President Smatresk

[UNT90]

I know you are new here, and I'm sure RV has tried to put his nose as far up your keister (that's butt to country folk) as possible, but please don't believe the excuses he will tell you to justify this embarrassing defeat.

It isn't Harris's fault for blowing up after the ODU game.

Just like it wasn't Tony Mitchell's fault in 2013, or Chris Jones's fault in 2014.

You have an AD that has been here 14 years and is 120 some odd games under .500 in revenue sports. An AD that has constantly blamed players for HIS failures, an AD that will lie to his fan base in a Southern Miss minute if it means covering his own keister.

Is that really who you want in that position?

If you choose to fight this fight, realize it's going to be a battle. The BOR as a whole really doesn't care about athletics and RV has cultivated close friendships with many big donors (job security, don't ya know). I don't know where you find the money to make the move, but, make no mistake, you need to find that money.

If not, realize you will lose yet another generation of donors, a continuing problem which this university has ignored for decades. You will see the best attended football game every year be a half empty beautiful football stadium that RV hasn't managed to sell out. Ever. And I know you like football.

You may see about 1k at basketball games. The same 1k that would show up to watch air simply out of habit.

This is getting weary. Many have given up basketball season tickets already. Will football be next?

Make him accountable.

Finally.

Edited March 12, 2015 by UNT90

[FirefightnRick]

@UNTPrez

Do it, I dare Ya!

Rick

[UNT15]

President Smatresk,

Please let the BOR know that you want to bring in YOUR guy. This is a chance to make your own hire and put your own stamp on UNT's Athletic Department. RV's time is done; we can't ride that horse any further.

P.S. I'm really excited that your signature will be on my diploma in less than two months. Why don't you sign RV's pink slip while you're it? Do it for the kids

[UNT90]

@UNTPrez

Do it, I dare Ya!

Rick

I'm sure he will see it here.

[DeepGreen]

I'm sure he will see it here.

Do it. Just in case he uses a private server.

[untjim1995]

Dear Neal,

If you care about winning in sports that people actually follow and pay money to watch, and if you care so much about it that you want to fight the BOR's anti-athletics members, go for it. If the BOR refuses to help you with this, make it public. Don't hide anything about it. You'll get a job somewhere else anyway that has much less troubles financially than you have here. Show everyone waht we are dealing with here in a public fashion, that athletics are well below music and arts, education, and low cost tuition on the totem pole.

If you don't care about winning in revenue sports, congratulations on the rest of your UNT Presidency. You should be able to stay here for at least a decade, if not longer. You'll continue to lose the segment of the alumni base that COULD help this place more than you could ever imagine, men who like sports and have a competitive streak. These are men with business and sales backgrounds, men with leadership positions that know lots of others who could be swayed to help. They stay away in droves here, unlike at the other places in the state. So ignore them some more, but they are your best bet to fix the financial mess that you inherited, a mess that probably doesn't become a huge issue if we tried to tap into the reservoir of men who have graduated from this place and have grown in their careers. We lost 25 years of alumni because of small thinking. If you don't want to fix that, it won't surprise me, since the BOR handpicked you, but it will make you look like you are just a company line man, a sellout, if you will, since you came from UNLV and showed the exact opposite type of care about revenue sports as we have shown here forever. Either you are you're own man or you're a sellout, no different than those corporate jerks that so many in academia complain about all the time. I'd just hate it if you got labeled as being a sellout. But if you don't care about winning in revenue sports HERE, than that's all you are in many ways, a bought man told to think and sell a belief that is totally opposite of how you were in Las Vegas.

Who are you, Neal? The next year will tell us a whole lot about this. We cut bait with a womens hoops coach because his record was atrocious. Benford's isn't anywhere near that bad, but his tenure as a coach of an even bigger revenue sport is much more disappointing than that of the womens coach we just fired. And if McCarney cannot find his mojo again, its looking very possible that we are going back to the days of being a boring program that loses a lot, similar to the Dickey years, sans 2002-2004.Whatever direction you choose, just let us know publically. Because right now, a lot of people don't know what YOU want, so they have to make assumptions from either your UNLV background or the history of the university and our views on athletics. We need direction--one way or the other. We just need to know if this is waht you are content with, like the BOR has been, if you aren't content with it, but the BOR won't budge, or if you can sway them to see that we need to make winning our clear goal and money won't be the problem anymore in determining who is the head coach in football, mens hoops, or womens hoops. We just need you to tell us in a clear and concise fashion.

