FloMoGrad

We're going to pound Denver tonight. We don't lose back-to-back games. The West still comes thru Denton, so does the overall season championship.

Going undefeated and thinking we'd play in the Natinoal Championship Game is unrealistic. Improving our win count by 3-4 games and going bowling, that's ultra realistic. We return our top Rush and Receving threats and offensive coordinator. We get an improvement to any degree in Defense and that's the margin of error for the 2-3 close games we lost last yr. Maybe expectations are too high, but I expect to see winning football very soon. Overall I think this is a great recruiting class and addresses almost every team need. Couple days to go yet, have we ever known this many recruits to be committed before signing date?

The fact that both were being recruited by AQ's and chose us is more than good enough for me. I imagine rivals dropped their grades after they committed with us.

We return 3 out of our 5 top receiving targets from last yr based off the 2010 stats. NAME REC YDS AVG LONG TD Darius Carey 38 524 13.8 46 (TD) 5 Jamaal Jackson 33 446 13.5 45 4 Lance Dunbar 28 332 11.9 66 (TD) 3 Tyler Stradford 24 268 11.2 75 (TD) 2 Alex Lott 15 164 10.9 37 (TD) 1 Add in the effective use of a TE and that should eat up a portion of our lost production. We have 9 returning WR's on the roster. And Whitfield and Jimmerson look great catching the ball out of the backfield as well, so I expect to see some throws there direction as well. We need a Brelan Chancelor type player to step up and start producing, but it's not like we lost our top 3 receivers or even top receiver. We still have our best RB and best WR back, fill in with support players and lets start hanging some W's on the board. And it wasn't our potent ariel attack that kept us in games last yr, it was LD. He had 13 rushing touchdowns to 15 Passing touchdowns, total. The only player I see us struggling to replace is JJ and it's really only 3 catches per game we're replacing there. Carr was the best offensive player in the district as a QB, where your hands are on the ball on every play. Again, he might have been the best defensive player in the district had someone else been capable of playing QB. End of the day, I don't care where they play him just get the most talented kids on the field and let's win some damn ball games.

That's what's even more impressive about the quality of recruits we're seeing. We have a lot of fluff to sell, facilities, new stadium, quality of our coeds, but nothing sells like winning. D-Mac's job on the recruiting trail gets nothing but easier from here. I'm thoroughly enthused with this class so far, and add in one or two more nice surprises and we could have the foundation of something special starting to happen around here. Definately want to see one more OL and one more DT, but other than that we've done pretty well with what was available and given our short field to work with so to speak.

Unless we went undefeated, with a road win over Kansas, we weren't getting an at-large bid. Good Mid-Major conferences struggle to get at-large bids, we're not quite there yet. We were going to have to win the SBC tourney to make it to the NCAA Championships. Nothing's changed, except our perceptions of ourselves. F the NIT, we're winning the Belt tourney and making it back to back trips to the Big Dance.

"You Mean Green, with your Sr laden team and big American PF. How could we compete against you and your big American Power Forward. " I quote that episode to my wife once a week. Keeps her expectations in check.

Congrats and good post. Took quite a few years before Gonzaga started earning higher seeds.

Just another factor. If we'd have eeked out a win, by just being a little better at the FT line, everyone would still be cruising. Bump in the road, even Kansas lost at home, it happens, 4 out of 21 isn't an alarming rate, just shows we still have to show up and do the dirty work. There's no cruising to wins for this squad. Everything we want for this season is still out in front of us.

Rooting for WKU and ASU? UALR loss gives us a one game edge in the battle for the bye. FAU loss keeps us in the hunt for overall champ with FAU coming here in 3 weeks. FAU & Denver are now must wins if we want the season championship.

My flags fly high year round. Agreed.

Goals are meant to be slightly beyond the reach of acceptable. This was our goal, run the conference table, be a 1-loss team at this point, get ranked in the top 25. Would a 20 win season, conference tourney win and another birth in the NCAA's be seen as a failure. Not at all. Did we fail to achieve our goal, we sure did, but doesn't exclude the positives we can still achieve. It doesn't have to be so we must be perfect or this season is a bust, does it? Ranking doesn't get you in the tourney. RPI does. We want the RPI so we can still have a shot as an at large should we fail to win the conference tourney. Our loss to Sam Houston pretty much took care of our RPI dreams. Season goals haven't changed much, if at all. Win our division, win the belt,(which is still possible), win the conf tourney and make it to the dance. Get to that point and that's 3 times in 5 yrs, outstanding considering the # of schools from our conference that make the tourney each yr.

