untjim1995

You are so dead-on here, its not even funny. Morris is a Mean Green Miracle if he can stay healthy. Immediately, he is better than any QB we have had here not named Derek Thompson in the last 5 years--and he may be better than him, we just don't know yet. But, without a doubt, he is better than Josh Greer, Andrew McNulty, Dajon Williams, Damarcus Smith, Quinn Shanbour, Caleb Chumley, and any other QB of the last few years, if only because exactly zero of these QBs listed belonged anywhere near a FBS roster. Hell, FCS might have been a stretch... What we have to pray for here is that Littrell/Harrell can actually entice a legitimate FBS Qb talent from a Texas HS to come here, as well as more FBS Grad Transfers, which is probably the short-term fix here until a QB can get developed from HS. The JUCO QBs we have signed have never panned out here as a season-long solution. We really need a Vizza-type talent at QB to believe in Littrell/Harrell and give us a shot--and then not have him get the $hit beat out of him to the point where he decides quitting football altogether is a better alternative than playing one more down here.

You worked for the RV athletic department...I think that pretty much tells everyone all they need to know about you. You take this message board very seriously...that's ALWAYS a great sign of maturity and achievement. I'm sure your life is just full of kick-ass activities, Snowflake...

I don't get into down or up votes, since it really doesn't matter...you know, since it's a website and all...otherwise, it'd be "kinda pathetic" to even care about what others think of your opinions. You telling someone to grow up is just a tad ironic...Ill let you figure out why, although I'm not gonna peg critical thinking as a real strong suit of yours.

Thank God, he's not from some mean suburb...

I agree. We have 5 teams we can realistically compete with on our schedule for actual wins: SMU, Butt Cookman, @Army, @UTSA, and @UTEP. I see us winning one at home (BC) and one on the road (UTSA is my guess). Obviously, we could win more than two, but I think getting above three means Littrell was the best hire we have made since Fry and it will probably cement the fact that he will be coaching somewhere else higher on the foodchain in a few years. BTW, I still will think Littrell will be coaching somewhere else even if we win less than two games this year--because absolutely nobody in the college football world see us winning more than two games with the depth issues of scholarship talent on the roster and the character issue that is being addressed now (hopefully) within the locker room to try and make sure we never have a team quit on the university ever again to the point of allowing us to have another worst loss in modern college football history.

http://collegefootballnews.com/2016/preview-2016-preseason-college-football-rankings http://www.cbssports.com/collegefootball/rankings/cbs/128 http://campusinsiders.com/news/college-football-rankings-predicting-teams-finish-07-11-2016 Looks like most of these look at us winning between 1-2 games this season, because of Butt Cookman and UTSA being on the schedule. I still say that 2-10 would be MAJOR progress from last year, especially when you consider we have a FCS-level of scholarship players around here, with a new coach and an offense that is 180 degrees from what we have run previously. We won one game last year and it took miraculous events to allow us to win that game by a TD at home. A win over BCU is the only game I expect us to win, but I do think we will beat UTSA, too. NO matter what, even if we go 0-12, and I recognize that is very possible, there is nothing that will happen on the scoreboard that will make me lose faith in Seth Littrell as our coach. What he is having to endure as a first-time head coach here is monumental in its difficulty. And he knows that this season is all about instilling in these guys a new way forward, both on the field and in the locker room. And, even more importantly, trying to win over the Texas HS coaches and parents that have looked down on us as a program for so long.

You forgot "blue collar"...

Yeah, don't bring that part up... UConn going to the Big East in basketball would be brilliant for all parties--and they can just do like UMass and be an independent out of the NE. At UConn, both basketball programs make the money for the school. The Big East is really the only non-football power conference. UConn would be very wise to do this. The current Big East looks like this: Creighton, Marquette, DePaul, Xavier, Villanova, Georgetown, St. John's, Seton Hall, Providence, and Butler. UConn and one more program, probably UMass, St. Louis, Dayton, or Richmond would be nice fits...

So? Everybody would bolt if given a chance--and will. The point is that we are currently in a conference that is light years ahead of where we have ever been in 45 years. No matter how unstable things are, its still better than what we have had. Realistically, the Big XII expanding is the only thing that changes anything in the near-term. And nobody knows if they are going to do that or not. The networks don't want expansion at all, making it clear that they don't want any G5 team moving up that they have to pay the conferences for, so they may increase the payout to the 10 teams in the Big XII to NOT expand. If they don't expand, nothing--as in nada--changes for anyone. The AAC stays the same. BYU stays the same. CUSA stays the same. No matter what, the Big XII won't exist for one day longer than the GOR mandates the parties to stay together, as in about 8 years. When that happens, the folks in Austin, Norman, Lawrence, and probably Lubbock, Stillwater, and Morgantown will find Power Conference Homes, probably the Texoma 4 to the Pac, with KU to the B1G, and WVU to the ACC. The other four are probably moving down to the MWC. And when the MWC adds TCU, Baylor, KSU, and ISU, that will be the end of the line for the two conferences that will have teams in its membership that will still be considered FBS. The rest of us, including CUSA, SBC, and the MAC, will be resigned to being lowered down. And unless the AAC or MWC somehow thinks gaining another team in DFW will be worth duplicating their market positions that they will have with TCU and SMU, our place isn't higher up the totem pole. And if that is the case, I'd just assume be in a league that has the setup of CUSA West and SBC Western teams, which will cut down on travel costs and encourage more regional rivalries, which is what the MAC has always enjoyed.

