untjim1995

Except for TCU, nobody else in that conference has ever been known for defense in the last decade...but Patterson is a freaking wizard.

You know, as I read this post, it really made sense to me...but for this to happen, Littrell and company will have to do what nobody before him has been able to do with any consistency in 21 years as a FBS program. Dickey got some talent here in that one class and Dodge got some offensive skill talent because of his HS reputation, but overall, La Tech has run circles around us for a long time. Not saying Littrell can't do it, but he's got his work cut out for him.

Lifer, from 1989 going forward, we played one money game a year. That was Steve Sloan's time as the AD, IIRC. In 1989, we played KSU, 1990, we played at A&M. In 1991, we played at OU. In 1992, we played at UT. In 1993, we played at Nebraska. In 1994, we played at Oklahoma State. Before Sloan left, he had realized that the way to making more money was to go up to I-A. Helwig figured out fairly quickly that playing multiple bodybag games, as well as 2 for 1 or 3 for 2 series at Texas Stadium with A&M and Tech would still provide net $$$ to us. In 1995, our first year as a FBS program, granted we were independent, but we played this schedule on the road with no return game: @Mizzou, @ OU, @ LSU, @Alabama, @ Louisville In 1996, our first in the Big West, we played @ A&M and @ Arizona State. In 1998, we played @OU and @Arizona State, as well as the last game at A&M. In 1999, we played @LSU. @ Tech (2nd of three visits to Lubbock), @ TCU (first of a 2 for 1) In 2000, we played @Tech (last of the trips to Lubbock), @Kansas State By 2001, Helwig was finished as the AD, even though his series were still to be played.

Basically, the NCAA did lower us because we couldn't/wouldn't meet the demands for stadium size that they required. But we chose to stay down there because it cost less for 12 years. Instead of taking advantage of Texas Stadium or the Cotton Bowl to play at for a season so that we could expand or destroy Fouts, we chose to just let the program rot. Only when it became clear that going back up to I-A would allow our budgets to get infused with cash from being a bought opponent in football as a bodybag did we decide to move up by putting 10,500 aluminum seats onto the end zones at Fouts, seats that were easily the worst you could ever sit in for a football game, if only because you were about a mile away from the field due to our track being around the football field.

I hope you're right...and I do think Littrell's gotta better pedigree than Dodge had, and that isn't even talking about he chasm in experience that his staff has over Dodge's coaching staff in his first few years. But those scars are still fresh, man...

So exactly how is it good for UNT that Kansas or Iowa State or Colorado can come down to DFW and run these camps and get in with the HS coaches and recruits? Because I don't see one damn thing good about it for us. We should already be talking to kids and HS coaches in East Texas, South Texas, and West Texas.

Absolutely. I look at TCU and I look at how completely different they recruit. Patterson sees RBs in a small East Texas HS and can see them becoming an All-American Defensive Lineman. They recruit for defense first, unlike every other program in the state. But that just speaks of Gary Patterson's greatness and TCU's commitment to excellence beyond just having a lot of cash. As for offense, this spread stuff is what the kids and the majority of HS coaches like in Texas, which is why every offense in FBS in Texas runs some form of it. But if you don't have a decent line, as we saw with Dodge, the QBs can get the $hit beat out them and the offense tends to bog down in the red zone because the offense cannot run under the center very effectively (or at all). I'll always believe in building your lines up first, then setting up an offense that maximizes your talent. I'm not a big fan of setting up an offense and then finding pieces to try and fit into it as your top priority, but that may have more to do with the shellackings that we endured in the Dodge years, too. Its why McCarney crashing so hard was so disappointing. I actually thought his specialty of developing linemen would be huge here, especially on defense. But not only did he fail on recruiting, he even failed worse at developing solid line play on both sides of the ball in his last two years here. Add that to the QB situation he chose to stick with and it equaled pure suckage. And now, we start completely over, in a gigantic hole, with a brand new coach running an offense that we watched in 2007-2010 and allowed us to see a grand total of 8 wins and 40 losses.

