NT80

Now 2-2: Sam Houston Invitational Tournament Sat, Feb 11 Louisiana Tech at Huntsville, TX 1 pm 7 - 4 (W) STATS Sat, Feb 11 Sam Houston at Huntsville, TX 5:30 pm 1 - 9 (L) STATS Sun, Feb 12 Louisiana Tech at Huntsville, TX 11:15 am 9 - 6 (W) STATS Sun, Feb 12 Sam Houston at Huntsville, TX 1:30 pm 7 - 14 (L) STATS

Sam Houston Invitational Tournament Sat, Feb 11 Louisiana Tech at Huntsville, TX 1 pm 7 - 4 (W) Sat, Feb 11 Sam Houston at Huntsville, TX 5:30 pm 1 - 9 (L)

Article on previous thread about this

SMU football schedule includes Tuesday game 12:15 AM CST on Friday, February 10, 2006 From Staff Reports SMU will open the 2006 football season with a pair of in-state road games, Sept. 2 vs. Texas Tech and Sept. 9 vs. North Texas. The Mustangs will be making their first trip to Denton since 1990. Sam Houston State opens SMU's 6-game home slate on Sept. 16 at Gerald J. Ford Stadium and the Mustangs will have a nationally-televised weeknight home game vs. UAB on Tuesday., Oct. 31. The game – the first of three straight conference games at home – will be shown on ESPN2. It will be the first time since 1999 that SMU will play a weeknight game. SMU opens Conference USA play with back-to-back road games at Tulane (Sept. 30) and UT-El Paso (Oct. 7). The second annual Conference USA championship game will be Dec. 2. 2006 SMU FOOTBALL SCHEDULE Sept. 2: at Texas Tech Sept. 9: at North Texas Sept. 16: Sam Houston Sept. 23: Arkansas State Sept. 30: at Tulane Oct. 7: at UTEP Oct. 14: Marshall Oct. 21: at East Carolina Oct. 31: UAB Nov. 11: Houston Nov. 18: Tulsa Nov. 25: at Rice

So how do we get into CUSA? Do we hope Memphis gets a Big East bid or Rice or Tulane drops football? Is La Tech still our biggest competition for another opening? How about our basketball attendance or lack of baseball hurting our chances? We need a CUSA Plan of Attack (CPA)!

We can argue SBC vs. WAC all day but our real focus should be how do we beg, borrow, or steal an invite to CUSA? That's the conference we need to be in, at least until the Big 12 has another opening!

"good_ken Yesterday, 06:57 PM Post QUOTE WAC vs. Sunbelt can be argued every day but I find that trips to Reno and Fresno are more entertaining than visiting the 1-AA upstarts in the Sunbelt. ......................................................................................................... That has nothing to do with the WAC as a football conference. I would think that some of the Florida 'belt schools would make for a pretty good trip." You commented like we should be talking about the WAC as a football conference, power vs. sightseeing, but then throw in your own fun destinations to go along. I was giving you the power facts for your comparison. Sorry if it wasn't the facts you wanted.

Idaho was only showing as having 4 home games for their average and I think all 4 were at Kibbie.

I and many others saw this happen at North Texas with Coach Fry.... “I am delighted that Coach Erickson will be the head football coach at the University of Idaho,” said Tim White, UI president. “Our student-athletes deserve the opportunity to develop and play under the tutelage of a proven, seasoned and successful head coach. I was in leadership roles at Oregon State University during Dennis’ renewal of the football program in Corvallis, and know first-hand of the positive impact he had on the entire fabric of the university, its alumni and supporters.”

From the Feb. 08 NT Daily article on the new color and logo branding: "......Right now it’s just the most visible places,” Wolper said. “When anybody does a NT news story, for instance on the television stations, we encourage them to use the new word mark [instead of the old circle and star].” Next semester, the Mean Green football team will have uniforms in the new color and eventually the signs posted in front of campus buildings will be updated as well. At the Board of Regents meeting this Thursday, the advancement committee might discuss the new timeline for the transition...."