You know, CUSA with Rice, UTSA, UTEP, La Tech, and USM is still light years better than our old SBC days...

You know, its ok to recognize that the powers that be are just too powerful. The NCAA, the Power 5 Conferences and Notre Dame, the national networks and media, and their incredibly powerful alumni that power the board rooms and legislative bodies in the states and in DC that the G5s and FCS don't have and will never have are just too much to defeat. Yes, it sucks, but it also creates opportunity. The G5s can leverage this situation to actually win a national championship in football--not just get a top 10 ranking or a BCS bowl spot for winning all your games. Right now, we have no chance of ever winning a national championship. We serve one purpose to the P5s, as a bodybag opponent. To me, I'd be glad to see the day where the G5s/FCS are on a different, non-competing level than the P5s. As times goes on, our level of play will not serve as an NFL and NBA minor league, but will be actual college kids playing each other. To me, unlike the I-aa debacle, where the king conference for football was in our backyard and we could actually play with and beat them, but basically gave up... Today, the landscape of college football is so overwhelmingly tilted in the big schools' favor for recruits and coaches and that won't change because of the money. I still bet we would get very similar crowds and following if we are a winning program playing against fellow G5s and top-end FCS teams, and making deep runs in competing for a national championship. Hell, we drew 40k to a HoD Bowl game against a spare UNLV team because we were good. And I totally expect that we are gonna get this chance. Because the Big XII's future demise is within 5-10 years of occurring, the final Power Conference schism will be complete. Now, I do bet the top end G5 schools will be given a choice on what they would like to do--continue playing the role of bought opponent, while receiving a bone for a bowl slot against a power champ that isn't in the playoff. I can see a lot of MWC and AAC schools choosing this route, too. But I also see a lot of them not following that delusion and gladly falling back into the G5/FCS level of play that allows for more competition and less money.

One thing we will know for sure, is that if Morris can read a defense at the LOS, can just throw a ball with any zip on it, with any hint of accuracy, and with any hint of being catchable, he will be LIGHT YEARS ahead of the four spares we have rolled out since 2014. Greer wasn't a FBS QB, anywhere, period, nor was McNulty. Neither of those guys would have been in the top 4 of another G5 program's depth chart anywhere else. And both Dajon Williams and Demarcus Smith couldn't get their acts together enough to be able to play at the level needed for a FBS program, for a variety of reasons. What I have liked about Littrell so far is that he IMMEDIATELY upgraded our QB situation...by getting rid of those guys who played here before. Greer was packaged as a FBS QB, but he was severely underprepared for this level. Smith didn't put in enough time at practice or watching film to get better, nor was he someone that could be counted on academically. Morris might suck, as may Shanbour, or Fine...but they won't be worse than what we rolled out last year. But FFR is right--without getting popped by a real FBS starting defense, you just don't know what you have in your QB. Dickey certainly over did it, ruining Meager back in 2005 was the worst example of this because he could have been a good QB with better coaching. But his QBs, especially Hall and Andrew Smith, were freaking tough as nails. When Dodge got here and allowed his QBs to be untouched by his really woeful defenses at practice, that led to Giovanni Vizza getting beaten to a pulp, both mentally and physically, by opposing defenses until he ran off and quit football after just two years of college ball.

That would be awesome...

Let's paint a picture: A person with several bankruptcies, no job, and deep in debt...yet he walks into the bank and declares he wants a mansion, you know, just because... imagine how that would go in the bank lobby--now you've got an idea of what this thread looks like to the folks outside of gmg's homers...

If UH gets moved up to the Big XII--terrible move by the Big XII--Rice will be your AAC replacement, in a heartbeat. They replace Houston, plus they have the backing of their fellow privates in SMU, Tulane, and Tulsa. CUSA replaces Rice with ULL...

The low expectations are well earned here. You can't have 5 winning seasons in 25 years, with a history of keeping a lazy AD around for 15 years, and having a history (until recently) of complete apathy, and think that expectations are going to jump real quick. Hell, after 2013, our best team in years, our fanbase was so excited to watch us follow up our HoD Bowl win that we saw season tickets and attendance DROP for 2014. You cannot raise expectations from the fans until you win consistently. And you cannot win consistently until you combine solid coaching with much improved recruiting. Right now, there aren't nearly enough Texas HS recruits that want to come here when they have other offers. Only winning can fix this...and that has only happened here in the 70s under Fry and the early 00s under Dickey.

Speaking of tickets, I wonder what the average attendance will be this year? We get SMU, Butt Cookman, MUTS, Marshall, La Tech, and Southern Miss, at home. Surely, especially with SMU coming to Denton and the way Denton-ites show up for former SWC teams, the average attendance should be above the 13k we averaged last season. It will also help out immensely that there is no home game on the weekend after Thanksgiving... I'll go with 17k...