McCarney's views on Qbs were his own fault, for sure. But even if he wanted better throwing QBs who were undersized, they were never coming here to play in an offense that Knute Rockne would have felt was too conservative. What frustrated McCarney to now end, however, was that his staff couldn't get recruits to come here "just because"...he literally believed that kids in DFW and in the area would come here like they did at USF when he coached and recruited there. He truly felt this was gonna be just like that. When he realized after the HoD Bowl that the kids that were here already and had stayed after Dodge left were here because of Dodge's system and reputation in HS circles, it caused him to basically go crazy. Ironically, his last class was not bad, but the classes before were just unacceptable for a school in the middle of Texas. But UNT's inherent issues with apathy and losing were hurdles that his staff couldn't jump over. Maybe Littrell and his staff will be able to jump over them, but those hurdles have only gotten taller since Mac left, leaving us in a hole MUCH deeper than what he inherited, as well as the one Dodge took over from Dickey. Its gonna take years for Littrell to get us out of here...and he may not be able to do it. It could very well be that Littrell doesn't turn us into a winner, but gets us into a place where another coach will be in better shape to take over the roster than the colossal hole Littrell has inherited.

Or an OLine that can keep said QBs healthy...

Idaho had no choice. And their FCS Big Sky affiliation is a solid one, with other regional rivals they have known for decades, which will help them with attendance and fan travel. They are actually in better shape doing this than NMSU will be, with no FCS teams anywhere near them. NMSU might be better off just dropping football if they cannot get into a FBS league, which only happens as a remote chance if UTEP leaves to go to the MWC and CUSA decided to replace them with NMSU, which seems doubtful. I will say this--I think the Big Sky, SLC, and a few other FCS leagues will see themselves joining the MAC, SBC, and CUSA in the years ahead when the next pruning of FBS occurs in the next 10 years. You'll see the Power 4 (no more Big XII) plus the AAC and MWC considered as FBS, with the Power 4 getting the playoff, but keeping the next level of schools still having a possibility of joining into the Big Bowls or even a playoff spot (highly, highly doubtful, though). That way, Boise, Fresno, UH, Cincy, and any Big XII castoff will still be sold that they can still play OOC games against the power schools and can have a chance at earning a place within the playoff system.

This may have been the kid that chose Tech over Central Arkansas a couple of years ago at his recruiting announcement...I'm serious, this actually happened.

FIFY

How many attended the Spring Game? I haven't seen any numbers on that...

He would be an awesome get for Littrell and co...

Give Brett Vito a break on the QB stuff. If you had to cover teams that were coached by Darrell Dickey, Todd Dodge, and Dan McCarney day in and day out, you'd come to believe that the QB position at North Texas was about as inconsequential as a typewriter at the DRC. Yes, he has seen a few games where the QB play has been very good, but he has seen 10x those games where the UNT QB looked worse than what Ryan HS or Guyer HS roll out on Friday nights, particularly anyone not named Scott Hall or Derek Thompson that played QB under Dickey or Mac. Those days of having the busdriver du jour must have been painful to watch as a beat writer, covering it everyday. Because its been absolutely brutal to watch as a fan who sees it every week in the fall... Watching Josh Greer or Andrew McNulty play QB was like watching a child trying to learn how to ride a brand new bike...but not ever being able to figure it out. You'd just as soon have seen the brand new bike being used by someone who knew what they were doing, as opposed to watching the crashes happen over and over, knowing full well it was just getting worse and worse for the bike and for your investment in that purchase. Now imagine having to report on that experience for years, with nothing ever getting better for any real amount of time beyond a game or two...that would drive anyone crazy!!

People always love the backup QB. He did good against our defensive backups...which means these guys cannot break in past the starters on a unit that has been just terrible and has no size or speed. Trust me, Shanbour will play in 2016, but its gonna be due to Morris getting killed. Except for Butt Cookman, we will not play one defensive unit that is less talented than ours is.

Talking about dumb, the game in 2008 at Rice, in non-conference, was the absolute worst. I truly believed we might be able to hang with an in-state non-P5 school, even at their place. Instead, we found ourselves losing 77-20 in the 3rd quarter. Only because Rice's coach called off the dogs in the 4th quarter did we not see Rice score over 100, which they easily could have that day. And BTW, yes, our offense was exactly the same that day as it was in the shellackings you mentioned above, but without the paycheck. Its yet to be seen if Littrell's spread offense will look like Dodge's, but I fear that they will definitely rhyme...