From the outside looking in, it definately seems like there's a plan in place and everyone's working towards said plan. This isn't just some random collection of best we could find on short notice. This is filling holes, changing minds and perceptions and building our program, recruit by recruit, need by need, with the types of players we want. Absolutely agree. If JJ can get Mitchell, then anything's possible right?

2 stud RB's. Could we ask for much more, considering we recruited them to sit behind Lance this yr. Great pick-up and agreed, this is the start of what could be a beautiful backfield in a yr or two. My man NT03, breaking news like it's sportscenter, nice find amigo.

Because he was the QB due to his being the best athlete in their program. Played Safety and WR before that, so don't know that his best position would be on offense, may have been more based on his HS teams needs rather than his desires or best fit. We have 3 QB's coming in, so it would make sense we're not recruiting him for what he won OPoY for. Agreed, Mac and Co will find where we need him most and thats where he'll play. Definately stoked at having 2 head hunters in the secondary. Huge for run support and with that size should make defending the pass and covering the TE much easier as well. Great addition!

And there-in lies the responsibility on each of us as fans. If we don't pour the kool-aid, who will?

4 home games and 4 road games left this yr. 3-1 at home and 2-2 on the road still leaves us at 21-8, with a conference record of 10-6, which is absolutely still in the hunt for a first round bye, even with a poor finish to the season. UALR is 4-4 in conf play so 2 more losses and we dismiss them from the bye talk, and we face them one more time after winning our earlier meeting. This is a stumble, not a fall on our face. We come out and spit the bit against Denver, there's reason to worry. But I don't see that happening. We haven't lost 2 straight all yr, even in back to back road games situations. Yes, there's a huge target on our back, and as the hilltopper's pointed out, there is nothing wrong with that, we're getting everyone's best shot and like mentioned, this should galvanize us for Tourney time. Honestly, I'd like to see the target on our backs in every sport every year, just means your at the top, it's much easier to climb to the top than it is to stay there.

4 clunkers out of 21, all in all not too shabby. Where we wanted to be, of course not, anything changed regarding our season goals or ultimate destinations, not at all. I'd much rather throw our clunkers and head scratchers now rather than come 1st week of March.

From the looks of things, he's needed much more on the gridiron. It would take a phenomenal athlete, and student, to pull off 2 sports. Would love to see it happen, but I highly doubt it.

True Story.

UNT Football... Converting the masses, one fan at a time. Nice work!

I was but a twinkle in my Great Grandfathers eye. What a long way we have come.

Pardon me, I stand corrected. Still same theory. Occupy blockers and allow the LB's to read flow and stop the run, ala Tank Carder. Speed at Safety and CB allow run support and multiple blitz options. Irregardless and nonetheless, I still don't see us changing to a 3-4 this yr. But of course I reserve the right to be completely and totally wrong based off my total speculation and illogical decision making. What position were the AQ schools recruiting him to play

Similar to what he did in his role as Interim HC. I'd expect to see a more balanced attack, TE's used effeciently and a more polished system this yr. It'll be his reins. Defense will be Coach Mac's baby. We'll stay with the 4-3 based on everything we've heard and committments we've seen in recruiting. I imagine a more fundamentally sound defense with playmakers at safety and LB and a physical defense that gets to the point of attack. I also expect to see more aggressive blitz schemes and better DLine technique and rotations. One of the biggest areas of need in improvement has been our Special Teams. I think we have the answer at Punter, Kicker, deep snapper, I think it's more of a focus and attention to detail issue, which all defensive minds brought aboard have made a priority at their previous stops. Blcoked Punts, Blocked FG's, big punt and Kick-Off returns and dismal punt returns have been bothersome for far too long. My best dumb guess.

The dude can flat out play. Offense, defense, perimeter, post-up. 24 hrs son. You can do it.