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Actually, the I-Bowl would have loved the battle of Louisiana. The bowl is in terrible shape financially, their sponsor still owes them well over $1.4 million bucks and they have no sponsor for this year. The game lost $400K last year and the state had to bail them out. Those "visitor's dollars" are not going to come from a 6-6 Northern Illinois... they will really be lucky to bring 500 people, tops. If the game had been played against La Tech and UL - it would have probably had 40K people attend. I am going to guess that they get 20K tops. It is ranked dead last in all of the bowl rankings and is a complete joke. Why in the world would La Tech be so freaking scared of a 6-6 UL-Lafayette team? Because they recruit against them and because La Tech still thinks that they are "elite" in some way. The I-Bowl could have stood up to La Tech but then they would have had a 6-6 ULL team against a 6-6 Northern Illinois team. Even still, you cannot blame anyone except for UL-Lafayette. All they needed were 7 wins and they came up one short. 7 wins and the I-Bowl doesn't have a choice. I read something on another board ripping Waters for the contingency agreements. The agreements are very simple - last year, an 8 win Troy sat at home during bowl season. We wanted to make sure that if we had any bowl eligible teams (7 wins or more) that they would have a place to play. Only one team hit 7 wins - Troy, and they get the NO Bid. Waters probably could have forced the hand at one of these bowls but it would have hurt the agreements for the future. Waters also could have probably worked something out to send UL-Lafayette to New Orleans and move Troy to the Indy Bowl but then we piss of the NO Bowl and CUSA and we screw ourselves for the future. When it comes down to it - take a look at UL's, ASU's, and FAU's schedules - the bowl season isn't about how you start, it is about how you end - and FAU ended the season strong with some very solid wins. They have an OOC win against a CUSA school and they played the big boys close in a couple of games. Schnelly, whether we like it or not, is a draw for that game and will take this game seriously. I bet that he wins it. I bet that there is nobody there to see it... but I bet that he wins it.

Louisiana has nobody to blame but themselves - 7 wins and this wouldn't have been a decision or choice for the I-Bowl, they would have been forced to take them. The Belt is very lucky to have gotten two bowls this year, especially when we only sponsor/pay for the invite to one. Loser Tech was probably scared sh!tless to play UL-Lafayette in the bowl game. They recruit directly against each other and fight for the same LA recruits every year. No way that they take the chance of getitng beat by any Belt team. I get the feeling that Waters could have pushed the issue but it would have destroyed the relationship for the future... bottom line, if the Belt had more 7 win teams, we would have gotten more bowl games - just by default.

A-State fans are claiming that they turned down the bid... I am guessing that Roberts is on his way out.

I find it a good sign that FAU got an at large bid to a bowl without a contingency agreement. A true at large bid is a sign of respect for Captain Kangaroo.

Interesting to see only one North Texas player on first team - Casey Fitz, and all defensive players after that with the exception of Cam at 3rd team RB. Louisiana really dominates this list, probably why they were so happy to post this on the Belt Board today, lol... Do you all remember when these teams were just filled with NT players on all 3 teams? Oh my how we have come on rough times. Link to Phil Steele's ALL SBC teams - 2008-2009

That would essentially be telling the students - No, you cannot tax yourselves. As long as the state doesn't have to pick up the tab, its all good. And the $10 bucks an hour is just a start. 10% a year my good men, until we can fund our program correctly. The only way that the fee could get revoked would be if the SGA were to put that up as a ballot item, get a majority vote to make it an item on the next election, and then even if the students were to somehow "reverse" the fee - the BOR could just say "tough" - because those monies are being used for the athletic dept now. That is like saying that students could (or would) have the ability to vote down the price of tuition, or books, or the Rec Center fee - the Rec Center fee is being used to runthe Rec Center - the students before them voted to pay for it and it is a part of the University now.

