untjim1995

If we had even 1/3rd of UNTs alumni that wanted to watch UNT football instead of UT football, we would have a stadium that seats about 45k right now. I think we have about half of that 1/3rd figure that actually is interested in UNT football and even that might be too generous.

Everything you posted is spot-on, except for two points: 1.) We aren't gonna have a choice--neither will most programs that are non-AQ right now. The Big Five will either have the NCAA do it or they will do it on their own, but they will determine who will be able to split the revenue pie that will come from all of this. 2.) Our size is only a huge advantage if we look at enrollment, but those numbers of people who attend games, buy season tickets, and also donate anything to the school is woefully below those other peers with larege enrollments. The comparison to look at is endowment funds and also to look at attendance and ticket revenues from athletics. Those are your peers. Its a tough pill just because all of the recent progress at UNT with the football program is impressive enough, but it just came too late. Even with all of the improvements in facilities, coaching salaries, and conference affiliation, they all happened anywhere from a decade to three decades to late. I think if we had what we have today, even ten years earlier, we might just be able to make a case for ourselves. We probably would have already been in either the old CUSA or the MWC. If that was the case, we would have had a stronger chance to get included in a separation. As it is, it just doesn't appear that any current CUSA, SBC, or MAC school will get much support on this, either, just as probably half of the schools in the MWC or AAC won't. I hate the idea of never playing at the highest level of college football or basketball in the future, but there's really not much we can do about it now. If they separate, then we have to make the best of it. Back in 1982, we dropped down and played teams that no one heard of or cared about, while everyone else around us that most fans did know either still played at the top level (all SWC schools and UTEP) or they just quit (UTA and Lamar). Maybe it wouldn't be as bad this time around, especially if you had more regionally recognizable opponents in your conference. Its nowhere close to what anyone wants, but it just appears that we all had better come to grips with what lies in front of us. 2.)

Those Tech wins were nice for our program in the 90s, but they weren't against a bowl team. Those were Spike Dykes teams, nothing like what Leach eventually built in the mid-to-late 00's. But they were HUGE upsets on every level--betting spread, conference affiliation, media attention--it was all there for UNT. But we neve capitalized on either of them. In 1999, in what has to eb one of the craziest tidbits in UNT history, our two wins were at Texas Tech and a home win over 9-2 Big West Champion Boise State. We lost to everyone else... The type of game you are really wanting to look at in UNT history is the one that is most famous--beating top ten Tennessee on the road. NOthing we have done is on par with that kind of win since then, even the bowl win over Cincy, who was pretty damn good, by the way. A freind of mine who is a sports media member in DFW has always told me that UNT has to do two things in the same year to draw any kind of media and fan attention away fromt he usual suspects in this area--win their conference AND beat someone of note on their schedule from an AQ league that is ranked. Whether it was K-State or LSU last year, UH or Alabama the year before, Clemson in 2011, the games against Texas, OKlahoma, Arkansas, etc...from the past bodybag beatings, we have to either beat them or come ridiculously close AND then win CUSA. Nothing less than both of those will not move the meter on UNT getting decent media coverage here or hopefully seeing the fanbase come out from under the rocks that it has supposedly been hiding behind all of this time.

I was listening to Jack Arute today on the College Sports Radio via Sirius and he just sounded so giddy at the thought of the Big Five moving on. The Big Media is on board here--ESPN and Fox want this to happen, in my opinion, as do most of theose who cover the sport. I think the Big Five split will essentially work itself out to where they won't play anyone outside of their group as soon as future scheduled non-AQ games can be bought out or played. I think they will introduce a playoff system for 8 teams to start that will include the BCS Bowl Games. Then, your Cotton Bowl, the Chick-Fil-A Bowl, etc...will be Power Five Bowls still. It won't hurt the BIg Five programs so much to schedule better in OOC, since a loss early on, wouldn't knock you out of the playoff picture. Therefore, a team like Texas could actually be able to play LSU in OOC without it hurting them, unlike now. Instead of trying to get a BCS Bowl spot, the goal is to get a playoff berth, probably for their conference champions and the other 3-4 teams that finished second in their conference. What I think we be really interesting is to see who the non-AQs who don't get moved up will do for a playoff system. I'm completely onboard with the FCS playoff system over, since it crowns a legitimate champion. Not that the New Orleans Bowl hasn't been fun, but it doesn't really have a future, in my opinion, if the future is playoff oriented. I guess we will see

Not nearly enough...

