outoftown

Dogged defenses, sloppy offenses with players on both sides giving their all in a melee about every 5 seconds.

Would obviously be awesome, but seeing as he is not only a 4* but also from Oregon, I doubt UNT has a real shot at this one. Shows however that EM was important in recruiting QB and had a highly rated one on the fishing pole (number 2 player -all positions -in Oregon).

Really hard to know what happened without more info. A lot of it sounds fairly weird. Definitely a case to withhold judgment until more is known. if there is video that could indeed clarify a lot. That could still go both ways though. Sometimes peoples reality distortion is strong enough that they don't realize what things will look like on video.

I generally like the thought process behind the Morris hire. but I don't get the implication by some of the posters that 1.25 million (provided that is the actual number) is not enough just because some other AAC members pay their coaches more. Have we not learnt anything from overpaying the previous coach for all of his seven years? SL was a decent coach, but never good enough to deserve being paid consistently in the top 2 of the conference. I actually wonder if he would still be here if he had earned 500k less and instead have that money added to the assistant pool / have it funneled by big money donors to NIL. I can sure imagine he would have won more games that way. Blindly overpaying for a coach and having bad buyout clauses is how you get to an ATM/Jimbo situation adapted to your own level. An AD has to have a plan a AND a plan b. Morris may be the right hire, but there is no reason to pay more than his market value. He hasn't been an HC for a single game at the FBS level yet, the market value is not 2 million. If he performs better, you can always prolong him (unless he gets hired away real quick but in that case he left NT better than he found it and NT gets to pick on a giant pool next time). Until then you can funnel that money into assistants and make sure the incentives are right (if he gets 200k for getting to 9 wins and another 200k for winning the conference, then that will simply be deserved). If I was the AD I might also backload the contract.

QB wise maybe you have a point. there are two important differences though between those 2 hires. 1. SL had NEVER been a head coach at any level before coming to UNT, he did ok learning on the job fast, but he also never had the time to get out of the situation and reflect what he would/should do differently with the necessary distance. I could actually imagine he'll be better at the next place he'll become a HC because he will now get the time to reflect on how he could have done differently ( i think somebody will eventually give him another chance, may not even take that long). Morris has not only already had all that responsibility for a few years, he also had a year to think about what he did right and wrong and improve the plan and now gets to build anew. 2. SL had NEVER been anywhere below P5 prior to UNT. Having resources was a given for him, that was the only kind of environment he knew. He was a good talent evaluator, but at NTs level -despite massively improved recruiting resources over the last decade- you have to be somewhat creative in the way you bring folks in. Sony Dykes was at SMU, SL was not. At the FCS level you have to be even more creative. And it appears Morris was. its not a given it will translate to top tier G5, but it IS an important difference in experience to when SL was hired. I think these are two really important differences between the two hires.

Its very sad news. The man was legend for good reason. Could rub some people the wrong way, but man was he creative and interesting. a real needed change from all those generic coach speak guys. For those who have a subscription, some very good eulogies on the Athletic. CFB is a lot poorer for this loss If I was a UTSA fan I would additionally be worried that this tragic way of creating a HC opening could cost them their coach. The year was extremely light on P5 openings in the south. Its the first opening where i can really kind of see Traylor being a fit and with SEC money Mississippi State could go get him.

I tend to think this is a good hire. Nobody ever knows for sure (Hiring Frost at Nebraska also looked good to almost everybody). Yes its not a name everybody knows, but he has done head coaching at the FCS level. Probably will actually need less on-the job training than SL did. Is young, and I sure hope he'll bring the necessary energy and understanding of the portal and about how to recruit with 18-23 year olds. As a Texas and FCS guy he will also know what he is getting into and not be thinking that the resources here are not enough. In fact I think NT doesn't have that much less than WSU did. I also think that this hire ought not to break donors bank, so that all of those big money donors can then funnel some money into NIL instead. At NTs level i think this probably actually the more efficient way to win. Color me cautiously optimistic

ok. That is at least an explanation I can kind of understand, and I guess as far as UMass is concerned it is just a return game that is similarly pseudoneutral. Still, I think it is better NET wise to go for real home games and real away games in the long run. Whether that is better for finances and fan interest is harder to judge for me.

Same story as with GCU again? Thats annoying. They need to stop scheduling those pseudo-neutral games immediately. If they canßt get good teams to Denton, then NT needs its away games to at least count as away games for its NET. GCU is a Q3 instead of a Q2 because it is counted as neutral, while it had all the disadvantages of being an away game. UMass on neutral ground is likely to end up as a Q3 game, and Q2 is the max if UMass goes on a roll afterward. As an away game it'd be certain at least Q2 and Q1 if UMass goes on a roll. That could really help UNT. The way it is UNT can pretty much only lose and has little to gain.

