La Tech Fans Saying They Will Hammer NORTH TEXAS!

PlummMeanGreen · October 16, 2005

Just weeks ago and during the summer I said the opposite would happen inasmuch that we would hammer La Tech. Well...........

Anyone want to pass it on to our Mean Green football players that La Techsters are making jokes about our school and our school's football team?

GMG!

bison · October 16, 2005

and why shouldn't they -- four conference champships, three bowl losses and now I can set up a defense that will stop DD in his tracks. I've seen it all losses, wins, but this less than excellent attitude is not acceptable.

ipEAGLE · October 16, 2005

Its ok for them to make jokes about this yrs team... we deserve it.

October 16, 2005

Tech will need to savor any victory because not many are coming their way. Although we are struggling, they are nothing to get excited about. If our players can get out there and get fired up, they can whallop a team like this. The question is whether our players are ready to get out there and knock some heads. I would think it would sure beat the alternative. I was so excited when they went up there to MT and won. But even then, there was little offensive production. Come on, Mean Green! Kick the crap out of Tech!

Baby Arm! · October 16, 2005

If we had ANY kind of offense I think we would have a decent chance of beating LaTech but Meager & Co. have been so anemic I won't be surprised to see us get shut out.

Eight turnovers and only 13 points????, against FI freakin U??!!!!

Things are worse than I thougt. I haven't seen our offense this bad since the dark days in the mid-90's.

IslandEagle · October 16, 2005

If we had ANY kind of offense I think we would have a decent chance of beating LaTech but Meager & Co. have been so anemic I won't be surprised to see us get shut out.
Eight turnovers and only 13 points????, against FI freakin U??!!!!
Things are worse than I thougt. I haven't seen our offense this bad since the dark days in the mid-90's.
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You are absolutely right. Why should Tech fans think they can clobber us? They probably can and probably will, as much as I hate to say it.

PlummMeanGreen · October 16, 2005

If we had ANY kind of offense I think we would have a decent chance of beating LaTech but Meager & Co. have been so anemic I won't be surprised to see us get shut out.
Eight turnovers and only 13 points????, against FI freakin U??!!!!
Things are worse than I thougt. I haven't seen our offense this bad since the dark days in the mid-90's.
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Never-minding our QB position, but the thing that has surprised me the most about our 2005 Mean Green offense is the lack of scoring from our running back position no matter who is in the backfield.

Last year, our bread and butter was the play of the running back position, ie, Jamario Thomas and company. Yet this season in key times that our offense needs to step it up a knotch (like in the Red Zone) we have no running game to speak of that can score. Now if that is Meager's fault I tend to doubt it, but this part of our team confuses me more than anything.

I think things on our 2005 offense can still be adjusted and even become effective (and doing that in Ruston for La Tech's homecoming would be a good start) but for the moment, I'm totally baffled with this most strategic problem on our team.

Will someone please remind me who we lost on last year's offensive line whose absence on this years Mean Green football team is making so dramatic a difference?

GMG!

Edited October 16, 2005 by PlummMeanGreen

Got5onIt · October 16, 2005

Why would they not believe they can hammer NT? Every game up to this point says NT will get hammered.

eagle60 · October 16, 2005

Our experienced Center last year was like having an extra "coach" on the field. We are feeling the effects of this now.

NELA87 · October 16, 2005

Our experienced Center last year was like having an extra "coach" on the field. We are feeling the effects of this now.
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Should be a good game, LaTech does have a pretty good team but believe me I will be rooting for you guys Hard to win. Im probably going to the game since ULM is idle for the next 20 days.

gamebreaker · October 16, 2005

lets face reality, we will get our ass kicked again. if anyone wants to say otherwise, then ill be ready to say i told you so. not that i hope that happens, but im just being real. its time to finally face reality about this years team and wake up from your fantacies.

Got5onIt · October 16, 2005

lets face reality, we will get our ass kicked again. if anyone wants to say otherwise, then ill be ready to say i told you so. not that i hope that happens, but im just being real. its time to finally face reality about this years team and wake up from your fantacies.
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Got5onIt · October 16, 2005

Never-minding our QB position, but the thing that has surprised me the most about our 2005 Mean Green offense is the lack of scoring from our running back position no matter who is in the backfield.
Last year, our bread and butter was the play of the running back position, ie, Jamario Thomas and company. Yet this season in key times that our offense needs to step it up a knotch (like in the Red Zone) we have no running game to speak of that can score. Now if that is Meager's fault I tend to doubt it, but this part of our team confuses me more than anything.
I think things on our 2005 offense can still be adjusted and even become effective (and doing that in Ruston for La Tech's homecoming would be a good start) but for the moment, I'm totally baffled with this most strategic problem on our team.
Will someone please remind me who we lost on last year's offensive line whose absence on this years Mean Green football team is making so dramatic a difference?
GMG!
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I think it all boils down to the pathetic passing game and abyssmal play from the QB position. That has been the running games worst enemy. The coaches have Meager on a VERY short leash to try and limit his mistakes. It's working so far, but averaging 90yds passing per game isn't going to cut it. The OL can't block everyone. No matter how you slice it and dice it, 5 linemen can't block 9 defensive players.