Both of those teams are well-known for what most univerisites in the state are well-knonw for--having front-runner fanbases. Its funny how far Tech has fallen back from its glory days under Leach--couldn't happen to a better bunch, either. As for SMU, well, even as they have improved under June Jones quite dramatically, to most people in Dallas and the rest of Texas, they are always going to be the team that cheated incessantly and then got left behind when the SWC disbanded. Hard to draw crowds in Dallas, TX when you don't really matter anymore...

Like they didn't do the last time we had a huge division shift in college football, in the early 80s? Congress isn't going to stop this--hell, they will probably encourage it, just to help their big schools in their individual states.

I was there--soaked from the top of my head all the way down to my toes. Can't believe we lost that game still. I remember Riley getting hurt (shocker) and that Tune came in and was asked to make a long throw on 3rd down that got pick-sixed. Then, we come back and have to settle for a FG to go to OT and then figure out every single way to blow that game. That season was so amazingly frustrating--lost so many games that were very winnable (Ohio, FAU, Army, and others). But, in the long run, if we had won even two other games that year, I could've seen RV giving Todd Dodge an extension--thank about that for a second...

Those schools usually have a bad time, historically, anyway. They will be gladly take the $$$ over wins every day of the week, just as they have all done for their entire history. OTOH, they might see a nice pickup in recruiting, as they can tell a kid that they can play at the top level, while they can't if they go to Memphis or Charlotte.

In 2010,Chico had an offense that was geared toward being wide-open from Dodge. That's all they were developed to do for the entirety of Dodge's tenure. He had Lance Dunbar. He had Riley Dodge as the QB, who only knew how to run that offense. And he had receivers that could make plays. Last year, Chico ran an offense that had no receivers worth a hill of beans, a QB that was very subpar, in my opinion, and an Oline and group of running backs that were the strength of the team. I don't blame them for not trying to throw the ball in games with DT. He threw a ball almost into the stands against Troy with the game on the line. He threw an absolute killer of an interception at WKU that led to a loss. He was beyond bad against South Alabama. You can blame that all on Coach Mac, but I'm willing to give him a pass since it was just the 2nd year of this rebuild. Now that we are in Year 3 of Coach Mac, that excuse is gone for me, but I was willing to give him some rope last season. If DT doesn't throw that INT at WKU, we finish 5-7 and everyone feels better about not taking a step back from Year 1 to Year 2. By the way, that step back didn't surprise me at all--I knew that our last season in the SBC was going to be tough, just because we weren't going to get many calls to go our way in conference games. Plus, I'm still absolutely shocked we won 5 games in his first year with the leftovers he inherited from Dodge--basically Dunbar and a few other decent pieces, but absolutely no size whatsoever on either line. I realistically expected us to win about 2-3 games that first year. I highly doubt that DT will be the QB for the full season anyways--he had no choice last year, where he will this upcoming season. Both of them will have receivers that should be better than last year's squad, so that should help open things up. I don't think DT has what it takes to be a QB that can make you a winner, so the sooner he can pass the reins to Berglund, the better off I will feel about the future. If BB is a bust and cannot beat out DT, then this thing is just gonna suck for the next few years and we will end up with a new coach in 2015.

I can't believe I'm gonna post this, but Cougar King is right. UH is in good shape for being included in a future new FBS Division because of their market, size, tradition, and results. I think the teams you listed (except SMU) all have a great shot to be included in that new division. I do disagree about your independence stance. If you get left behind, it will make even more sense not to be independent, because cost and revenue sharing will matter even more when you won't have the stature of being included in the new FBS. I think that some schools, like Tulane, Rice, and SMU might just say that they would rather not have a program if that can't play at that FBS highest level. I could see them drop to Division III if they still want football around. All of this is why Utah and TCU were the absolute biggest winners in conference realignment. They got moved up to the Big Boys Table and get a headstart over the other non-AQs in figuring out a way to stay at the top FBS level. I actually think the MWC/AAC upper echelon of teams might get included, too, just to show that the Big Five aren't colluding for themselves only. I'd expect Boise State, BYU, SDSU, Fresno State, Colorado State, UNLV, Nevada, AFA, Navy, UH, UCF, USF, ECU, UConn, and Cincinnati to be the 15 that get strong consideration to be FBS when this split occurs. If all of those teams get included, you would have 80 teams that are included at that highest level, but that seems higher than I'd expect that level to get to. I would think 72 is the round number that would make sense--6 conferences of 12, or 4 conferences of 18. If 72 is the correct number, that would leave 52 of us behind. Add in some of the bigger FCS schools, and I'm certain you'd see a new division of i-aa that would also be around 72. NOt what any of us really want, but it is what it is.

NO kidding--some of those games in his last two years were so boring, I thought about falling asleep. Talk about give-up. 3rd down and 8 = draw play...