Oh now come on... don't go throwing shade at us.

https://bracketologists.com/conferences/ Conference did very well so far. 9th on NET average (American is tenth, despite Houston being 2nd). Also nice: C-USA is lead by FAU, UAB, UNT and Charlotte (i.e. all teams that will leave with NT)

Kent State coach Sean Lewis? Lacks any Texas connections whatsoever as far as I can tell, but is otherwise awesome. Was said to become Colorados next OC, but somehow the confirmation / signature on the dotted line was not really confirmed as far as I can tell, which is weird and engendered speculation

Sadly, I too fear this is (and ought to be) coach Mitchells last year at NT. There may have been reason to believe she may turn it around finally, but now those reasons look effemeral now and she had more chances than coaches usually get, but the results never really came, and now it looks like it is rolling off a cliff. Short of a crazy late season and tournament run I don't see how she can be brought back.

Don't know who they would go with, and they could afford the buyout, but I have trouble seeing him as a fit there. As i said before, I don't see him leaving this year, because the coaching carousel was extremely tame this year: south of the Mason-Dixon there was not a single P5 opening between Phoenix, Arizona and Auburn, Alabama. That never happens. The ACC, SEC and Big12 combined had 3 openings (4 if you count cincy. If that were the norm coaches would average 13 year tenures. But I have a hard time imaging he isn't gone by 2024, next year it is likely to pick back up. Plus, if he is good again -which given the QB return seems likely - he will get hotter while the buyout gets lower. While it may price out some Big12 and ACC teams, I don't think the buyout is that big a deal to B1G and SEC teams to be honest though. The money available has gone up a level again, and in most of those places 6 mil is just a normal yearly salary for the HC now, maybe even on the lower side.

I get the argument about lack of HC experience, but I don't dislike it as much as many of you seem to. I think he'll do a fine job recruiting, he'll be better at QB development and he knows what this place is and isn't.

IS he though?

All members are guilty, not just UNT. But I will admit, having a member that is on a 13 game losing streak vs FBS teams in OOC is baaad for your conference. Having said member reach your conference championship game is even worse.

Liberty is going to do some things on the field to this run-down conference that they might have to ask forgiveness for after. Lots of low-budget schools locked into a conference with them and their high budget. If they go 13-0 and 12-1 season after season, could they actually endanger the AACs grasp on the playoff because folks will get so used to seeing them ranked?

Summing up from what i read in this thread on Fuente: Things i don't like: Lack of actual trophies. Recruiting pointing slightly downwards starting from medium territory. Things I like: Seems to better understand the portal, had the introspection to understand that he went wrong on identity, that promises improvement. More Texas ties than i realized. Things i still wonder about: How did he do with NIL and boosters who may facilitate it. Still overall, I would rather have someone who just killed it at the FCS level and could now try to replicate it with more resources than he had prior. Also some posted on the value of experience. maybe it is time to post on the value of youth and weakness of experience, as some of the older folks seem to have forgotten about it. The last few years have seen some fairly young HCs emerge, like Riley at OU-USC, Day at Ohio State etc. On average they did just as fine as older head coaches. You need a lot of energy to be an HC. That speaks for youth. You need to understand and credibly relate to 17-23 year olds, that is easier for someone who is young. You need to recruit across all those new channels. You need to fully adapt to the portal and the redshirting rules etc, not just when recruiting. Youth is more open to try completely new things over proven things and it is a weakness of experience that it often creates a bias that makes folks fail to realize when proven things are gradually stopping to work or overtaken by better things. Sometimes people learn from bad experience, but often enough they learn the wrong things -they decrease their trust when trust is essential.

Sure. I am not a fan of the idea either in general. But if I or you don't like it that has little to no consequences for the on the field product and nobody will fire us from our positions as fans. Whether the HC likes it or doesn't, it still IS now part of his job, so he needs to handle it well, otherwise he will get passed by and lose a lot of talent. Not adapting to the portal sadly makes you unqualified to be an FBS head coach in this day and age.

What happened to warrant an exit: While his schemes were still mostly succesful, his culture approach had started to be out of sync with the current generation of student-athletes. As a consequence the on the field effort wasn't always what it oughta be. Also he might not have seemed that in love with some of the new requirements in recruiting. Some of that gets alleviated when you have UT NIL money to throw around, maximal staffing, and don't have to make all the HC executive decisions and recruiting frontman stuff

The timing sucks. And that IS a problem. I am not really sure all that much was gained by not firing Littrell after the Memphis game (or even the UNLV one). It will create trouble for next season. However the bigger point is: has there ever been a UNT president who not only thought that sports was important for the universites future, and who not only thought that .500 was not good enough, but who actually was willing to fire a coach and put real money behind that kind of thinking? I doubt it. That IS major progress of more importance than the timing issue. It means the administration is serious in an all new way.

Hmmm. I was almost hoping they would hire Littrell as the HC. Would have been a lot better for the offset.

With all due respect to Auburn... but that one is on Auburn first.

I get the feeling and can't fully discount it. But I fear this is too short term thinking and that NT is effed anyway on this recruiting transfer portal window. So may as well take the long term view to get the best candidates in (which then has the AD first). Also I have this weird feeling (absolutely no info) that Smatresk has already decided on Mosely, but that the coaching search will go a bit wider given that probably a decent number of the names on any made lists are already off the board.