PlummMeanGreen

NT is only using 200 acres of what was our NT Golf Course for the Mean Green Athletic Village. That golf course had well over 400 total acres as I recall reading somewhere, so I guess my question is: What is NT going to do with the rest of all that extra acreage out at our Eagle Point Campus?

(1) Last time our QB situation was even more unsettled, we went to a bowl game and beat the CUSA champion with a freshman QB, ie, the great Andrew Smith. (2). ULM is back in our House again this season. Don't we always like our chances in our House? Of course, there have been a few exceptions thru the years, but we do win most of our games at Fouts Field.

You be preachin' to the MG choir, sir.

One of the things coming from the media that I have always found to be funny goes something like this many times: "And last seasons 3 & 8 Aspiring State U team returns everyone from that 3 & 8 team for this next Fall's campaign. I know MT won more than 3 last year, but who is to say that they don't keep getting the same results from the same players who gave them a sub .500 season last Fall? Always the missing ingrediant in all this is how the SBC recruiting gurus "NEVER" quite have a handle on the Texas and Oklahoma recruiting Darrell Dickey and staff seem to have success with once they get them off the recruiting experts paper polls onto the field of battle.

HerdZoned did post on the Georgia Southern board a fairly positive (for him) post about NT of which he included a rendering of our new football stadium. It was an uncharacterstically positive post about NT from ol' HZ, in fact. He did go on to say that our facilities were not ready for that of a school that coveted CUSA membership; but to a great extent that is the truth, too. NT can ill afford to not have all our facilities in place for the next go-around of non BCS conference musical chairs. That would not help the psyche of our NT fan base whatsoever and might possibly have the same effect as 13 years of NCAA D1-AA did on many of our alums back in that day and even still has with our program today to an exent. Just think about it, though, why would a school that has had 1 winning season in 2 decades receive membership in CUSA over one that has been to several bowls and has some nationally recognized momentum going on as a football program? One word......F-A-C-I-L-I-T-I-E-S. (In all fairness to NT, if we had singularly been competing for one spot in CUSA vs SMU, we would have had a much better chance to get in, but as we all know, the Stangs' got invited to CUSA as part of a consortium of schools which dramatically helped their cause in gettting in. SMU's Gerald J. Ford stadium played a rather large part, too. HATE TO SAY THIS BUT............that same CUSA private school consortium is the very thing that makes me think CUSA membership for NT in the future will never become a reality. We need to transcend and do a Road-Runner "beep beep" with every CUSA Texas member and we can do this with what we have going on on those 200 acres between Denton's 2 interstates. Florida State did this in the 70's when they started to build their program to surpass the 2 conferences that always stiffed them most of the time in that era, ie, the SEC and ACC. What could be the the most hillarious and ironic part of all this for NT is if the Sun Belt Conference dramatically grows and succeeds in the next 5-10 years as to have us thinking: Why'd we ever entertain the idea of leaving the 'Belt in the first place?

The ones on the La Tech board who know how the cow eats the cabbage with all this WAC business are the ones who are fairly silent on their board on that subject. If they post their concerns, they get accused of being negative and listening to all those 'Belt folks when they offer a dose of the truth to their fellow alums. What a school is able to do with its facilities is a pretty darn good barometer of the shape of any school's present athletic situation and its future. NT is catching up for years of neglect for ours thank goodness. The timing of doing all this in Mean Green Country could not have been any better.

Already had mine, but it may not be working as effectively as yours seems to be, GGII! Rick, have you personally witnessed the power of posting a poll yet? You would be surprised the warm, fuzzy, feel good feeling you get from doing so. You know, kinda' like a tall glass of prune juice? GMG!

The National Privacy Act will probably keep us from knowing about J. Byerly's grades unless he, a family member or someone from NT Athletics post on this board for us to "Think Meager." Yet we all hope Joey gets his grades first for himself, secondly for NT. PEACEFUL, EASY FEELING: With the way our NT coaches handled the great Andrew Smith (then a frosh) after Scottie Hall went down at DKR Memorial Stadium in Austin, I am just not worried about who the Mean Green QB is because of the offense that Coach Dickey runs at NORTH TEXAS.