meangreendork · October 17, 2005

I think it all boils down to the pathetic passing game and abyssmal play from the QB position. That has been the running games worst enemy. The coaches have Meager on a VERY short leash to try and limit his mistakes. It's working so far, but averaging 90yds passing per game isn't going to cut it. The OL can't block everyone. No matter how you slice it and dice it, 5 linemen can't block 9 defensive players.
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Correct you are. Good passing will draw the blitz off and give the linemen better odds. We know that's the major problem with the offense, but fixing it is another story.

FirefightnRick · October 17, 2005

Will someone please remind me who we lost on last year's offensive line whose absence on this years Mean Green football team is making so dramatic a difference?

From an August '05 DRC article.

This year, on paper, the offensive line doesn’t look to be that experienced, with the loss of Brewster, Lonnie Chambers and Weston Thaggard.
But don’t be so quick to judge.
Back is Joel Foster, who started every game in 2004 at left tackle; Jeremy Brown, who started the first four games last season before contracting mononucleosis; Jason May, who returns after being ineligible in ’04; and Dylan Lineberry, a stalwart at right guard. The only newcomer is center Chad Rose, who Dickey believes is going to be a fixture there for years to come.
Now they just need to meld.
“Our biggest concern, based on our style of play, how quickly they come together and know each other,” Dickey said of his offensive line. “It is very critical in our system, that that group learns each other and learns how to play with each other. It is going to be important how quickly they come together.”

From another August '05 DRC article

Jeremy Brown seemed to be headed for a standout redshirt freshman season at North Texas last year when he felt a twinge in his throat.
Little did he know, it would be the beginning of a downhill slide.
Brown started the first four games of the 2004 season at offensive tackle before a sore throat developed into strep throat, which turned into mononucleosis. The illness forced Brown to miss three games and left him with plenty of motivation to capitalize on a second chance to develop into one of the top players in UNT’s offensive line this season.
“I have been looking forward to this,” Brown said Tuesday following the Mean Green’s only practice of the day. “I feel great and am stronger than I have ever been. I am better than I was last year for sure.”
An improved performance by Brown would be a boost to UNT’s offensive line that lost three starters after last season, including Weston Thaggard.
Thaggard started the last eight games of the 2004 season in place of Brown before deciding during the offseason to give up football.

So from those who played in the N.O. Bowl against Southern Miss, we lost Brewster, Chambers and Thaggard. Brown, who returned this year, started in front of Thaggard early on last season until he got ill, and May, who blocked for Cobbs all of the '03 season, and who would have started in front of Chambers last year but was ineligible, is back this year. So our only inexperience going into this season on the offensive line who didn't have a start under his belt blocking for a national rushing champion was Rose, who replaced Brewster this season.

Since the 1999 season I have paid closer attention to our offensive line play than ever before and every year, every damn year we have had changes with personnel here and there. And every year we have struggled early on for the first 5 or 6 games before all five start to gell in "our style of play". And next season we lose May and Lineberry from the offensive line and I expect we will struggle the first 5 or 6 games again. To me, if this system weighs so heavily on the play of the offensive line but is so difficult to learn that they have to go through this every year then that tells me something needs to change. We will lose someone every year. But I'm not sure we can afford it every year?

Rick

FirefightnRick · October 17, 2005

By the way, the veteran Jeremy Brown has been benched for sophomore Josh Alexander. I believe FIU was Alexanders second start of the season.

Rick

PlummMeanGreen · October 17, 2005

By the way, the veteran Jeremy Brown has been benched for sophomore Josh Alexander. I believe FIU was Alexanders second start of the season.
Rick
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It's a definite under-statement that DD and assistants are going to have to go after some JUCO offensive and defensive linemen during the JUCO recruiting push assuming they are available and are not wanting to go to USC. We need many of these JUCO's in our January classes so they can play Spring, uh, I mean Winter football.

It's been on both side of the trenches where we've been dominated much of this season. We have been man-handled in ways we haven't seen our football team treated for several years and none of us are quite used to this kind of treatment just yet. You can't start every play on defense with your DL getting slobber-knocked back into the linebacking corp many times during a game and expect to stop most offenses, specifically those on our OOC schedule and now even those in the SBC.

We have to hope this team can improve dramatically because like the kind of offense we have that you can't afford to get too far behind in in any game and expect to rally for a win, our football program can ill afford to get behind other SBC football programs who appear on the rise. We just cannot afford to do that in Mean Green Country and you who have been around the Mean Green scene awhile know all the reasons why .

GMG!