Sincerely,

GMG.com

[FirefightnRick]

Plummer, that you?

Rick

[untjim1995]

Plummer, that you?

Rick

You'd think, but I don't use colors or fonts...there's only Plumm!!

[gradumacated]

He's bringing in his own Provost over the summer so make it a two-fer and send Athletics in a new direction as well. It's about three years over due.

[GrandGreen]

Dear Neal,

If you care about winning in sports that people actually follow and pay money to watch, and if you care so much about it that you want to fight the BOR's anti-athletics members, go for it. If the BOR refuses to help you with this, make it public. Don't hide anything about it. You'll get a job somewhere else anyway that has much less troubles financially than you have here. Show everyone waht we are dealing with here in a public fashion, that athletics are well below music and arts, education, and low cost tuition on the totem pole.

If you don't care about winning in revenue sports, congratulations on the rest of your UNT Presidency. You should be able to stay here for at least a decade, if not longer. You'll continue to lose the segment of the alumni base that COULD help this place more than you could ever imagine, men who like sports and have a competitive streak. These are men with business and sales backgrounds, men with leadership positions that know lots of others who could be swayed to help. They stay away in droves here, unlike at the other places in the state. So ignore them some more, but they are your best bet to fix the financial mess that you inherited, a mess that probably doesn't become a huge issue if we tried to tap into the reservoir of men who have graduated from this place and have grown in their careers. We lost 25 years of alumni because of small thinking. If you don't want to fix that, it won't surprise me, since the BOR handpicked you, but it will make you look like you are just a company line man, a sellout, if you will, since you came from UNLV and showed the exact opposite type of care about revenue sports as we have shown here forever. Either you are you're own man or you're a sellout, no different than those corporate jerks that so many in academia complain about all the time. I'd just hate it if you got labeled as being a sellout. But if you don't care about winning in revenue sports HERE, than that's all you are in many ways, a bought man told to think and sell a belief that is totally opposite of how you were in Las Vegas.

Who are you, Neal? The next year will tell us a whole lot about this. We cut bait with a womens hoops coach because his record was atrocious. Benford's isn't anywhere near that bad, but his tenure as a coach of an even bigger revenue sport is much more disappointing than that of the womens coach we just fired. And if McCarney cannot find his mojo again, its looking very possible that we are going back to the days of being a boring program that loses a lot, similar to the Dickey years, sans 2002-2004.Whatever direction you choose, just let us know publically. Because right now, a lot of people don't know what YOU want, so they have to make assumptions from either your UNLV background or the history of the university and our views on athletics. We need direction--one way or the other. We just need to know if this is waht you are content with, like the BOR has been, if you aren't content with it, but the BOR won't budge, or if you can sway them to see that we need to make winning our clear goal and money won't be the problem anymore in determining who is the head coach in football, mens hoops, or womens hoops. We just need you to tell us in a clear and concise fashion.

Sincerely,

GMG.com

Lets givePresident Smatresk a chance, he has had a few even more pressing issues to deal with than our apathetic athletic department. It would be really strange, for a President to be anything but supportive of his employees on the surface. RV has served four or five presidents, so if nothing else, he has survival skills.

I like what I have seen out of Smatresk thus far and I believe that he has seen enough of NT's athletic department to be very aware of the issues. Hopefully, he will act soon.

[DeepGreen]

Or........

Do the right thing RV, just retire.

[FirefightnRick]

He's bringing in his own Provost over the summer so make it a two-fer and send Athletics in a new direction as well. It's about three years over due.

A tiny ray of hope grows inside from reading these words.

Rick

[JesseMartin]

If he really was cultivating close relationships with big donors, wouldn't we be bringing in a lot more money? I'd be slightly more accepting of everything if we were loading up on cash. Of course, that would mean we had buyout money and they wouldn't have that particular excuse for holding on to poorly performing coaches.

I've always liked Rick, but it is getting to be about the time where it would be nice to get some fresh blood in here pretty soon, somebody with new ideas and the energy that comes with starting a big new job. Rick's been at UNT like 3 times longer than a lot of ADs stick around at their jobs. He got a ton of stuff done and helped change attitudes. He's not popular with everybody, mostly because of revenue sports records, but really, leave while you're still generally well thought of so that good vibes with everybody else can be part of your legacy rather than waiting until you're eventually pushed out, you know?