I think the old-timers used to call that the crown of a football field. And Harry: WILL ALL THIS IN SOME MAGICAL WAY BRING US 40 YARDS CLOSER TO THE ACTION? build it (before some of us go blind straining our eyes at Fouts)!

If GMG.com had a "thumbs up" icon that is exactly what I would be putting as a single icon response to the aforementioned post.

Anyone remember the little Texas greasy spoon diner several blocks south of the courthouse square called "Tom & Joe's?" I loved going there to eat their hamburger and fries and just shoot the bull with the locals. Read a few years ago that that was also a favorite eating spot for one of Denton's favorite daughters, the great Phyliss George. Last time I drove by where it should have been--it wasn't there.

Once we get the right formula, ie, a very pro-active and out in the community marketing program (just like the above photo shows) to solve this attendance thing (and I think we will) there is nothing that can stop this program especially when all the new venues at the Mean Green Athletic Village are completely finished. I say it about this time every year when this attendance subject comes up, but TCU had a very pro-active "TCU: My Home Team" type campaign that really included a very large cross-section of community and Tarrant County leaders and they are now in the 30's per game average attendance most years. I just have to think that that community focus had much to do with the Frog's success. You know, though, if 50,000 fans will sit in heat and humidity at a Texas Ranger game yesterday even with all the bad publicity they've gotten lately, I just have to think NT can put over 30,000 fans for any home game no matter who we play. We need to (as meanrob posted) increase the season ticket base and just go "lights out" for new fans and we can do all that in Denton County (population, over 500,000 citizens). And then any NT Exes we get from outside Denton County can be the icing on the cake at our football stadium's turnstiles. Solving the attendance situation at NORTH TEXAS should be our next new frontier in Denton as we seemed to have conquered making it to bowl games.

Totally agree, untgirl04... Our future attendance growth at Fouts will be with all those who were students (and future NT Exes) who have been part of this great 5 year run of winning Mean Green football at the University of North Texas. I just wish we could put a hot shot up against the alums from the 1970's (my group), 1980's and 1990's--these are the NT Exes who are holding us back at the turnstiles BUT............. .............I think the novelty and excitement of our future new state-of-the-art college football stadium at Eagle Point Campus will even bring some of that group back to campus (if for no other reason than to satisfy all their personal curiosities as to ask this question: "What in the wide world of sports is a-goin' on at my alma mater?!?!" I then feel many from that group will come check it out and stick around once they see.

Super photo of Rick V mixing with the masses... I just wish everyone else in his department and other departments on our campus had his evangelical zeal because that is just what its going to take to put dramatically more new faces & new fans into venerable Fouts Field. With our location and growing NT constituency, we don't need to stay log-jammed where we presently are at the turnstiles and we won't in due time. Fellow Greenbackers, there is going to be day when having a crowd under 30,000 will disappoints all of us, but we have a ways to go before we get there. ............................................................................................................................................................ PS: Wonder what they project our 2005 Fall Freshmen class to be? Our entire 2005 Fall enrollment?

IMHO, I think the Sun Belt grows to a healthy state in the next 10 years and this will happen when the 2 Florida schools get all their programs on track. Our SBC geographical footprint is not a bad footprint at all and in the next 2 years I feel SBC Commish' Wright Waters lines up the 'Belt with its 2'nd bowl game probably somewhere in the Sunshine State. BUT if all bets were off on what I truly think will eventually happen in the SBC...........my choice would be the Mountain West Conference. I don't think we would mesh well with a league that has too many private universities in them. Truth be known, where too many private schools gather as members in one specific conference, instability most always seems to follow. I do agree with ADLER inasmuch as we need to get all our facilities up to par with our new football stadium as the shining buckle on that rolling Texas prairie located between I35-E and I35-W, then we have bargaining power because of that AND our location. LOCATION? Do most of you realize that any Big Boy U program can fly charter into Alliance Airport just 15 minutes from Denton, Texas, America? Flying into Alliance, a visiting football team can get to our campus faster than they can TCU's.