You are correct - the amount that the athletic department could normally pull out of the student service fee was allotted at $3.00 of the pot... this last year, they got a little over $5.00 per hour from that fee. Why did they get more? I am guessing it was requested by RV to retire the debt of the Athletic Center so that we could have that note burning right before the vote (smart politics in my opinion) and we might have still been paying out Dickey's contract. The $3.00 is what was set aside by the SGA and BOR directly towards Title IX compliance after the first vote failed. There are always exceptions to the rule and this last year was one of those. In the future, the amount will not be flexible because it will be a dedicated athletics fee and that $3 bucks has been taken off of the student service fee. I don't know how many times the department has gotten more than the $3/hour like they did in 2007-2008... Maybe it was a normal thing... not sure about that. What I am sure about is that we are in really great shape for funding the program in the future once the fee takes place so that is even MORE reason to get the stadium built (because the fee does not go into effect until the stadium is done).. I hope that I am getting all this right, it is what I understand to be true from talking to the entities at NT and also through reading this board. Financing for this would not be done with a loan like the AC - it will need to be bonded out. As long as there is a guarantee for retiring the debt, the bonds should not be a problem... of course, we need the Texas Legislature to go along with all this but with a resounding student vote - I can't see any reason why they would deny NT students the right to "tax themselves.

You bet, those are the loans that I was referring to. The Athletic Department initially took a $1 million dollar loan and then added another $2.6 million onto it - then I think that there was a shortfall on the building costs so they borrowed even more. So I don't know what the total amount came to, allt hat I know is that they had a "mortgage burning" party before Homecoming this year and basically burned the note - because it had been paid off... and 3 years ahead of schedule on top of that. It really is kind of silly - Illuvious summed it up better than me - we just needed the student vote to guarantee half of it, more for commitment than anything. Hypothetically we could have bonded out the whole thing with enough pressure. But we have the student's fees now, of which the $10 per credit hour is a $7 per credit hour increase over our previous student fee revenue. The $3 bucks an hour used before will be replaced with $5 bucks an hour so that we can have a higher athletic budget and the other $5 bucks an hour will go to facilities (stadium to start and 15 years down the road, whatever they want). I would also like to point out that this fee can be increased by up to 10% every year WITHOUT a student vote. So if the fee goes into place in 2011 at $10 bucks, it can go to $11 bucks in 2012, $12.10 in 2013, and so on and so on - until it gets to the state maximum which is like $20 bucks a credit hour. I expect the administration to raise this fee by 10% every single year so that we can fund this program the way that it SHOULD be. In three years, just off the increases alone we will have back that original $3 bucks an hour that the student service fee was giving us, and we will be able to retire THIS debt well ahead of schedule. Plus we will be able to buy out lousy coaches if they do not produce. This fee was such a huge thing for NT and athletics, I really don't think that people know the magnitude of it. The stadium is just the tip of the iceberg.

Guys, we have a guaranteed stream of revenue - it is called the athletic department. They have already shown that they are willing and able to retire debt with the Athletic Center. The state law simply states that student fees cannot pay for more than 50%. Realistically, we raised about $3 million in donations for the AC - so the rest of the debt was paid down from the Athletic Department over 3 years. Let's lowball the AC as a $9 million dollar project - 6 million paid off over 3 years, about $2 million a year. Even if the Department was conservative and only retired $2 million/year - they would take care of the other $30 million in 15 years. That is with zero sponsors which we all know will happen as soon as a concrete structure is being built. This isn't rocket science.