Well, after reading this link, it doesn't appear that my last hope for change is gonna happen at ESPN. http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/9499740/is-college-football-big-five-conferences-split-ncaa

There will never be another death penalty issued again for an AQ program. SMU's death penalty changed the game after seeing the results that SMU endured afterwards. Not saying they didn't deserve it, but there is no way the NCAA is going to let Miami or any other program that is a big name fall that far again. College football is a great sport. But everything that surrounds it, directs it, supervises it, broadcasts it, and covers it really, really, really sucks...

Problem with that is that most state legislatures, congress, and lots of members of the judicial branches are graduates or highly connected to those Big 5 schools. Think about here in Texas--obvioulsy, UT and A&M are the truest power brokers, with all their PUF money. They are both so protected that even the next layer of college powers (i.e Tech, Baylor, and TCU) just try to leach off the big two the most they are allowed to. Tech, UH, UNT, and Texas State all rightfully deserve some of that PUF money. It was setup for higher public education . Just because they were only two school systems around at the time the PUF was started doesn't make it ok that they are the only ones who share all of that wealth. But that PUF money never goes away from those two achools--because they have so much power in Austin and across the state. This same setup is what ECU faces in North Carolina or what FAU/FIU face in Florida. Heck, Arkansas State is the only other FBS school in that state besides Arky and they never even play each other in anything. La Tech, ULL, and ULM will gladly tell you all day long who has control of their state (LSU). Most non-AQs in these states are just way behind the 8-ball when it comes to power, both in $$$ and in legislatures. To me, the only chance you have is to somehow get in front of the college football media and convince them to do your bidding for you. The power of media coverage is very persuasive. Make your college football story comparable to the NCAA Tournament's Cinderella story. Maybe that gets enough media sway to take on this issue. But, again, most of the college football media only follow the AQs, so I'm not sure how feasible it is to get them to carry our water for us.

I voted 5-7. I think we have two wins for sure over Idaho and UTSA. Then we will get 3 other wins over the rest of the schedule. I see probable losses against Rice, Tulsa, Ohio, and Ball State, as well as the sure loss at Georgia. That leaves @ Tulane, @ La Tech, @ Southern Miss, home to MUTS, and home to UTEP. I think we will win the home games and win one of the road games, most likely Tulane. Remember this about Tulane and Tulsa--they both are leaving the conference after this year. Just as we saw last year in the SBC, and all other teams have seen when they leave their conferences to go somewhere else, the breaks don't really seem to get "called" your way very often. I doubt many 50/50 calls in CUSA conference play will go Tulane, Tulsa, or ECUs way this fall. Same thing will happen for Western Kentucky in SBC play, too.

As I have said for a while, if Coach Mac can't turn this around here, no one can. His fire and his spirit are contagious and you have to be that kind of guy to make something work here in Denton. His experience in building a program and making a connection with the community and fanbase are well known. This story is just another great example of who we are blessed with as a leader. You might say that Todd Dodge or Darrell Dickey did stuff like this too, but we rarely heard of any decent interactions between those two--especially Dickey and his MFer comments about the fans--and the fanbase. Coach Mac is facing a huge mountain here and he isn't even halfway up, but the reality is that he is trying to build it up the right way. His recruiting of HS kids has not been good, but that is more institutional, in my opinion. Texas High School coaches and their parents need to see UNT win--becasue they will continue to see and hear Coach Mac be the kind of man that they would want their kids to be under. I'll tell you this--I'll take Coach Mac's personality and drive over a lot of other coaches around this state and region. In the end, and he knows this better than any of us, it will come down to wins and losses ONLY, but he's got this thing at least turned in the right direction. Whether he can get it moving further up the mountain is yet to be seen, but I like our chances with Coach Mac a heckuva lot more than any coach we have had here since Corky Nelson.

Gray Eagle--I'm sorry your sarcasm wasn't sensed by the three people who gave you a minus. I'll bump you up for a great reply!! Love sarcasm that goes over lots of heads...