Please explain your choice if you wish to leave the Sun Belt in 10 years (or whatever time-line) OR if you think NT should stay in the SBC and watch it grow.

I think most of us Texans and Metroplexers would pull for the Frogs vs OU. I am not sure we compete with TCU that much for their recruits and the same with SMU for that matter; although the Frogs did pick up the big lineman from McKinney who was giving us serious consideration toward the end. TCU caught a little flack from fellow CUSA'ers for dumping them for the MWC, but in the non-BCS sometimes I think you just have to do things that could be considered a gamble from time to time. Would NT turn down a MWC invite? Case closed.

All dressed up for the Prom and no one came by to pick em' up.

5 different shades of burn't orange? Surely the UT people have the burn't orange ink number that they have even shared with their Texas Exes? I guess shade of color is just another one of those subjects that gets us through the long, hot summer? At NT, you are just not going to make all the people happy all the time, but I will re-iterate what meanjoe says in his every post and thats something that really does amount to a hill a beans more than any shade of any color ever will: Join the Mean Green Club Buy season tickets ........Now those are 2 areas we all really need to agree because we do want to keep the store open and being successful at the same time, now don't we? NT Ticket Office: 1-800-UNT-2366

I am taking it, Rick, that you are not on board with NT going back to what our school's official shade of green is really supposed to be? Excuse?!?!? I am reading my post once again to see where I am making an excuse and what I am making an excuse for. Have I missed something between the lines on this? I am sure all at Fouts this Fall won't be wearing kelly green, but I'll give it 2-3 years with our most diverse and opinionated group and by then I think most will. Some will just get a head start in doing so this Fall. Even when Hayden Fry had the apple green debut in 1973, I would be lying if I said all were wearing that color in the stands that first season--although I think most were by the end of that season. It caught on quite well and quite fast along with Rick Spear's futuristic eagle some call the flying worm. GMG!

I think the "Friends of the Library" got first dibbs on getting the new logo designs from the branding committee, ADLER. Was walking on campus weeks before the official campus Branding Ceremony and the "Friends" already had the right shade of green AND the right logos as they whispered to each other (they're librarians--don't forget) and did some hardly noticeable high five-n' as well. (sorry, inside joke to some out there). PS: ADLER, thanks for the new info on the shirts and it is very encouraging that most of us are going to try to walk into Fouts Field on September 17'th with as close to the correct color green as we can. The national, regional and local (news) TV cameras at Fouts Field will be the ones who telecast to all the very visable difference compared to what we had been wearing the past few years. Wal Mart has a nice selection of kelly green type sportswear and I think Target does to (or they will). Since we changed back to kelly green, I've noticed that it really never completely lost its popularity on many stores clothes racks.

Well, as much as I hate to say this, you can start with us--NORTH TEXAS. I am trying to remember what our 1975 wins over Tennessee, Houston, SMU and others did for us as far as significant fund-raising was concerned and how many (much needed) football related facilties we built as a result of high profile wins? Hey! we are all "FOR" high profile wins, but I think we are moreso supportive of a football program that is consistently upgrading its recruiting and athletic facilities as to where high profile wins are not so much a big surprise to anyone anymore. Well, we did get our athletic offices near Fouts Field because AD/Head football coach Hayden Fry knew Bob Moody of Galveston's Moody Foundation. (Amazing, we had an employee at NT who actually knew someone with the Big Bucks--what a concept). And yes, it was that Galveston family's foundation that financed much of SMU's Moody Coliseum, too; but FWIW, our athletic offices were already in the works well before that most defining 1975 football season in our school's history. In fact, weren't those offices already finished are almost finished before the Fall of 1975? I am trying to see what several high profile football victories have done for Bulldogs of La Tech. For sure, Karl Malone gave em' a bunch of money for their weight room, but they are (apparently) having a difficult time gettting funds for much needed Field Turf or Omni-Grass. As I look at the latest photos of LTU's football stadium, I don't see luxury suites, end zone athletic centers, Daktronic scoreboard/instant replay boards, etc, etc, etc.; furthermore, I don't even read on their board of solid plans on the drawing boards for such. Agree with the part on Bobby Bowden who (as you would probably know) even brought his Seminoles to our own Fouts Field, but one thing that Bowden got that NT still hasn't received is a whole army of FSU supporters who give the really Big Bucks, a community that supports its home town college football team and an administration who (back in that day) wanted much bigger things than we presently are saying we want. Florida State just had a bunch of constituencies who put their monies where their mouths were. We have many talkers but we don't have enough doers, that is those who focus on giving to the things that keeps our athletic program afloat. Such as giving to the Mean Green Club as to free up other monies for new athletic venues at NORTH TEXAS. SUMG has in the past received a little hell for his hot sports opinions (as many of us have) but for the 2'nd year in a row, he has given $2,500 to the Mean Green Club and has persuaded me to double my own donation this Fall. We just really need many new MG Club members giving what they can afford to give and not because anyone on this board says we need this, but because that is the very lifeblood of our men and women's varsity athletics of which we are all concerned of its well-being. The UNT administration cannot continue to subsidize NT Athletics the way it has and especially fund it to the level we all aspire this program to be. So just who is it that is going to fill in all the blank check$ ?

