SCREAMING EAGLE-66

---An ESPN commentator had the best answer why he is really a rat... His resigning doesn't just effect him personally. It effects all the coaches he hired to go there, their families, and the staff in general (trainers and even some behind the scenes and office staff) who moved there . They were commenting that after Jimmy Johnson went to Dallas, he went 1-15 and felt terrible and decided that going back to a college (at least quickly) was not an option because he had hired people that effected about 30 families and that he could not do that to them. He just rolled up his sleeves and said they need to improve and rapidly. He showed a lot more class than new Arkie coach. It worked out for him.. Changing levels (hello Dodge) is difficult and the game is not exactly the same, what works at one level may not be very successful at the next because the opponents have a lot more talent and speed. ----Petrino just "gave up" and quit and to heck with everyone else. He did not even have the "character" to finish one season and put everyone on his staff into a bad situation. This was not a mutual agreement by him and the Falcons for him to disappear midseason. He is a totally selfish Hogg. ---When Weis took the Notre Dame job he finished the year with the Patriots before going to South Bend... Everyone knew he was going to leave but was finishing the year at NE even though they went to the Super Bowl and had an extended season. ...... No doubt it hurt recruiting that first year but he lived up to his agreement. ND probably wishes he would leave now...LOL.

Great answer.... either that or a mirror.....would be the quickest way.

--Those type of "promotions " work very well with baseball and especially minor league baseball... It is a game with a lot of down time (between innings) . I don't think anything like that would work at all with football... any level. Football is constant action with only a brief time between plays... I doubt it would work at all... ---On the other hand, some time of entertainer at halftime MIGHT put a few more people in the seats. Even that is rare except at some really big event... Bowl games or Super Bowls. Those tend to be big party type events and not just the game fans.....

The Scores: Belmont 80 ... Mid Tenn St 86 - OT New Orleans 67 ... Colorado 65 A couple of nice wins...Colorado out of the Big-XII Belmont was 6-3 and been the best team in their conference (Atlantic Sun) and has defeated Alabama and Cincinnatti.... MUTS had lost to Belmont earlier by 23.. quite turn-around.

---The article concentrates on the The Southland teams and North Texas. ....almost no mention of the CUSA ones and not much about the Big-XII ones. The Southland's success can only mean good things for us as well as its gets people looking at the state of State of Texas basketball... and not just Big-XII teams.. It even mentioned UTA's strange gym.. Go Southland.... some of them have some big name games on their schedule. Correction: they did mention Rice of CUSA and how bad they are. SMU was completely ignored as well as TCU, and UTEP. Not really related or in the article but Midland College (Midland, Texas) is the current junior college champion...which contributes some to the Texas basketball image.

NICHOLS STATE is a Southland team. The top three in Southland-West are now 23-1 [sam Houston, SF Austin, and UT-Arlington]

Atlanta locked up a quarterback....LOL.

You that part right... there are more athletes ... but necessarily better. there is only ONE AAAAA district out here, two if you count the one with Lubbock/Amarillo which are not as good. The El Paso area is a lot like the Rio grande not good at all, we don't even consider them at all like us... LubbockAmarillo is much different as well... very little oil, mostly agricultural area. When you consider we should win only 1/32 of the State titles we greatly exceed that one. Plus if you consider the number of times this area make to finals is is even more lopsided... [ we have to defeat the Metroplex and East Texas to get there] .. I notice the guy ignored San Antonio... they have produced a huge amount of good athletes [Detmers for example] and Converse and some others schools really win a lot.... Converse has defeated both Midland Lee and Midland High in AAAAA finals..

-- I think you are missing the point..... A larger stadium means teams that will not come now will consider scheduling us in Denton.. ....... and bigger names will attract more local fans and in cases some of those will bring a large number of fans with them . It will help with our scheduling. Name teams at home AND wins will increase attendance.

---Let them brag.... They view us much as view the Big-XII schools.. The Southland often has several good basketball teams and often just don't get the credit they deserve... They are playing and taking out some bigger names this year. It may help us to linform places that some pretty good basketball is played in Texas. --- The Southland looks very interesting with Sam Houston, S.F.Austin and UT-Arlington having a combined 21-1 record... SFA lost to Tx Texh but SH defeated Tech plus they have defeated OU, us, and Wichita State. There are often a lot of good basketball teams outside the Big-name conferences. --I wish them all the luck in the world. and hope they will support us as well.

Some people like misery and are pessimistic... meanwhile some just drink the Kool-aid and see no problems. We won... that is the important thing... there are always if and buts .... some days a team plays beyond its ability and some days not even close... the point is we won... even when we were not all that sharp and missing players. ..... that is a good thing.

---And the flip side what the attendance would have been without the wet and cold Western Kentucky game after a poor season. The two washed each other out.

---Interesting to note the only two that could be considered Southern universities are Rice which is very tiny (less than 5000) and FIU which had a long losing streak and only won their final game (unfortunately against us)..