Look, the Big Five Conferences are gonna get their way here. Heck, when its all said and done, you'll probably have about 70 schools that will get their own Super Level within the NCAA. The NCAA cannot afford to lose them, they already know this. Plus, its not just football they lose here. The NCAA Tournament certainly loses a lot of interest, as does the College World Series, too, if the NCAA loses the Big Five in Football and the Big Six (surely the new Big East will be with the other AQs) in hoops. The NCAA knows that the networks are going to salivate all over themselves to broadcast all of their games, whether they are in the NCAA or not. Plus, those AQs know that the lawsuit being brought on by the players is creating a lot of grumbling. Helping to show a way that players can be paid going forward will be used a peace offering. This could be a nice bargaining tool for settlements. I am at the point of it not even bothering me anymore. I don't want to play NFL-lite factories on their terms only anymore. We don't have a budget that even comes close to the Longhorns or the Aggies. Hell, even Tech, Baylor, and TCU are way ahead of us and I'm not even sure the last two teams are guaranteed to make the cut when the AQs separate from the rest of us. We decided long ago to not put enough interest or capital toward college athletics, so our bed is made to lie in with most of the other CUSA, SBC, MAC, AAC, and MWC schools. We will still have a great stadium to host games against SMU, UTEP, Rice, UTSA, Texas State, Tulsa, La Tech, Tulane, etc...but it just won't be as a "1-A" team. It truly won't surprise me to see the small private schools quit football, but we will see how it goes. I think the regional conference we have dreamed of has a very good chance of getting even closer in the near future--it just won't be as a FBS or 1-A level. A lot of folks are going to feel crushed at these other schools--here at UNT, we know all to well how this realignment feels. Only this time, it would actually be with teams that people have known about and followed for generations. Its not anywhere close to what I hoped would happen to us when we moved back up in 1995 to 1-A, but I'm afraid we just didn't accomplish enough to make a difference in this race.

I totally agree, Emmitt. But RV isn't going anywhere with his new extension. There are only two groups that will be gone after a UTSA loss--fans and/or coaches. If that preceding sentnece ends in "and coaches", then you may not kill the fanbase that has remarkably grown during the last 8 years of suckitude. If it doesn't involve "and coaches" after something as catastrophic as losing to UTSA at home in its third year of existence, I really don't care who else leaves--at that point, I'd be gone...

I think that getting an AQ here from the SEC, Big XII, or the B1G will be almost impossible if they keep scheduling 9 games a year and Jerry World continues to host big games in the DFW Metroplex. Trust me, I never wanted to give RV a pass. I already think the strong majority of UNT fans think he is genius just because he allowed tailgating. To me, that really says more about the idiocy of the ADs before them that didn't allow this, but that's how low of a bar RV has to clear with most of this fanbase. I've already been on record that RV is the worst AD I've personally ever seen at any college at hiring coaches in the money sports, mostly because other ADs who made poor hires like his never got much of a chance to make further hires. But not here... All that said, if Northern Illinois has to lose a "home" game against Nebraska in Chicago, but they still play 4 times in Lincoln within 8 years is just amazing to me. Northern Illinois has accomplished quite a bit over the last 10 years. It wouldn't seem that they couldn't get a home game against a Nebraska program that is certainly down from its heyday. But the 9 conference games leaves you with 3 OOC games and if you figure the B1G teams play a Pac-12 team every year for one of those 3 OOC games, those B1G teams aren't going to give up a home OOC game when they can make so much money buying North Texas for a game--see Iowa. Just hate admitting it, but it says a lot about why we couldn't get them here for a return game. RV still needs to call the Pac-12 schools, the ACC schools, and the MWC schools for home-and-home series, but I am willing to give him a pass on the Iowa games. Sorry RV...

Rice is very interesting. They are small, but very well-respected because of their academics. They have money, too, but not sure they care about athletics enough to really stay at FBS for the long road. Wouldn't surprise me to see Rice disband the program if they ever find themsleves left behind in a future FBS split. The MOB is great, as long as you don't have thin skin. Anyone who drives the idiots at UH crazy must have something going for them. I still believe that our epic beatdown by Rice in 2008 was the absolute lowpoint for this program since we became FBS again. Losing to Rice--old SWC doormat Rice--by a score of 77-20 was just amazing in its UNT ineptitude. What made it worse was that Rice could have EASILY scored 100 points or more if they had wanted. We aren't talking about UT, OU, A&M, Tech, LSU, Bama, Arkansas, TCU, or any other AQ power we have played in the past--we are talking about one of the absolute smallest schools in FBS--them and Tulsa--who both seem to revel in just pouring salt in the wounds they have given to us when we have played. It is worth noting that we did improve enough in two years that we almost beat Rice in Denton two years ago, only to fall short at the end. That's kind of why I feel like that Rice game in 2008 was the low point as a FBS program since 1995. I do remember losing at Nevada my freshman year in 1991 as a 1-aa school 72-0, but they were #1, we had our first failed high school coach in charge, and since it was 1-aa, literally no one cared around here. I did think that was our low point as a 1-aa program, though.

