A Big Dose Of Perspective

[UNTLifer]

DRC.com

Read this and then move on. It's time to get ready for SMUt.

[rcade]

Read this and then move on. It's time to get ready for SMUt.

No offense, but what's with all of the people telling us here to move on? The debut of the Todd Dodge era has been obsessively anticipated for months. OU hung more points on us than any other school in our history. I can't speak for the other mopes, but I need at least until Wednesday to fully suffer this loss.

[KingDL1]

No offense, but what's with all of the people telling us here to move on? The debut of the Todd Dodge era has been obsessively anticipated for months. OU hung more points on us than any other school in our history. I can't speak for the other mopes, but I need at least until Wednesday to fully suffer this loss.

I am not very mopey, I am glad TD didn't fold and try to burn the clock, it gave our players more experience. The more reps in real game play with our new offense the better. OU and most the top 10 teams play games they feel they can easily win the first game of the season as a warm up or scrimmage. Why not treat the OU game that way once you know you were going to lose? It is just a W or L in the column after the game.

I said before in terms of a blow-out in this setting I don't care if it is 30 points or a hundred. TD is building from scratch, its not like this is his forth year here and we are having record blow-outs like the last two years.

I think the mopes who want mope go ahead if it helps, hell mope your hearts out! I would think that tonight's SMU game would be a good time to stop, but what do I know I not very mopey.

Go Mean Green!!!!!

Edited September 3, 2007 by KingDL1

[MGW]

No offense, but what's with all of the people telling us here to move on? The debut of the Todd Dodge era has been obsessively anticipated for months. OU hung more points on us than any other school in our history. I can't speak for the other mopes, but I need at least until Wednesday to fully suffer this loss.

No offense taken. I consider myself a relative newcomer to UNT athletics, having only followed the Mean Green since my arrival at the school in 1995. The one constant during my tenure as a Mean Green fan has been the high expectations of our fans leading into every season.

With respect to this year's team, and this year's expectation of the GMG mob (or is it mopes?), I read many posters expecting the Mean Green to be a top 25 team by year's end. Don't get me wrong - I hope that happens, but I do not expect that to happen.

Dickey ball would have kept the score closer on Saturday, but I appreciate our new style of play and our willingness to attempt to slug it out with Oklahoma. As far as this year is concerned, OU was a body bag game. Sure, 79-10 stings, but realize this is a rebuilding year and our coach didn't play run down the clock just so we can keep with within 50.

Because it is a new system Dodge is implementing, I think SMU might be a tougher challenge than it was for the Mean Green last year. For me, losing to SMU would be more painful than getting spizanked by OU.

All that said, the good thing about lowering your expectations for this year's team is that the wins will be sweeter and the losses won't hurt nearly as much - especially last week's game.

GO MEAN GREEN!

[rcade]

Dickey ball would have kept the score closer on Saturday, but I appreciate our new style of play and our willingness to attempt to slug it out with Oklahoma.

I cheered when Dodge went for it on fourth down early in the first half, rather than kicking a field goal that would've made the score 21-3. Getting the goose egg off the board is OK in the third quarter when there's no chance of a comeback, but if you're not playing to win in the first half, you're telling the team that it's OK to lose.

Edited September 3, 2007 by rcade

[eulesseagle]

"Just about" everyone will have to admit there were bright spots in the defeat to Oklahoma.

Watching the game on TV, UNT did have these positives against the #8 team in the nation:

1. Our defensive line against an OU's offensive line that was about 50-60 pounds heavier looked solid.

2. Meager looked confident and threw the ball really well (15-27) with a few dropped by the receivers.

3. Vizza had some snap on the ball and was confident running the ball.

4. UNT did not give up and kept trying to move the ball down the field.

5. UNT has another excellent punter. Great hang time.

6. Special teams looked good.

What looked like glaring defiencies to me was the play of the cornerbacks and safeties. It appeared that anything to the soft corners and deep was "big" yardage.

Anyone can "nit pic" the positives that I cited but for a casual observer looking at the game objectively UNT just can not complete with these types of programs, yet.

IMHO, UNT will be able to compete with the other mid-major programs in 2007 and we should all look for massive improvements to the next two games against SMU and FAU.

[The Fake Lonnie Finch]

On the whole Meager versus Vizza thing...

If Daniel Meager can go 15-27 against OU, things aren't as bad as the anti-Meagers think. He wasn't doing that well against much worse competition last year. I think Vizza is a better runner, although Meager did have a nice run. Vizza also appears to throw a better long ball. Either way, it looks like we'll do well as the season progresses. I can't really complain about either guy at this point.

[The Fake Lonnie Finch]

Also, Euless -

Did you notice OU put in former Trinity DL Tommy Taggart in the fourth quarter? Other DFW walk-ons I noticed were Carrollton Creekview's Derek Gove and Rowlett's Garrett Bothun.

I bet we get guys like this coming to UNT instead of them going up to OU before too long.

[SouthBendGreen]

This game doesn't affect me at all. During the whole predict the score thread I stayed away because I expected like 63-3. This was easy to see coming and it means nothing really. I'm not nearly as upset about this loss as I might be if we drop a game the game to SMU or another belt team.

[UNTLifer]

Believe it or not, considering we had no returning starters on the OL, I was pretty pleased overall with their play. Well, Venegas was having trouble, but overall I was pleased considering this was the first extended play for many of them and they were facing OU.

Edited September 3, 2007 by UNTLifer

[PlummMeanGreen]

Believe it or not, considering we had no returning starters on the OL, I was pretty pleased overall with their play. Well, Venegas was having trouble, but overall I was pleased considering this was the first extended play for many of them and they were facing OU.

Good points, UNTLifer...

The only thing that bothers me right now about our team is how long it usually takes a new offensive line to mesh and mold into a unit. Last year's offensive line had some veterans in it and that makes a difference.

SMU marched right into Fouts Field and into a Mean Green buzz saw last season. I have a fear that the Mean Green are going to march into Ford Stadium and into a Mustang buzz saw. The home field with this kind of game can be a difference-maker.

Certainly, we all hope for a win this Saturday against SMU, but we have to keep our eyes on the real prize which we may not be able to attain until TDodge's recruits become 4-5 year residents at the Mean Green Village. We need to hope for improvement this next Saturday night at SMU and if that improvement will translate into a win, that would be a bonus.

I defer to the signature below and hope our fans don't put all of their season into one game, ie, the SMU game. What we need to eventually happen in Denton will be much more important than any win over SMU and in any year. Did beating SMU last year really mean much to us toward the end of last season, uh, like during those closing weeks which included BlackJerseyGate?

TRIVIA: The last 2 UNT coaches to beat SMU did not return as Mean Green head football coaches the following season, so I guess a Mean Green win over SMU could have hardly been called job-savers, right?

Nor will it hardly be called a program breaker if we were to get beat this Saturday--as most of you know by now, we are a work in progress, folks, but when the TDodge foundation has been established at UNT, we hopeully will be looking at Top 25 rankings with our future bowl teams and I think we would all agree that that would be the kind of success we all want from here on out in Mean Green Country.

Edited September 3, 2007 by PlummMeanGreen

[Cr1028]

The biggest bright spot I saw was the fun factor on offense. I understand we didn't light it up but I had more fun watching this game than I did in last years game vs UT(except for the Woody TD pass). Tackling wasn't perfect but it was better than last year's opener. The best part was still giving an effort despite the score. Dickey knows the outcome before the game and just pounds J-mo's (or whoever else's) head against the wall. Run the clock out and get out alive is a recipe for some boring-ass football. I'm excited about SMU!