Homers are gonna homer...

Listening to the Hardline right now and they are talking about how awful a choice for the Big XII that Houston would be...all for the reason I listed above. The Big XII has two choices that will help them--BYU and Cincy. Everyone else takes away from their members in some form. As for the B1G, they are giant state schools, except for Northwestern. You may not care about Iowa playing Minnesota here in Texas, but they sure do in the Midwest. The SEC and the B1G matter the most because of viewers, both in person and on TV. The ACC, Big XII, and Pac-12 don't have the interest from their fanbases like the other two do. SO when you compare the Big XII to the ACC and the Pac-12, the problem always comes back to being a lack of eyeballs outside of Texas. The Pac-12 has LA, SF, Portland, Seattle, Phoenix, Denver, and Salt Lake City. The ACC has Boston, Pittsburgh, Washington DC, Charlotte, Raleigh/Durham, Atlanta, Jacksonville, Tampa, and Miami. Both of those carry a lot of eyeballs that the Big XII cannot offer outside of Texas--Kansas City is the biggest market outside of Texas. Otherwise, its Tulsa, Oklahoma City, Wichita, and Des Moines. The Pac-12 will need to get their network going at a higher rate than it currently runs, which will require expansion eastward. The easiest solution, politically, for the Pac-12 is to add 4 schools from the Big 12. It could be the Texoma 4 or it could be Texas, OU, KU, and Iowa State. No matter what, the LHN killed the future of the Big XII because it created an unfair advantage for Texas. So whatever the Big XII does to expand in the near future is really just lipstick on a dead body. There is no way it can continue to exist. And when that happens, the MWC and AAC will be there to take up those leftovers (TCU, Baylor, Kansas State, Texas Tech, and Iowa State are all potential leftovers).

I think that at this point, UNT just has to prove they can be a winning program more than once in a blue moon. When you realize that we have had exactly 5 winning seasons in the last 25 years, it's very easy to believe it just can't happen here. If Littrell can't turn this around, the rest of the CFB world isn't going to hold it against him because outside of this website, nobody believes you can win here. But if Littrell does turn us into a winner in the next three years, he's going to be hailed as a miracle worker. He's got a FCS roster, with very little size and talent. To build this up is going to take a huge upgrade of talent. And that talent has to get developed in the years ahead. It's why a <2 win season won't tell us anything about Littrell as a head coach, just like it didn't tell us anything about Chad Morris at SMU last year as a head coach. I think people on this site don't want to admit just how much of a crater we are in from the McCarney regime. You cannot go 4 years with terrible recruiting that now leaves us with less than 70 scholarships. A category 5 hurricane decimated this place on Homecoming last year. You cannot endure something like that and expect to be able to bounce right back up. It's gonna take years (at least three) to get a winner around here.

Except for 2013, average in the SBCUSA would be a dream...

Sure, they are our rival. But, it's not a true rivalry because we have only recently played them again. SMU can and will end the series when it provides no value to them. And value to them is winning games to bolster their record. When that becomes jeopardized, they will bolt because of their cash. Losing to us caused them to get rid of their coach after the 2nd game of the season. Now, with Morris there, they aspire to becoming a winner again. If they lose to us, it evens the field. When they don't play us, it slants back to their advantage because of their history, name, and money. If they do become a winner, they will dodge us again for awhile, just to avoid losing to us. ive said it before and I'll say it again. SMU only plays us when they are really bad and need a win over a program that can show their rich fans that they can beat someone they've heard of before. See 1989, 1990, and 1992. See 2006-2007. And think of where they are right now after the last two seasons. This series was always meant to be a 4 gamer to them, while are fanbase thought it was definitely going to be 12 years straight. That's not how SMU works with UNT--never has been, never will be.

If SMU cancels the series, after 2017, then it could be the very best thing for us. A real AD can bring in an OOC game in Denton against a FBS team ranked above 100.

Because TV and eyeballs matter and the Big XII has about three schools that anyone cares about nationally--UT, OU, and KU basketball. TCU and Baylor don't bring the eyeballs. Tech, OSU, KSU, and ISU are all looked at like they are stepchildren of their big brothers. WVU is kind of a national name, but don't bring many eyeballs either. The SEC and the Big Ten blow them out in eyeballs that follow their schools. The PAC and the ACC both have more populated areas to pull in viewership from than the Heartland schools and West Virginia... A conference built on one school being the CEO (UT), a CFO (OU), and a COO (KU) who all make way more money than the bottom serfs is one that won't last.

The single best thing SMU could do for us is to stop this series and allow our new AD to actually attempt to schedule someone that might be ranked above 100 at some point in a preseason poll. Let SMU go...they don't want to play us anyway, unless it helps them. Right now, they need the wins, but if they become a winner this year or next, they will drop us in a heartbeat. And that would be the chance for an improving Littrell team to actually schedule and beat a team at home that would bring some much needed attention to the program