1. CUSA membership 2. New Football Stadium 3. Beat SMUt 4. Win more OOC games 5. All others

NT spring practice starts Monday Feb. 13 thru the spring game on Thursday night March 9. It is the earliest start of any 1-A team, and usually is. Coach Dickey likes to get spring practice over before NT's spring break (starts Mar. 11?). It also gives the players a longer break before fall to heal from injuries and just be students the rest of the semester. Are you a player's dad?

Final 2005 1-A rankings: 30 Boise State 43 Fresno State 58 Louisiana Tech 80 Hawaii 102 San Jose State 104 Utah State 111 Idaho 118 New Mexico State 74 Louisiana-Lafayette 88 Arkansas State 94 Florida International 95 Louisiana-Monroe 96 Troy State 98 Middle Tennessee State 107 North Texas 109 Florida Atlantic

No. NT was ranked #97 in attendance at 16,400. Idaho (2-9) was ranked #101 in attendance with an average of 15,200. Way up for them over SBC years attendance.

What does this mean as far as their long-term "new" baseball facility with UNT that was suppossed to be ready for this summer?

I admit I now have Idaho-envy. Better conference and better coach.

54-2 against Tulsa was bad publicity.

I think he is referring to this upcoming season. BTW, OU is paying MUTS $550K AND travel expenses.

2006 MTSU football schedule Aug. 31 Florida International Sept. 9 at Maryland Sept. 14 Tennessee Tech Sept. 23 at Oklahoma Sept. 30 at North Texas Oct. 6 Louisville (Nashville, Tenn.) Oct. 14 at Louisiana-Monroe Oct. 28 at Louisiana-Lafayette Nov. 4 Florida Atlantic Nov. 11 at Arkansas State Nov. 18 at South Carolina Nov. 25 Troy full story about schedule and OU $$

I mostly agreed with your rant, except the above part. If UNT had SMU's 2005 schedule of hosting Baylor, TCU, Tulane, East Carolina, Rice, and UTEP I would glady saw we'd average close to 30K, not 18 like SMU. If however, SMU hosted Tulsa, Troy, ULM, ULL and Arkansas State like we did, I doubt SMU could fill 10K much less the 17K UNT had. And try it in a fan-unfriendly facility like Fouts instead of posh Ford Stadium. SMU has fewer students, but they also have better games to attend and in a nicer facility.

This was the kid everyone was touting as the next sure-thing in kicking for us. We bypassed other great kickers to suppossedly get this kid and he goes to SE La.? We lost 3 games last season by 3 points each, and now we have no placekicker? But everything's GREEN.

That's pathetic, and they signed 2 kickers.... Les Mulkey, K, 5-10, 175, Independence, La., Parklane Academy (Miss.) Jeff Turner, K, 5-9, 170, Houston, Texas, Cypress Creek HS Losing recruits to McNeese and SE La. shows how little recruits respect our program. Have we fallen that far?

