UNT Mean Green

1) Is there a number of wins ultimatum during his stint as interim coach? Yes. 2) If yes to Question 1, then what is that number? and what game(s) does he need to win? I believe he needs to win 2 or 3 games total out of his final 5 to average around .500% (yes he already has 1 under the belt). Taking into account the circumstances of competing with a physically depleted roster, I believe Canales must defeat UL-Monroe on the road (to prove he can win 2 road games in 1 season on the road); be ultra competitive with Troy and Middle Tennessee (and not have silly mistakes), and realistically I'd like to see us play Kansas State in a similar "competitive" way that we did at Clemson for the last game of the season. 3) If no to Question 1, why not? n/a 4) Is there a way or part of the game that you would expect to see managed and/or performed differently under Canales than Todd? There's several aspects: Eliminate the vast majority of the stupid & costly penalties that opposing teams have feasted off of the past few seasons. Improve the kicking game into a sure thing. See an aggressive approach against opponents with superior talent instead of a conservative, just "here to collect the check" type of deal. See more of an emphasis on defense and recruiting "elite" talent on defense (especially lineman). Play the best 22 guys you've got. If that means True Freshman, so be it. Don't hold anything back and try to win every game. 5) Do you feel that Canales can turn the recruiting around, and begin getting more legitimate players like they did and currently do at USF? Absolutely 100% I believe in what they did at USF and how they recruited. I feel Canales truly has the type of personality and charisma to win in the living room, and knows HOW to win in that situation. We have to start recruiting at a higher level; and that takes a staff of guys who know HOW to recruit, and it all begins with the head coach. I do not worry about Canales spending most of his career on the East Coast. We have pretty darn good football in this part of the country as well, and I'd like to see us tap into this market. Unfortunately, we have made mostly a living off of JC kids from the SE and Kansas (credit to Gandy and Leftwich) these past few years, but Houston, Baylor, SMU, etc. are winning a ton of ballgames with a lot of kids from Texas high schools. I also like that Canales comes with connections in the Southeast, where they have athletes everywhere, and only so many of them can play in the SEC. Look at how many NFL players USF has turned out recently. I'd love to see the same thing happen in Denton, and I firmly believe Mike Canales is capable of making that happen because he has been there and done it, and can sell that. 6) IF Canales were named Head Coach after his interim stint, what current assistant coaches would you like to see stay? Which ones would you like to see go? Shelton Gandy to stay for sure. We have to continue to use his connections in the Southeast Junior Colleges and in New Orleans. He's gotten us some really good players, and not to mention with Dunbar, Hamilton, and Byrd coming back, we're pretty loaded at RB. Probably Conroy Hines to stay as well. He seems to know what he's doing. You may keep Chuck Petersen to bridge the gap for a year. The rest of the assistants are fair game I'd think, especially if DeLoach is truly retiring. I'd love to see the next head coach snatch up some guys from truly wining programs (like a Clay Jennings from TCU, etc) with guys he feels like are as good or better of a coach than he is. 7) Do you feel that Canales is a legitimate candidate right now? Yes I do. And I say that because he has a leg up as far as auditioning right in front of Rick Villareal and his senior staff every day. And I've heard it's been "a lot different atmosphere the past 2 weeks" (in a positive way). 8) Million Dollar Question. Do you have the confidence that if Canales performed well the rest of the year (up to your personal standard, whatever that may be) that he would be able to lead the program from 2011 forward as any other potential candidate? Yes. I feel like if you are evaluating current assistants, the level of diverse experience Canales has is as good as you'll find out there. I have the utmost confidence that Rick Villareal will make the correct decision, and the next head coach will build North Texas into a winner, be it Mike Canales or not.

Let me set this straight, that I am not lobbying for one candidate or another and am going to be totally objective through the process of hiring the next head coach, and will fully support Rick and Dr. Rawlins' decision. But I have a question for the fans. What should we expect from Canales for the rest of the year to make him a serious/legitimate candidate? 1) Is there a number of wins ultimatum during his stint as interim coach? 2) If yes to Question 1, then what is that number? and what game(s) does he need to win? 3) If no to Question 1, why not? 4) Is there a way or part of the game that you would expect to see managed and/or performed differently under Canales than Todd? 5) Do you feel that Canales can turn the recruiting around, and begin getting more legitimate players like they did and currently do at USF? 6) IF Canales were named Head Coach after his interim stint, what current assistant coaches would you like to see stay? Which ones would you like to see go? 7) Do you feel that Canales is a legitimate candidate right now? 8) Million Dollar Question. Do you have the confidence that if Canales performed well the rest of the year (up to your personal standard, whatever that may be) that he would be able to lead the program from 2011 forward as any other potential candidat?

