letsgiveacheer

Liberty pouring the coals to Arkansas; 14-0, 2nd qtr.

I am not convinced that we have ever had a "Golden Age", especially now. As Wardly stated, we enjoyed some football success during the Mitchell and Fry tenures and in 1976 (I think) our basketball team was nationally ranked for the only time ever. The Sun Belt run is diminished by the blow-outs we suffered by non-conference opponents. There have been a few other flashes of brilliance, notably our four NCAA golf championships.

I'll also add I believe the reason that Fry is held to such high esteem here is that he is the only former North Texas coach that went on to be a football icon. I can't imagine that anyone who follows college football would not know of Hayden Fry. He even had a TV show patterned after him! Ironically, Rod Rust went on the be a NFL head coach. He did not last long, however. Maybe one season?

Agree with all you have said. Mitchell also brought us to major college status in 1957 when we joined the MVC. I will add that in those pre-internet days, Mitchell was not talked about much by the time Fry came around. Rod Rust had been our coach for six years. Rust did quite well with Mitchell's recruits but once they all graduated, the wheels came off and Rust had three terrible seasons, leading to his dismissal. On a personal note, I had the pleasure of meeting Odus Mitchell and he was very unassuming and modest. Quite a gentleman as well as a successful coach.

Hilltoppers favored by 10.

That's a good thing. Who likes a noisy eater?

I'm not a fan of black, but those helmets look great!

Some fun facts. We have played SMU, Texas State, and New Mexico State more times than any other teams. http://mcubed.net/ncaaf/series/nt/index.shtml

Details... The helmet and pants in the inserts are not the same as the uniform being worn.

Regardless, they were ranked in five weeks and we have not been ranked in the AP poll since we started playing major college ball in 1957.

I believe these are all time records, not just recent. I think the last time we were ranked was 1977 but that was the coaches poll. Have we ever been ranked in the AP top 25? Interestingly, James Madison was ranked 25 last week, five games as a FBS team.

Hello Greenminer! I am speaking of an expected ROI from the funds given to our athletic program. I can think of no G5 school that has benefited to any great success due to its prowess on the field or from exposure on TV. As an example, our endowment and enrollment are very similar to UTA who, as you know, does not play football. UTD has an endowment about 4 times of UNT. These schools are doing quite well. In terms of name recognition, maybe a hard core fan will know about the Chanticleers, Montaineers, Dukes, or whoever else, but ask the average joe about Boise St., and they will just shrug their shoulders. Regarding your GB analogy, I would have to do some research before I could agree or disagree. I will say that the 15-20K fans that watch them at home games are pretty much the same people every time. The COM maintains a huge You Tube presence and there are videos with millions of "likes" from around the world. Couple that with a vigorous concert schedule (multiple events every day) and I would estimate that more people are exposed to the COM from concerts than from football games. Please don't get me wrong. I love UNT football as much as anybody, but I would enjoy it at a D3 level just as much. It just bothers me that we, and about everyone else, place so many resources in something where the returns are negligible.

I make my little comments but I swear, where is the end to this? On the bye week, instead of keeping my ear glued to the Varsity app and listening to the game, I went to see the nearest college football game I could find, which happened to be in Danville Va; the Averett Cougars vs the Randolph-Macon Yellow Jackets. A ODAC D3 showdown! I had no allegiance to either team other than a former president of Randolph- Macon was a roommate of my father at William and Mary. Both schools have enrollments of less than 2,000. I had a great time. The stadium was overflowing, there were at least 50 tents up for tailgating, and everyone was really into the game. As I see coaches who are paid more than the president, ever-expanding AD staffs, and athletic programs that are propped up on the backs of students, I have yet to see a justification for any of this. Forget about "athletics being the window of the university" because this is just not true for G5 schools like us. I have posted something like this before, but one day, some smart president is going to wake up and ask themselves what is the point of all this? As I saw on Saturday, a true college game-day experience can be had without this craziness. PS. In case you are wondering, it was a blow out with RM winning 55-7.

We will soon have more AD staff members than fans.

Correct and my guess is that the change was made in 1961 when we became a university.

Unless I am getting senile (highly likely), it's been "striving for the right" since my time at North Texas. Rhythmically, "forever in the right" is not correct and would have received a D- in composition class. I have no idea when the change was made but it was a long, long, time ago. Objectively speaking, and as someone who has played and conducted both more times than I care to count, our fight song and alma mater are musically disappointing. I wish we had something else but it is what we have and what we love.

Does anyone else besides me have difficulty with RV's sentax?

We almost made it two weeks without a post about SMU. I'd call that progress.

The source is openpayrolls.com. I believe this is as of 2020.

There once was coach named Littrell Whose teams were not often that swell He said with a grin Just look at our wins The cellar we no longer dwell

Excellent!

Well, shoot.

Keeping Texas' German heritage in mind, some polkas would be nice.

Nice!!

We write as if this lack of culture, support, and interest was unique to North Texas. It is not. If you have ever been to an away game at any of our C-USA conference mates, you will most likely see more empty seats than occupied. There are any number of articles speaking to the declining interest and attendance of football programs across the board, including the big boys. People are just not interested and it is getting worse.