Copeland's successor will face lackluster fans 01:27 AM CST on Saturday, February 4, 2006 UNIVERSITY PARK – At a casual function not too long ago that brought together some SMU boosters and coaches, a booster asked a coach about the nonconference schedule that was being put together. The booster wanted to know what school he could get excited about seeing. The coach laid out the schedule. Then the coach suggested to the booster that he should be excited to see SMU play, against whomever. The anecdote popped to mind Friday while watching SMU president Gerald Turner discuss the challenges for whoever succeeds the gentleman seated to his left, Mustangs athletic director Jim Copeland. Copeland was announcing that he planned to retire at this school year's end. Turner mentioned the need to do for basketball what had been done for football under Copeland's 12-year watch – improve the facilities. It was not a revelation. Anyone and everyone who has been around SMU athletics know as much. What was interesting was that Turner noted why it seemed to be such a long, hard slog – my words, not his – to build a much-needed basketball practice gymnasium and have ancient Moody Coliseum brought into the 21st century. "We don't have the fan support and donor support to do everything at once," he explained. "They have to be done sequentially." SMU isn't FSU. SMU isn't even TCU, which is not a knock on Fort Worth's flagship private university. The regional rivalry won't allow SMU folks to admit it, but they would love to be the Horned Frogs right now. TCU appears to be home to a perennial football bowl team despite not having football facilities as nice as SMU's. Its men's basketball program, although experiencing tough sledding this season, made the NIT only a year ago and has a new facility in which to practice. Its successful baseball program has new digs, too. And what TCU has that SMU doesn't is fan support through thick and through thin, which is most critical. Football at TCU's Amon G. Carter Stadium drew an average of 31,254 fans last season, according to the NCAA. SMU's fantastic Gerald J. Ford Stadium attracted an average of 18,630 for what turned out to be a scrappy 5-6 team that upset TCU. Basketball at TCU last year drew only 4,344 per game, but that was still more than the 3,345 that supported men's basketball at Moody. So it doesn't matter who succeeds Copeland. Whoever it is will still have, first and foremost, the unenviable task of trying to wake SMU's moribund fans (if they can be called that), be they alums or, even more disconcerting, classmates of the university's athletes. (There may not be a campus in America with a less-supportive student fan base than that on the Hilltop. They're an embarrassment.) Copeland's departure will be yet another litmus test for all this. After all, SMU fans, whose bark belies their bulk, have grumbled that they haven't turned out in recent years because they came not to like the athletic director. Their greatest football player of the second half of the last century, Eric Dickerson, not long ago blamed the football team's woes squarely on Copeland and his coaching hires and said he wouldn't cut the athletic department a check because it wouldn't help. Well, Copeland's last day on the job will be May 31. That means the Mustang Club can expect Dickerson's first check to arrive on June 1. That's the biggest problem for SMU athletics. It isn't the administration. It isn't the AD. It's excuses. Everybody's got them. The coaches say they can't recruit everyone because of academic restraints. There is some truth to that, but the Hilltop ain't quite Harvard Yard, either, and Copeland got some of those restraints relaxed. Alums say don't come out because they don't like the AD or the coach. Tell that to Texas fans, who came out when they didn't like Longhorns AD DeLoss Dodds just to fly banners expressing as much. What SMU needs more than a hotshot new AD who can shake hands and kiss babies like a presidential candidate is a reality check. The Southwest Conference is long gone, and it isn't coming back. The truth is that the only reason a private school of a few thousand students was running with the big dogs in the biggest of sports, year in and year out back in the day, was because it cheated. SMU now is where SMU always should have been, and people who went there or go there need to acknowledge that. That doesn't mean the school doesn't deserve support anymore. It means it needs it now, the legitimate kind, if you indeed want to see winning football, a new basketball facility and all the pride that comes with it. A new AD won't be able to do it alone like some magician.

Doesn't look like Malone is going to Arizona State.... ....................................................................................................... ASU Names Al Simmons Cornerbacks Coach Simmons joins Dirk Koetter's staff after spending last season with San Jose State Feb. 3, 2006 TEMPE, Ariz. - San Jose State University Cornerbacks Coach Al Simmons was named Cornerbacks Coach for Arizona State, according to an announcement by ASU Head Football Coach Dirk Koetter Friday. Simmons takes the place of Mark Carrier, who was named Secondary Coach for the Baltimore Ravens last month. A 20-year coaching veteran, Simmons' diverse background includes coaching experience at both the collegiate and professional levels. He has nine previous seasons of Division I coaching experience, including three at California (1998-2000), two at Oregon State (2001 and 2002) and one at San Jose State (2005). In addition, he has also served on the coaching staff of the San Francisco 49ers for two seasons and has participated in the National Football League's Minority Fellowship Coaching program in 1993 with the Oakland Raiders, in 1996 with the Arizona Cardinals, in 1999 with the San Diego Chargers and in 2000 with the Dallas Cowboys. "Arizona State University is a place that I have always wanted to coach," says Simmons. "I am extremely excited to get back into the Pacific-10 Conference once again. I have always admired ASU for having a consistent football program. It will be great to work for Coach Koetter. I think the defensive staff and I are a good fit. There are a lot of good things in store for this program." "We are excited and fortunate to have added a coach of Al's experience and reputation to our staff," says Koetter. "With Al, we have added a proven West Coast recruiter with contacts in Northern and Southern California."

What a $ham. They probably bought their way back into 4A.