach actually does the supervising, and the college coaches follow all contact guidelines.

It's amazing that this has to be done, but... The comparison and question didn't have to do with OU's coach and program versus Boise State's. It was a question about Peterson versus Patterson. Release your misguided hate and use your brains. TCU is a private school, Boise a public school. Part of the reason TCU (and subsequently Tulsa, Rice, and SMU) bailed on the WAC was Fresno and Boise loading up on nonqualifiers that TCU would never offer. They ended up in a better situation. And, with the exception of one season, Patterson has proved to be more than just Franchione's defensive coordinator. If he were just another coach, Kansas State and Miami wouldn't be giving him interviews. Peterson got nothing in the way of interviews. That's not surprising. No Boise State coach has proven he can do it outside of the WAC. When everyone is in the same boat regarding recruiting rules, former Boise State coaches have been average at best. Koetter failed at Arizona State and Hawkins is doing so at Colorado. AD's know what the deal was at Fresno and Boise. That's part of the reason they stopped scheduling them. That has led to both schools and the WAC curbing the NQ signings. Fresno has already seen a drop off. Boise will follow. But, TCU won't. Patterson has them chugging along quite nicely.