BillySee58

Happy Birthday, man!

Big Ten Network 2. And yeah, this game is absolutely winnable. Doesn't mean we will win, but it is winnable.

Good point. He has coached there too. Although that's a really tough job. Much harder to be competitive in conference there than here. He has this thing trending up, and can keep winning until he gets a really good offer.

He either would need to win out this season and win 10 next year, or win 10 next year with a CUSA championship to have a resume that would match the G5 coaches who got hired away by P5s last year.

Go Mean Green, go Seth Littrell, Go Wren! This is where we belong. Don't believe any of the excuses the previous regime said. We should have the best program in our division and we are on our way there.

As someone mentioned in another thread, if fans are coming to the games to see the team UNT is playing and not going to see UNT then we're always going to struggle with attendance. I get it. I want to see better opponents in the Pit too. This is a transition year with a really young team. I hope we get some big name opponents in the Pit in two years when Gibson, Woolridge, Smart, Lawson, and maybe Simmons are in their third straight year as starters and are more battle tested. Mccasland has won 20 games in a similar conference already. This isn't Benford and RV trying to mask how bad they are by playing a bunch of easy teams. This is guys knowing what they're doing focusing on getting this team playing well together and racking up some wins and confidence before CUSA play starts. I don't think it's a bad strategy for year 1. Are we really nitpicking NAIA vs D3?

And if it didn't, then what? We lose an early non-conference game on the road to Nebraska? People are acting like playing this opponent made us worse. This game was never intended to be some tough, competitive game. It was just to get a game under our new players' belts, get another game of the roles on this team getting defined, getting a chance to play everyone, and let the fans see the new team in live action. We aren't making the NCAA tournament as an at-large team. Nothing is riding on the outcome of this Nebraska game. Lose and we take the experience forward, win and you build up some early momentum. Playing a BIG 10 opponent is supposed to be a learning experience and a test in and of itself, regardless of the preceding game. I'm sure it will be.

Sounds like Miller's injury is more day-to-day. As another posted, Tikhonenko needs to get his eligibility in order first so maybe that means he can play once the first semester is over. Not sure. As I mentioned in the podcast, I also wouldn't be surprised if he redshirted this season.

Michael Miller is out with injury

If you said "hope to see you at the game" then yeah, that would be a more appropriate response for George. But saying "you should make it out for a game" implies he hasn't been or doesn't normally, when in fact he clearly never misses a game.

Completely agree Yeah, 4 to play 3. Graduated HS in 2017, and is a qualifier

5'9" 182 lb Freshman running back at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College. Originally from Gautier, MS. We have offered. Has rushed for 1,298 yards and 12 touchdowns this season. Qualified out of high school so does not need to finish his associate's degree and is eligible to play division 1 ball next year. Highlights: http://www.hudl.com/profile/4244436/deandre-torrey

Amen to that

Or this guy http://m.espn.com/ncf/playercard?playerId=4039662&src=desktop Lost out to Tulsa on him and it went down to the wire. Look at the state of our programs now. We absolutely should be able to win that battle going forward.

Georgetown lost 19 games last year including a game to Mccasland's Arkansas State squad. OU lost 20 games, although they should be much better and add a 5-star in Trae Young. Nebraska was 12-19 last year. Ga Tech is probably our toughest game and closest thing to a sure loss. Next is either UTA or OU. Everything after that is winnable, including Georgetown and Nebraska. Indiana State may be our marquee home OOC game from the MVC but they lost 20 games last year, and we also go to San Diego and they were 13-18 last year. The other 6 OOC opponents I didn't mention we should be easy favorites against. Now of course teams are looking at us the same way and they could easily be more improved than us, but we loaded our schedule with winnable games, including against good programs that were down last year. Lot of chances for wins in non-conference.