Outside of LSU, our OOC schedule seems a bit lighter than usual. I think we've played a Top 10 school to open our season most every year Dickey has been coach it seems. Darrell Dickey's Mean Green teams have beaten Texas Tech (was it 2) out of 3 or 4 times they've played. So we are not completely without some higher profile OCC wins during his tenure in Denton. Oh, and we did beat the CUSA football champion in the NO's Bowl 3 years ago so I guess that sorta' counts, too, right? We all want to beat a Big Boy now and then, but for mid-majors and after having done a bit of research on the subject, such victories don't seem to turn mid-major programs around as much as you would think. One might think such victories might translate into a substantial increase of alumnus fund-raising, dramatic improvements on athletic facilities or even new athletic venues, but for most mid-majors I don't see that that has happened after such a Big Win over Big Boy U. What NT is doing at our 200 acre Mean Green Athletic Village is out of neccesity because TxDOT wants frontage property adjacent to Fouts Field (and they will get their land) PLUS we are just playing catch-up with facilities we should have already had in place quarter of a century ago IMO. The best part of all this for NORTH TEXAS is the fact that our campus fathers made a most dramatic decision to move all football venues, operations, a new Athletic Center, a new luxurious dorm and a future new football stadium to one of the best locations any NCAA D1-A school could ever hope for, ie, on 200 acres of prime interstate real estate and on land located between 2 Texas interstates. What a visual that will be for the hundreds of thousands who will annually drive by our athletic village as they go to Dallas or Fort Worth where those 2 interstates divide in Denton right where the Mean Green Athletic Village just happens to be located. What a recruiting gem all this will be when all venues are completed. For the LSU game this Fall, I really hope Coach Dickey will play about half his bench, get our key players several plays in a hostile environment and then get em' all ready for a more important game for us the next week at Middle Tennessee. There was a time I wouldn't miss going to such a Big Name football game such as an LSU, but now we don't take 5K-10K Mean Green fans to such games anymore because they have sold out their stadiums with their own fans OR they stick you in the worse seats in the universe as to where our players hardly know we are even there.

If any alum is going to try to match your 2005 Mean Green gear with the new color we are now going to be using, I am not sure we will always match the greens exactly, but best rule of thumb is to go for the green that is somewhere between our old apple green and the hunter (dark) green, and that will many times simply be kelly green. Looked at Wal Mart' selection today and kelly green seems to be coming back strong. Wal Mart had several shirts with something close to our new green and the brand Athletic Works has some "below the knees" shorts that was what they called elf green (which was really closer to kelly green) and I bought them for future use. Anyway, most of us liked the dark green we've been using a few years now, but I think we will all like the results of seeing our fans dressed out in the brighter green when the TV cameras scan our crowds during the course of football games that are on ESPN TV as well as the 2005 NT Football Highlights DVD.

For certain that Alvin Crenshaw should be in the NTAHOF.