Always... We've been trying to tell everyone that this year isn't going to be about wins on the field. We can very easily go 1-11 again, probably will be within a game of that on either side, especially if we cannot beat Butt Cookman at home, which will be the only team we face this year as a favorite. 2016 is all about wins off the field--winning over FBS recruits that are actually being recruited by other FBS schools, winning over the roster in the locker room to keep working to get stronger and more comfortable with the system that Littrell has put in place, and by winning over Texas HS coaches to actually consider recommending UNT as a place that would be a good home for their players as anything but a safety net school. If we go 1-11, but our recruiting is ranked above 90th overall, by next February, then 2016 will have been a huge success. We need a culture change within our locker room and we need a huge upgrade in talent coming into the program. If we don't get the last part, even a culture change within the team won't be enough to make Littrell turn this into a winner anytime soon. Basically, we are exactly in the same spot that SMU was a year ago, when they beat us and Tulane, but also lost to an FCS team at home that was better than we were in James Madison. Only once, against Tulsa, did SMU lose by less than 10 points. Every other loss was between 19 and 63 points. But their recruiting has jumped up and they have changed the culture over there to actually believe they will be good soon. Morris came from Clemson as an offensive minded coach, just like Littrell has from UNC. And if Morris can turn things around at SMU and get them to a bowl game in the next year or two, after taking over the absolute worst FBS program in the country, he will be headed to greener pastures somewhere in the P5 world. Sound familiar?

UNC was also ahead in most of their games last year. Those 4th quarter snaps were usually running plays. Littrell's offense will resemble Leach's offense. He always had one guy who could take handoffs in the backfield next to the QBs or go out into the flat and catch a dropoff and turn it into a big play. But those Tech teams threw the ball A LOT...

I agree. We got rid of QBs who proved they couldn't play at this level, Maybe Morris and Shanbour will prove the same, but we don't know. We do know that Connor Means couldn't beat out any of the two worst QBs I have ever seen in a UNT game, Greer and McNulty, or Damarcus Smith, who wasn't very good, either, but mostly because he didn't put in the work necessary to be good despite having the physical tools to be a decent QB. Morris and Shanbour, with this offensive scheme, should move the sticks. But to not fear the real possibility of an injury to either of them, with this style of play and an OL that is having to learn this scheme now, is just burying your head in the sand. We just gotta pray that they stay healthy and can move the ball for points. Otherwise, its very, very possible that a duplication of Dodge's first few years could be a reality. Better coaches with more experience should help, but we have very little talent and size. Without either of them, its gonna be a hard season to watch, especially if the QBs get Vizza'd over and over.

This is where things are headed here. Its just a matter of when. It might not be for another 5-10 years, but its gonna happen here because of that fee being on the back of the students. We barely kept the football program alive in the early 70s, with a student body vote that barely passed--and at a time when the students didn't have to pay much in athletics fees compared to today. We were gonna drop the football program in the early 80s, but the I-aa safety net kept the powers at be content with allowing us to play there for 12 freaking years. Only when it became clear that you could make more money for the program by whoring yourself out as a low-level I-A program did we figure out a way to get the program up to the level we are today. And we only have that brand new stadium because of the fee that stealthily got passed onto students who are now in school. That fee has a small shelf life, IMO. We don't like athletics here, as an institution. Never have, never will. It costs too much and it gives away too much power to hundreds or thousands of donors who usually have higher expectations based on accomplishment. Not here, though. We like music, arts, education, and large enrollments. We would die, as an institutional, based on the majority of our leaders, faculty, and students, to be considered in the same academic profile as UT-D. It is what it is. And its why less than 2% of the UNT Family gives one rip about our teams. Institutionally, for decades, we have just made it uncool to be a diehard UNT fan. That's why home games on Texas/OU weekend cause so much trouble here or other major sports going on around here during football season. We have about 5000 that are diehard fans, which is awesome when you compare it to the 1000 we had about 20 years ago, but its very telling when the university has moved up to D-1 21 years ago and seen enrollment jump up from around 27k to 36k, as well as the local population jump up by tens of thousands in Denton alone. The old line that you can't beat City Hall could easily by replaced here with the fact that you can't be the UNT Administrative Building as UNT sports fans.

Congrats...when are y'all gonna have the parade for leaping over that gigantic hurdle of being better at football than us?

I don't see how...two seems as high as I can see us achieving. Butt Cookman, most likely, and maybe an upset at UTSA.

True

OU is gonna truck you guys...