Strong Words From Canales After Game

November 14, 2010

I really like his composure, and he really believes in his players. It's a good thing to see them fight and not give up down the stretch. Just like Canales is trying to prove himself to earn the job on a permanent basis, the players have to prove themselves for the next guy as well.

http://www.ntdaily.com/?p=13750

Mean Green 93-98 · November 14, 2010

‘Lance Dunbar running through a big hole.’ Those were the words repeated over and over again by the voice of the Mean Green George Dunham on 100.7 The Word, as the Green Blur embarrassed the Middle Tennessee (3-6, 2-3) defense for 272 total yards and a touchdown.

KNTU ought to be ashamed reading that paragraph.

November 14, 2010

KNTU ought to be ashamed reading that paragraph.

Well KNTU had the Denton High School game on, so I could not say that he said it on there.

Mean Green 93-98 · November 14, 2010

Well KNTU had the Denton High School game on, so I could not say that he said it on there.

EXACTLY.

November 14, 2010

EXACTLY.

I agree, it is very sad that instead of broadcasting our D-1 college football game, the university is broadcasting a local high school football game. Instead of a great, competitive college football game, people were 'treated' to Denton High getting embarrassed.

Green Mean · November 14, 2010

Yup he was really making a case for himself w hen Jub Jub was interviewing him. The players have responded to him but I don't know if this will translate the next 4,5 or however many years he may be here.

Newfan · November 14, 2010

Actually - Feeley started 2 other games this year

MeanGreen01 · November 14, 2010

Coach Canales is the guy for next years Head Coaching Job at North Texas. I'm not saying sign him to a long 5 year deal, but sign him for 1 or 2 years and see what he can do with HIS TEAM.

As I sat back tonight and thought about our team and how they have responded over the past 3 weeks, our success is due to this coach's player/coach relationship. Watching Coach Canales during his post game comments will give you a small taste of the excitement he brings to this football team. He wants this job, is passionate for not only his players but the coaches around him. This excitement is contagious and we are seeing the by product of this excitement overnight. We are finishing these tight games with Wins and not "Tough Loses". Please, watch him in this video and think what will our team's attitude be like after his direction and excitement over next summer and into Spring training workouts. Then ask yourself, would I play for this guy? If he would have had this team a year ago and was the head coach at the beginning of this season, I have no doubt we would all be on Bourbon Street come December. You can't help but want to go to battle with Coach Canales.

He is the guy we need to take us to the next level and consistently win at this new level. RV is a smart man and I have confidence he will make the right decision. We are very lucky to have both RV and Coach Canales at this time.

Go Mean Green!!

Mean Green 93-98 · November 14, 2010

Coach Canales is the guy for next years Head Coaching Job at North Texas. I'm not saying sign him to a long 5 year deal, but sign him for 1 or 2 years and see what he can do with HIS TEAM.

A head coach with a one or two year contract is not going to stand a chance in recruiting. If you don't feel confident enough to give him a longer contract than that, you need to look in another direction.

Harry · November 14, 2010

A head coach with a one or two year contract is not going to stand a chance in recruiting. If you don't feel confident enough to give him a longer contract than that, you need to look in another direction.

+1 to 93-98!

VideoEagle · November 14, 2010

+1 to 93-98!

Didn't RV say almost exactly what 93-98 wrote in the podcast from a few weeks ago? Five years is pretty much the minimum.

SleepingGiantsFan · November 14, 2010

A head coach with a one or two year contract is not going to stand a chance in recruiting. If you don't feel confident enough to give him a longer contract than that, you need to look in another direction.

This. However there is another way of doing it.

That is, you give the coach a 5-year deal with a buyout provision after years 2-4. Such deals are usually graduated, with the amount of the buyout being less each year. It's difficult to get a prospective coach to agree to something like that if you're negotiating for his services against other schools. However, in the case of Canales, since he's apparently got no other suitors, I see no reason why he couldn't just be presented with such a proposal on a take it or leave it basis. If he leaves it, you hire Leavitt, Franchione or one of those guys. (I'm not saying you should do that. Only that I think hiring Canales and guaranteeing him his full contract for five years would be, uh, dumb?)

SleepingGiantsFan · November 14, 2010

Five years is pretty much the minimum.

Actually five years is pretty much the norm.

UNT90 · November 14, 2010

This. However there is another way of doing it.

That is, you give the coach a 5-year deal with a buyout provision after years 2-4. Such deals are usually graduated, with the amount of the buyout being less each year. It's difficult to get a prospective coach to agree to something like that if you're negotiating for his services against other schools. However, in the case of Canales, since he's apparently got no other suitors, I see no reason why he couldn't just be presented with such a proposal on a take it or leave it basis. If he leaves it, you hire Leavitt, Franchione or one of those guys. (I'm not saying you should do that. Only that I think hiring Canales and guaranteeing him his full contract for five years would be, uh, dumb?)