I am also very puzzled as to why everyone is all of the sudden "puzzled"... Dr B was very clear, she would not sign off on a new stadium until at least half the funding was in place. This was before the student vote. It was the entire REASON for the student vote. It was her most aggresive stance against building any type of stadium without a student fee in place. No stadium (or athletic facility) is ever 100% funded before you break ground, if that was the case - nobody would ever build anything. Even if the Athletic Department doesn't get a single larg ticket donation, they can retire the debt the same way that they did with the Athletic Center loans. In fact, they will have a much easier path to retiring the debt now that they have an actual DEDICATED athletic fee to run the program with. Will a lot of this fee go to the stadium? Yes, but some of it will go to day to day operations and scholarships that had to be subsidized by donations in the past. It is really silly, it is like taking out of the left pocket and putting into the right - but that is exactly how this thing will get paid for. The stadium is a done deal, it was a done deal the day that the "yes" beat the "no"... For those of you that cannot wrap your minds around it - just look at The Athletic Center. It was like $9.7 million to build (going off of memory, could have been $7.9).. We had a million dollar donation and then a few other smaller ones but for the most part, it was paid for with loans. Those loans were paid back by the Athletic Department (and they were paid off 3 years earlier than expected). The money came from lots of things - body bag games, donations, merchandising, season ticket sales, Mean Green Club donation, other medium donations... etc etc. The stadium (I imagine) will be built the same way. Instead of loans, it will be bonds. The fact that the Athletic Department has already shown their ability to retire debt is a HUGE plus... I don't think that people give RV the credit that he deserves because he actually helped the department build a credit line throughout this LONG process. Bad coaching hire? Sure - but he sure as hell made this stadium happen with the help of hard working students like Flyer. Many would have thought that it would have been impossible but we will break ground after the State approves this, like it or not.

So is it possible for both Boise and Utah to get in? And if the football gods do let that happen - how will those units be divided (or not be divided). From what I understand, the first non-auto-qualifier splits the money with the other non-auto-qualifier conferences and then with their own conference. I do not know of any rule for a second team. Would the second team keep the entire share? Without having to give out any of the proceedings to teams from the MAC, Sun Belt, etc..? That is just weird to think that the 2nd highest non-auto team would get rewarded more (monetarily) than the higher ranked team. I doubt that the BCS fagoids let it happen, even though both teams deserve it. Maybe they will just stick them in a game verses one another and tell them to slpit one unit. No way they give up more than one piece to the pie. What happens with the Big East after this year? Highest ranked team is #19? With only one other team clinging around in the top 25? I mean, what does the MWC have to do to replace them? I think that this season, they deserve to replace the Big East. Is it a 3 year rule (being ranked as a conference ahead of the Big East 3 years in a row)? Help me out here guys - with NT down, I am routing for these Cinderella teams!

http://client1.sigmachat.com/sc.php?id=73780

Question for you legal eagles... When a person gets an expungement, does the arrest go away from the record completely? Obviously, I am not a legal guy - I was under the impression that the record can be cleaned up but that the actual arrest (with booking) is always there in case a person commits another crime (so that it can show a trend).. Is that not correct?

You are somewhat right - the details of the case would be gone, but the arrest would always be there. There is no possible way to get an arrest off of your record without expungement and that usually takes going up the ladder practically to the lt governor. In some cases, it is worse to not have the details because you can't ask about it. Deferred is still a guilty plea - so if you lie on an application (Have you ever been found guilty of a felony crime), it hurts your chances as well. How do you answer that? The answer is kind of yes and kind of no. Either way, my point was - this could have easily been worked out between the parents and the player. Maybe they did try to work it out, I don't know. It doesn't sound like they tried to work it out though. And the 26 thing just makes me laugh, the new vending machines on campus take cards - so if you go get a coke, that is one... you go to get some chips, that is two... some cookies, that is three. The amount of dollars should be looked at, not the amount of swipes in my opinion. Less than $400 bucks should be a misdemeanor, not a felony. I really don't think that I need my tax dollars going to a public defender to help this guy plea a case that shouldn't have happened in the first place. I think that the UNT cops got so dang excited that they were able to have a "case" of this magnitude that they jumped all over it. They are used to riding their bikes, giving out parking tickets... and occasionally - if they get REALLY lucky, they can write a ticket for urination in public if a kid can't hold it until he/she makes it back to their dorm from Fry Street