Nice article from the NT Daily on Canales. I hope he does well for himself and these players in this "tryout". He seems like a stand up guy all the way.

Mack Brown sucks, and we've known for a long time that Greg Davis sucks. How do you have all that talent and perform the way they do?

what about Dana Dimel? Anyone have any interest in him?

Any idea if Coach Chico will have a radio show today?

You really think anyone at Texas knows how to use running backs? You can't be serious.

and Venables can recruit the region at a much higher level than Dodge's group did. Dodge's best asset was Shelton Gandy, who I think the new regime should take a look at as one who could stay around.

The lineage of Stoops/Bill Synder/Hayden Fry have had a large group of successful coaches. I would not be opposed to Kevin Wilson or Brent Venables at all.

No surprise here. Good job RV. I think we all owe our best wishes to Todd. He has been nothing but a gentleman in this position and he endured some extremely tough circumstances (some of them self-imposed) over the last 3.5 years. I am grateful for the impact he had on some of the players and that he was always looking out for the best interest of the university. Let the speculation begin on who will be the new coach.

At this point, anything is better than Todd Dodge. What I don't like about it is that I feel the players are getting cheated by this level of coaching. There have been so many close losses under Dodge, that it makes you wonder 'what if there was a different coaching regime in there?' I feel like the kids would have quite a few wins actually. That's sad. And supposedly after the game TD just said a prayer with his team and left the locker room without addressing them. Bad, bad, bad...

Would Dana Holgorsen be a good candidate for the Head job here? He's been extremely successful as an offensive coach every stop along the way, and has done extremely well recruiting at Tech, UH, and now OSU. Thoughts??

This is not a knock on Dustin or the team Doctors, but are these athletes getting second opinions? Or are they going to the same doctors who have diagnosed all of these? It may help to get a second opinion and go see a foot specialist somewhere. It's just odd that all of these injuries are being diagnosed and treated as the same rare injury.

There are already architect drawings from HKS for the expansion completed. I'm not claiming they are a working set of drawings, but the following concept has been drawn: Fill in the corners of the end zone. Add a row of suites (15 or so) to the top of the visitors side, and add a deck on top of it. Add 4 suites to the home side on the ends of where the current ones are.

This is just incredible. I can't believe any one program can have this run of injuries and bad luck.

Looks great. It appears that they still have to "frame in" the press level like the suite and club level below it.

This points to how other sports are doing so well at the university. Particularly golf, swimming, and tennis. This is why we HAVE to get the football program going. If the football program begins to win it all takes care of itself.

Couldn't agree more!

Isn't that Adam James standing next to Leach???

He's playing with a cast on his hand. Injured in camp.

SEASON ENDING: QB-Nathan Tune QB-Derek Thompson C-JJ Johnson C-Nick Leppo WR-Benny Jones WR-Chris Bynes FB-Greg Brown TE-Conor Gilmartin-Donahue PENDING: FB-Micah Mosley WR-Breece Johnson WR-Darius Carey DEFENSE: CB-Stephen Ford CB-Chris Neal S-DeWaylon Cook Those are the ones that I'm personally aware of.

This guy's good

we had better step up and get a bona fide coach like SMU did to turn this thing around quickly. I don't think it's far away from turning the corner, but I really don't think Dodge knows how to get his players to win and in turn the players do not know how to win. If we can get someone in the head coaches seat to accomplish that and the wins start coming then all will be better, but we don't have that type of leadership.

There's some Western Kentucky on the lists but no North Texas on some of those kids. Doesn't make any sense. I do agree with TFLF though, you have to think outside of the box in some regards because of your lack of recent success when everyone else in Texas is experiencing some success. Shelton Gandy has done a great job and hopefully Canales can help in the Southeast as well.

No