But yet so many are ready to hand him the reigns after 3 games. Can he recruit? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games. His plan to build the program? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games. Can he develop and refine raw talent? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games.

I hope that the people conducting this search are way smarter than the win-starved fans on this board and hire the best candidate out there for this position. I fear they aren't.

SleepingGiantsFan · November 14, 2010

But yet so many are ready to hand him the reigns after 3 games. Can he recruit? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games. His plan to build the program? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games. Can he develop and refine raw talent? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games.

I hope that the people conducting this search are way smarter than the win-starved fans on this board and hire the best candidate out there for this position. I fear they aren't.

I saw the same at SDSU.

Losing can do that. So can such other misguided ideas as the philosophy that nobody on a message board has a valid opinion in comparison to that of an athletic director. ADs are experienced in these things and are privy to information the rest of us aren't, so the argument goes. Well, I don't know the background of your AD but SDSU hired the former AD at Ohio State and Minnesota who once almost bragged about having quit the OSU job because the president ordered him to fire Earl Bruce and he wouldn't do it. Then he seemingly wouldn't fire Ted Tollner at SDSU until alumni brought such pressure that he was pretty much forced to do so. Word from people I know to have credibility is that guy and Ted used to play golf together regularly during the off-season along with an SDSU alumnus who has been the leading sports columnist for the Union-Tribune for years. I have no problem with that except when it results in such an incestuous relationship that the AD and the columnist lose their perspective on the quality of the job the coach is doing. As a result, it's widely believed the AD waited a year too long to fire Ted as his recruiting classes got gradually worse because he put less and less effort into it.

Speaking of recruiting, one of the things I think has improved SDSU football is the extent to which interested alumni with contacts with HS coaches, many of whom are SDSU alumni themselves, have reported on our board about how often our coaches are seen looking for talent. I believe Chuck Long was fired after only three years partly because although he said at his introductory press conference that he and his assistants were going to "build a fence" around San Diego county, the coaches of two big public schools reportedly hadn't seen anybody from SDSU in two years!

A former Aztec who went to multiple Pro Bowls told me when SDSU was looking to replace Chuck that the key to winning is just as much assistants as it is the head guy. Chuck had enough brains to retain a guy named LeCharls McDaniel from his predecessor's staff who has been at SDSU for years and done a bang up job of recruiting high character inner city African American kids. However, that's about all Chuck did right. For example, he failed to retain LB coach Andy Buh, who everybody knew was great, and instead hired some moron the players reportedly laughed at because of his false intensity. Buh was then hired by Jim Harbaugh at Stanford to be his LB coach and Buh is now the DC at Nevada. In other words, Buh has essentially been promoted twice whereas Chuck was fired and then accepted a demotion to OC at Kansas, a job which he isn't exactly excelling at this year.

Sorry to ramble. My point merely is that Chuck Long has proven himself to be an excellent QB coach but a miserable head coach and a mediocre at best coordinator. Maybe Canales isn't another Chuck Long. Maybe he will turn out to be UNT's version of Bob Stoops. However, you're correct about some people apparently being convinced of him being the latter based on simply improving things after replacing your Chuck Long.

Green Dozer · November 14, 2010

But yet so many are ready to hand him the reigns after 3 games. Can he recruit? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games. His plan to build the program? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games. Can he develop and refine raw talent? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games.

I hope that the people conducting this search are way smarter than the win-starved fans on this board and hire the best candidate out there for this position. I fear they aren't.

So 71 recruits at the Troy game is not an indication if he can recruit? I would also say he has one three games given the fact he was given the most credit for the win against FAU, even by Dodge. I can't believe a guy is being blasted for wanting a job and especially THIS job. And the insenuation that folks who are leaning his way just are not as smart as say the ones that want Leavitt is uncalled for.

Edited November 14, 2010 by Green Dozer

UNT90 · November 14, 2010

So 71 recruits at the Troy game is not an indication if he can recruit?

No. It's an indication that 71 recruits (if that number is correct) took a recruiting trip. No one has signed on the dotted line.

He should have to present his history of recruiting while at S. Forida, including player names and contact info for said players that he was responsible for bringing into the program. Ditto for Arizona. The claims should be verified with the graduated players (which could also give insight into Canales value/problems).

He should have to present a comprehensive plan for taking this program forward.

Winning against a bad WKU team and a MTSU team that is falling apart is nice (hell, any win at this point is nice), but there should be greater criteria applied in the interview for a new coach.

SleepingGiantsFan · November 14, 2010

So 71 recruits at the Troy game is not an indication if he can recruit? I would also say he has one three games given the fact he was given the most credit for the win against FAU, even by Dodge. I can't believe a guy is being blasted for wanting a job and especially THIS job. And the insenuation that folks who are leaning his way just are not as smart as say the ones that want Leavitt is uncalled for.