The deferred adjudication only keeps a GUILTY off of the record - it still shows the incident happened. Many companies will not hire a person based on the incident being on there at all. There is this huge misconception that those incidents just get wiped off your record. If it is a traffic ticket - yes... not an actual crime. It is there forever. While companies are not supposed to judge a candidate on these things, it is always there on the background check. If the company really wants to hire the guy, maybe they overlook it - but if it between him and someone with nothing on the record, the clean record wins out. Especially since this involved money, he certainly won't be eligible for a job dealing with banks or any financial matters. I had a guy working for me from a temp agency and he was a rock star employee. We tried to bring him on full time and did his background check to find out that he has behind on his student loan payments. Well, most companies (including mine) will not hire a person that has defaulted on more than 10K worth of debt. So you have a person that is out of work for "x" amount of months... they finally get an opportunity through a temp agency and go in to prove themselves... that person does great and is finally going to get employment with benefits and guess what?? Because they got behind (due to unemployment) - they cannot get full time work. And from what I understand, my company is pretty lenient on background and credit checks. Most companies these days don't let you have up to $10K of defaulted debt, if you have bad credit - you don't get the job. Same goes for these "deferred" guilty pleas... can we legally discriminate on it? No... but we can sure as heck decide to go with another candidate based on their "qualifications". No reason needs to be given as to why someone does or does not get a job.

When we first announced the Athletic Center, didn't we sell these exact naming rights to some Denton Hospital? Also, last I checked - we got a cool million for the namind rights of the practice fields, not a lousy $200K. Look, everyone is hopping up and down excited down at Lamar that they are going to tee it up against the likes of Central Arkansas and Sam Houston pretty soon. Let them have their moment in the sun. I am sure if we had decomissioned our program and just brought it back after 20 years, there would be a lot of excitement in the Denton area as well.

Thank you Chad, that is EXACTLY what I was saying. It was 26 times because they were vending machine purchases that generally are about $2 bucks each along with something at the mall. I hire people and I would hate for someone to get denied a job for a STUPID STUPID STUPID mistake that he made in college. They were friends, he didn't steal it out of the mail - he took it from a friend. Look at the details, the girl's parents just asked her to cut back on her spending - so she probably used it for these same things and maybe she even told him it was ok once or twice to get a soft drink or some chips and he went overboard by sneaking it a whole bunch more. I am not saying that he should just "get away with it" - what I was saying was that it is less than $400 bucks and I don't really think that a felony arrest is needed for a dorm room vending machine debacle. God, do none of you remember age 18? People make mistakes, felonies stay on yuour record the rest of your life. This was overkill. The kid had texted the girl several times apologizing, the parents could have surely worked something out with getting the money back and even if they didn't, I wouldn't ruin someone's life for $400 bucks.

Umm, is arresting him really neccesary? For $400 bucks??? Come on parents, the kid admitted it and I am sure he would have paid it back. I do not consider this a crime, I consider this as a very young guy (freshman) making a stupid mistake. There really was no reason to arrest him for this.

Video of Rick Rod going nuts about message board:

TCU would probably agree to play us as a one game series like that but why would we do that? There are plenty of teams that will play us home and home (SMU, Tulsa, Rice, Army, NAVY, half the MAC, etc...) I am surprised that A&M would give $500K for a FCS team but Waters has asked Belt schools to take no less than a million for canned hunt games in the future.

Tiger Bait.

Troy holds them to a 3 and out than fumbles the punt, LSU ball on the Troy 21. Just bizarre.

Troy keeps passing and stopping the clock. This game was won - all they had to do was run the ball and run the clock. They really deserve to lose after this. Even if they just went 3 and out, if they used the whole clock - LSU wouldn't have had time to get back in this... but these incomplete passes are killing them.

Well, LSU is within a TD (7 points) with a full 11 minutes left and all the momentum in the world, I would say that they have come back. I am hoping Troy gets back in it but they were getting all the right bounces and bobbles earlier and now everything that can go wrong is going wrong... grrr

They were up by 4 touchdowns and they kept throwing... why not run the ball and the clock? They are blowing this big time - and the refs just gave a facemask to add insult to injury. So frustrating.