You know, ULM has done ok with their limited resources, but doesn't that hit at the reality of why non-AQs are stuck? They accomplished all of this and managed to get mudholed in their one bowl game that was down the road from them, and that opponent only played there because the other choice refused to play there due to the fact that ULM was there!! Really, that is about as spare as you can get, even if it isn't ULM's fault. That just doesn't scream success to me. I give them credit that they have accomplished more than we have, especially since they have no advantages as a program of location or size, but achieving more than UNT isn't exactly setting the bar high, especially if you look at the last 13 years.

I loved Steve Kragthorpe. That guy was a fun guy to be around and he was very good at offensive gameplans and making QBs believe in themselves. His success at Tulsa never surprised me. His failure at Louisville did. He took over bad leftovers and made them believe that they could accomplish big things at Tulsa. HE also knew that winning games against DFW teams would help turn on a pipeline to Tulsa from the Metroplex. He knew that DFW kids would like to go to a school that was a good academic institution but was farther away from home than TCU, SMU, or UNT. He took much glee in that 54-2 ass-whipping because he knew that it effectively killed UNT's progress, meaning he had one less program to beat out for recruits. He did the same thing with victories over SMU, too. What surprised me at Louisville was how Petrino's leftovers from a BCS Bowl team never jelled under Kragthorpe--probably because both coaches were opposites in personalities, I suspect. I was very much on record as wanting Kragthorpe as our head coach when Dodge got fired, but his health situation obviously would have kept that from ever happening. Fast forward to Dan McCarney. I was on board with his hiring and still am. I think the similarities are there bwtween the two programs, but as TFLF mentioned, Burns was a successful college coordinator before he became head coach at Tulsa. He knew what a college football player should look like, both in size and in spirit. Kragthorpe took over a team full of college football players. Coach Mac took over a team from a high school coach that left him with the smallest lines in the country, and no defensive playmakers on the entire roster. He basically got Lance Dunbar and full roster of FCS or lower level players. I think he has tried to turn this thing around the best he can and I still believe in Coach Mac's ability to do that. This year will tell us a lot, but I suspect that Coach Mac will do enough to get us to 5+ wins this year and get an extension. If we get to 5 wins this year, that means he will have won 14 games in the last 3 years under McCarney--or the equal of the previous 6 years under Dickey, Dodge, and Chico. It will just add an element of stability that we desperately need here under a legitimate college coach that is fan friendly, both of which we haven't seen here at UNT since Fry roamed the sidelines. I want him to succeed badly and his failure at UNT will surprise me, in part, because I truly believe that he if cannot fix this here with his experience as a rebuilder, then it probably can't get fixed by anybody.

I hear your sarcasm very clearly--I'm conservative, too, but I am not so blind to the reality that power is corruptible and can hurt others from being the best they can be. It doesn't mean that you can't overcome those hurdles, but power is tough to fight if you don't have the heart and the desire to fight it. Even then, without power of your own ($$$, people, votes, etc..) the hurdles that can be placed ahead of you by unbridled power, government-wide or otherwise, are too much to overcome. You'll get no argument from me ever that North Texas hasn't shown the care, initiative, or the will to even fight for college football power. Basically, after the SWC told us to pound sand at the thought of ever joining their league in the late 70s, we saw our savior, Hayden Fry, leave, and then we made it very easy for our SWC brethren by just giving up for the next 12 years, if not longer. We made our own bed because the powers that be of the time, in Texas, the SWC, and in Denton, decided we weren't worthy of being a solid college football program. Maybe if we had shown some gumption back then, today would be a much better picture of what north texas should be, but we didn't follow that path. I will say this. Although they are nice programs for non-AQs, Arkansas State and ULM are not success stories. I'm sorry, but very few in the college football world look at either of them and think they are success stories. Both of those schools still take on several $$$ games on the road every year because they have to. That alone means you aren't a success story to most of college football. They think Texas A&M is a success story, that Louisville is a success story. TCU and Utah are looked at as the ultimate success stories because of how they worked to become AQ programs in leagues they could only dream of joining. Arkansas State and ULM do not fit the same definintion because they are SBC schools, who most media and fans in think are just glorified FCS schools, even with their recent wins. Boise State is a totally different success story--a true outlier--but again, they have advantages that other non-AQs don't share, especially ours. They don't share a market with anyone. Not a pro team, not a college team, nothing. With a decent sized town to claim them as their own in a region that has not other team, they have cultivated that advantage. North Texas has one major advantage--its enrollment--that they refuse to even try and take advantage of. Charging half of the athletic fee that stalwarts such as UTSA and Texas State charge is not taking advantage of your advantage. In that regard, you are right in that we won't get off of our dead-ass.