The only thing you say that I question is the implication that quantity is synonymous with quality. That number is immense, particularly considering that with a couple exceptions, nobody can grant more than 25 scholarships per year. I would add that under SDSU's current excellent staff, we're getting our best recruits, including a kid Rivals rates as the seventh best pro style QB in the country, through holding camps the kids attend, not via hosting them to a game. The kids attend those camps, see our facilities (which except for the absence of an on-campus stadium are state of the art), meet the staff and then have a much better idea what playing at SDSU might be like.

Granted, holding camps can be a waste of time and money if your facilities are lousy. However, you guys are building a new on-campus stadium. I can't overemphasize how beneficial that can be. So whoever gets named head coach, I would recommend you watch to see whether "camping" becomes a regular occurrence at UNT.

UNT90 · November 14, 2010

And the insenuation that folks who are leaning his way just are not as smart as say the ones that want Leavitt is uncalled for.

Never said that. Every candidate should be vetted the same way. Some on here are not wanting that to happen, they just want the job handed to Canales because he won a couple of games. Hell, some suspiciously new posters are actively campaigning for support.

That isn't the way a major university should be conducting it's search. I hope that the search is being done correctly, I fear it isn't. This fear is based on recent hires and nothing else. .

SleepingGiantsFan · November 14, 2010

Speaking of recruiting, I just checked Rivals and Scout and it seems you guys have gotten a few pretty good verbals whereas a couple of your conference peers are getting nowhere. That said, ULM is cleaning up. Assuming the kids they have gotten commitments from actually sign in February, they are going to have a class as good as the bottom third of the MWC has been getting.

Todd Berry was a terrible head coach at Army and I wasn't all that impressed with him as a game day OC at UNLV the last few years. However, he had an excellent reputation as a recruiter for the Rebels and he's sure showing the same thing at ULM. If you bring in enough studs, even if you are lousy at X's and O's, you're going to win some games just by tossing the ball out there to your guys.

FirefightnRick · November 14, 2010

The 71 some odd kids in letter jackets were not all recruits. There was some high school event that was scheduled for that day, not sure what it was, but there was a tent set up out north of Fouts for it. Several of them sitting down in front of us were not even big enough, in my opinion, to play varsity high school much less be d1 college talent.

Second, just because people are hoping that NT gives everyone who wants this job equal consideration does mean they dislike coach Canales.

Third, I have a question for Coach Canales for the next person who interviews him to ask. If your rewarded the head coaching job will you extend a hand to your friend Jim Leavitt to be your defensive coordinator? After all, he did the same for you TWICE when you needed a job. He now needs one and needs a second chance to repair his reputation. Seems like a match made in heaven on paper and would be a fantastic gesture between friends. What do you say Coach C?

Rick

Edited November 14, 2010 by FirefightnRick

SAM Coach · November 14, 2010

No. It's an indication that 71 recruits (if that number is correct) took a recruiting trip. No one has signed on the dotted line.

He should have to present his history of recruiting while at S. Forida, including player names and contact info for said players that he was responsible for bringing into the program. Ditto for Arizona. The claims should be verified with the graduated players (which could also give insight into Canales value/problems).

He should have to present a comprehensive plan for taking this program forward.

Winning against a bad WKU team and a MTSU team that is falling apart is nice (hell, any win at this point is nice), but there should be greater criteria applied in the interview for a new coach.

Interesting points, yet even more interesting is the opportunity to be considered for a HC position while being a HC. In most cases, it's a coordinator with no HC experience that's in line for HC role or a former HC. Is there any guarantee to what someone will do as a HC? Not really.

I believe Canales has demonstrated the ability to put Ws on the board immediately. How is he doing it? I have no idea. But he is doing it RIGHT NOW AT UNT. Does that guarantee it will happen next year if he is retained? No! But there is no guarantee that someone else will either.

I feel confident he will be a HC somewhere soon. If not UNT, than somewhere else.

MeanGreen61 · November 14, 2010

The 71 some odd kids in letter jackets were not all recruits. There was some high school event that was scheduled for that day, not sure what it was, but there was a tent set up out north of Fouts for it. Several of them sitting down in front of us were not even big enough, in my opinion, to play varsity high school much less be d1 college talent.

Second, just because people are hoping that NT gives everyone who wants this job equal consideration does mean they dislike coach Canales.

Third, I have a question for Coach Canales for the next person who interviews him to ask. If your rewarded the head coaching job will you extend a hand to your friend Jim Leavitt to be your defensive coordinator? After all, he did the same for you TWICE when you needed a job. He now needs one and needs a second chance to repair his reputation. Seems like a match made in heaven on paper and would be a fantastic gesture between friends. What do you say Coach C?

Rick

So DeLoach should go if Canales gets the job ?

eulesseagle · November 14, 2010

But yet so many are ready to hand him the reigns after 3 games. Can he recruit? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games. His plan to build the program? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games. Can he develop and refine raw talent? Doesn't matter, he won 2 games.

I hope that the people conducting this search are way smarter than the win-starved fans on this board and hire the best candidate out there for this position. I fear they aren't.

I guess he did it a South Florida.