I'll add to this by saying there hasn't been enough to say whether or not recruiting has improved since the winning has started. 1 really good commit and 1 decommit. Not much of a sample size. That being said, this staff still hasn't proven they can win recruiting battles consistently. They've done good being opportunistic, they've done good evaluating, and they've done good developing. Finding a way to win recruiting battles consistently and parlay this on-field momentum into recruiting wins is the last step we need to take to ensure the 2018 class will be playing for division and conference championships in November all throughout their careers like the current team is.

UAB is a west opponent

2 other offers qualifies as a "B" recruit. You'd be surprised how many signees of ours have fallen on either side of this line in the years I have researched. Also, Woodworth had a UTEP offer. Tillman Johnson and Murray were "B" guys in 2014 and 2015. Garner was a "B+" guy in 2014, Rod Young was a "B+" in 2015, Jeff Wilson was a "B" in 2014, Syd Moore was a "B+" back in 2013, and some others are contributing like Barr and Chumley. And yeah, you throw in the jucos Littrell has signed and that fills in the gaps of the upperclassmen. Maybe those classes don't make up he majority of our starters, but signing good, highly-coveted recruits those classes has been integral in the turnaround. That includes the guy who has scored more than a third of the offensive touchdowns in the Littrell era and the anchor of our d-line, among others. But if you swap the 14/15 classes with the 12/13 classes there is no way the turnaround happens this quickly. Littrell has had success here. He has signed key players in our turnaround. He has not won many head to head recruiting battles, particularly since the calendar turned to 2017. Both with the tail end of the 2017 class and the 2018 class. He has had success scooping guys up late, hitting on evaluations, and developing. I expect that to continue, but winning recruiting battles has not picked up and our success on the field is not an example of the contrary.

We got top 25 votes for the 9-4 season in 2013. If we won out, there's a good chance we could sneak into the top 25 at 11-3. That or 10 wins would be monumental.

I made this graph a few months back. The guys in this current class are not the ones on the verge of playing in the conference championship. Actually, the upperclassmen on this team are guys from the two best classes, offer-list wise, that we have signed in recent history. 2014 and 2015. Compare that to our team two years ago with upperclassmen from our two worst classes, 2012 and 2013. I don't think Littrell and co are great recruiters. However, they have been opportunistic recruiters, good evaluators, and good developers. They got guys who held many FBS offers at various stages in their recruiting processes but were not actively being recruited by other FBS schools when we got them to commit to us late (i.e. Darden, Hamilton, Nick Smith, Jenkins, etc). That's opportunistic recruiting. They got guys with no other FBS offers and proved their ability to evaluate as those guys have gone on to be solid contributors, like Fine, Kemon Hall, Ejiya, Lawrence (walkon), Sosaia Mose, and Khairi Muhammad among others. That's good evaluating. And they've done a great job developing Fine at QB, as well as many others and the recruits they have signed with good offer lists are panning out at a VERY high rate (Bussey, Guyton, Smith, etc.). They've done a great job so far developing their players. I don't think this is a good recruiting staff. I think if we had a good recruiting staff we'd see us winning more recruiting battles. It's not solely or even mainly because we are North Texas and it's hard to recruit here. But like I said, this staff is doing a good job being opportunistic when top prospects are left with dried up offers, evaluating no-offer guys, and developing. Those are this staffs strengths and it's working just fine. That being said, this class needs to pick it up or else it will more closely resemble the upperclassmen classes of the 1-11 team than the 2017 team. I'm sure we'll snag some guys at the end again, but it would be extremely helpful to win recruiting battles straight up as well with our momentum that we have.

Based on JayD's posts that we have kids visit who are committed to other schools, and he withholds their names, it seems we do not stop recruiting kids who commit to other schools.

Do you honestly believe the people of your generation would not be decommitting if they were committing months, even years in advance of their signing day? In your generation commitments didn't start occurring until after their senior football season was over, so there really was no time for decommitting. It was commit, then signing day would be there in about 40 days.

Has decommitted :/

Clutch ClUNTch Clunch Clinch

I'm just saying in the instance that they had to burn his shirt this year they could redshirt him next year since the guys ahead of him, Fine & Shanbour, will both be back.