---Obviously you have not heard of West Texas... Permian, Abilene, Midland Lee, Brownwood, etc. which includes Ced Benson, Roy Williams, and many more. Other than SouthLake, only Abilene and Lee have won three consecutive state championship and Mojo and Brownwood both have SEVEN state champions. Midland High is the only team is the district that has not won state at least once and they lost in the state finals about 5 years ago. Mojo (Permian) has a well known book, movie and thinly vailed TV series based on their history. Mojo defeated Todd Dodge in the state Finals when he was a HS quarterback at Port Arthur. NT has had many Midland/Odessa players lately , including Brewster, the Pertiles, a tight end and the starting RB prior to Galbreath. --Abilene is in the AAAAA semifinals this year.... Their last two victims were from the Metroplex...three of the last four if you consider Weatherford a metroplex team. They defeated Mesquite, Denton Ryan and Tyler, earlier in the year. that makes it 0-6 for East-Texas/Metroplex teams against them. --Hayden Fry was a graduate of Odessa High and was their quarterback when they won state duirng the forties... You may have heard of him. Ut's current QB is from a small town near Abilene. (maybe 10 miles away). Highland Park's coach is from Abilene. The Ennis coach is from Brownwood and his son lived there for many years until they moved to Ennis, he is now the TxTech QB. A Brownwood kid was the QB at Miami (Fla) for several games this year. . Spike Dykes (coached at TT) is a West Texas native and was a head coach in Midland.. This just a few I can think of quickly. When I was in HS in Brownwood I was walking the halls with several (about 5) future NFL players. We only had 150 in my class.

--- The Southland looks very interesting with Sam Houston, S.F.Austin and UT-Arlington having a combined 21-1 record... SFA lost to Tx Texh but SH defeated Tech plus they have defeated OU, us, and Wichita State. There are often a lot of good basketball teams outside the Big-name conferences.

---Back in old OLD MISSOURI VALLEY DAYS the old men's gym (aka: Snake Pit or The Pit) was packed on week-nights... it wasn't on week-ends because so many left campus.... but then again the enrollment was less than half of what we have now. 3000 should be an easy number to obtain...every game... we were doing that with less students and with teams that sometimes were not doing all that well. Other teams in the conference hated the place because of the crazy crowd here...it really loud.. Students need provide most of the support for basketball, especially weekday games.... Some just don't get it that support brings the school and their degree more recognition and credibility.

That is some Green Kool-aid.... Never underestimate Western Kentucky plus UA-LR is having a good year. It is "possible" but very improbable...

---LaTech missed 27 consecutive shots... a few would-be dunks. TxTech in 19 minutes scored 42 points meanwhile LaTech scored ONE... a free throw. 31 points is the fewest points that TxTech has allowed since 1948... By the way LaTech has defeated LaLa...[ 56-64 ].....so how bad is Lala??? It is LaTech only win. For those who have not read it was: Texas Tech 86 --- LaTech 31

---Bowls are so different than they were when I was in college... I doubt there were over ten and only good teams went. Now it is crazy and every town wants to have one and bring in visitors and $$$$. Even then teams were chosen for the "secondary" bowls based on what kind of crowds they would bring... This one of the reasons that North Texas was ignored duing the Hayden Fry era and also the Joe Green era... not because North Texas was not good but because we would not deliver the fans and $$$ than a team like Nebraska would.

---Does not appear on FSN program in Midland... but it could be wrong... sometimes is. Will look at gametime.

What is wrong with the truth.... we had a very bad year.... A pig with lipstick is still a pig..... Let just be honest about the situation.... I doubt this season met anyones expectations..... To say other otherwise sounds like some politicians we currently have. I may be older than you... who knows... I am definitely no new grad and have claimed NT as my school 40+ years. After the season we just had, I doubt anything we say will have any impact on recruiting..... good or bad.

---I agree with you if you are talking about keeping him a second season....but only partially for the first season. It takes one season to realize the DC wasn't ready for college football. Dodge will be held responsible if no changes are made for year two.. Mendoza "may" be a decent defensive co-ordinator but the season indicates otherwise... especailly since he had so much talent returning. The head coach can only do so much especially the first season when there are so many areas to address and even more so since the offense was making drastic changes from what had existed in the past . ---This is pure speculation but I feel the coaching staff by promoting sophmore/freshman over seniors lost a lot of leadership and hurt morale. It makes sense if the freshman is "obviously" much better but not otherwise. Give them playing time but not starting roles. Very few of you would accept a " rookie kid" as your supervisior or boss if you had been there several years and paid your dues and felt you were as qualified as the new guy. Team morale is extremely important especially in football. This may not show from the stands but I am sure it does in the lockerroom. I am sure a lot of seniors viewed it as a lost year and thought they had been swept aside as part of the "old DD group"...

---I agree.... considering how many starters were back on defense... this year was worse than awful.... and often against some some really weak teams... Something drastic needs to change on defense... Those players should have done as well as last year or maybe better since so many returned.... This is what points to the coaching staff.. the morale of the defense may have gone south but even the defensive coaching staff is largely responsible for that also well...

---I supported Dodge replacing DD who played a very dull game and no longer could win and had ticked off the fans. At least no one complains about the unimaginative offense anymore this year.... I thought we could win a minimum 5 games and still think we should have. Dodge has had his "free pass".... He needs to improve greatly next time.... The Belt is rapidly improving* but he needs to get back to .500 in this league or there will be a lot of unhappy natives around Denton.... *The Belt is now reguarded as a stable conference and is recruiting better and giving some "name" teams some pretty good games and even a few wins against them. We should have defeated SMU, Navy, Arkie State and FIU and ULL.... well at least 4 of that group. Several we lead into the 4th quarter but could not keep them out of the endzone... awful defensive play..

Well the loss to FIU did produce ONE GOOD THING.......... SMU now has the nation's longest losing streak (along with two other colleges... at 10 games).. The bad news their last win was North Texas... We lost to two 1-11 teams, both of which would have been winless had we beaten them...