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Mean Green Nation’s invasion of California has begun. Our friend Ted Davis doing some climbing today on Hoffman Summit, with Half Dome behind him. Rick

A Cal win or Houston win and we move on from SMU. He needs to win C-USA Champ this year. That is the measuring stick to me.

I feel bad saying this, but I'm surprised it's only 12 points after last night. A lot was exposed...

Funny. I was watching last night thinking “I thought Graham Harrell left”

For better or worse he is the best coach (by winning percentage) we have had since Hayden Fry left for Iowa 40 years ago. 40 years! Cool your jets and be grateful we aren’t just striving to be bowl eligible anymore. We are trying to hit 9 these days instead of 6. Although that loss sucks hard because of who the opponent was, we still have an entire conference slate coming that could be a totally different season from this start. And those of you saying Seth isn’t going anywhere because no P5 would want him forget that he was a staff disagreement from being the KSU head coach despite losing to Old Dominion and blowing several 21+ point leads. Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it.

I just saw that one of my favorite Mean Green players of the past is now coaching at my alma mater Coppell High School. Very cool. https://twitter.com/CoachTrice8/status/1170499179594047490

There’s a fine line between being spoiled and having big boy expectations. SL is one of the highest paid coaches in G5. I can appreciate that we’re probably only a stopping ground for him. My gripe is that, if SL left tomorrow, what would his legacy be? Where are the signature wins? We beat up on hapless Arkansas last year. Was that the pinnacle of North Texas football under SL? Every time there’s a smidgen of hype or attention paid to this team, we shit the bed. That is on the coaches. If we have to put up with the constant speculation about SL moving on to another program, I don’t think it is unreasonable to have higher expectations than winning most of the easy games, dropping the tough ones, and getting blown out in a bowl.

I have been home now for several hours and have had time to reflect on what I witnessed tonight. Something has to change and quickly or we will lose any and all respect and momentum we have gained. I walked out of Ford Stadium tonight disgusted and sick from what I observed. I was not alone. Many I walked with to our respective vehicles were expressing the same feelings. Why can we not take the next step? This is year four for SL and company and we are not seeing results. There is a disturbing trend starting to repeat itself. In 2016 we roll into West Point and whip Army on their field, only to crap the bed against UTSA the following week. It’s year one, but we are making baby steps. Moving to 2017, after a pool party and an ass whipping at the hands of FAU, we somehow manage to get to the Conference Championship only to get our ass handed to us again by the Lane Train. But things are forgiven, as it’s only year two. Let’s not forget a close HOD Bowl loss to Army and a NO Bowl blow out to Troy along the way. But we are making progress, right? So now let’s move onto year three. We start 4 and 0 with a P5 win over a struggling Arkansas team which SL says was not an upset. Another baby step in the right direction? After a win at Liberty we roll home to Apogee and dedicate a statue to a UNT Great, only to squander a double digit lead and take a crap on our home turf in a loss to La Tech. The next disaster would come a few weeks later at ODU when the heavy favorite Mean Green would piss away a 28 point lead in a loss to a conference bottom feeder. Don’t forget, this was after blowing a lead on the road at UAB in a game we were picked to win. With all of this said, I won’t even go into the New Mexico Bowl. Yes, I know Fine went down early but I think if we are being honest with ourselves, we all knew where this game was headed before the injury. Now we find ourselves in year four. We had a great first half in the home opener before letting things slide late against a weak FCS team. We were told the team lost interest. Really? So what the hell happened last night? Did the team lose interest again? This has got to end! We should not tolerate this kind of result in year four. This team has too much talent for this kind of performance. Anyone else see a trend here? The season is young. Will it be a success or filled with disappointments? GMG

My mood is not good! At this point I am super happy I could not go to Cal. Would hate to spend that cash to see another beat down. I will get over it...like I have for the last 50 years or so, but man, I hate going down to Dallas time and time again just to get my ass handed to me by SMU! Getting beat is one thing. I can handle that if the game is competitive and we play well and just come up a bit short. But, to get absolutely run out of the stadium is another matter! Going to take me a bit to get over this one. I hope the team and coaching staff get over it much faster and figure out how to "put out the fire" before conference play. Man, at this point I am not looking forward to seeing Cal or Houston! Yikes! But, my Mean Green and I love 'em. Just going to take a few days to "recover" from this one, and looking at that Doak Walker bobblehead ain't helping at this point!

Can I borrow a decoder ring, anybody? Rick

@TheTastyGreek is the hero GMG.com deserves, but not the one it needs right now... he's a sarcastic tongue, a megathread creator, a green knight.

Expectations are great provided they are reasonable. It isn’t like the other 13 teams in CUSA are taking days off. Their fan bases are saying the same stuff. We have made tremendous strides in the last 3 years. We are less than 4 years removed from having the record breaking shit kicked out of us by a FCS school for homecoming. A game we paid 6 figures for. I’m sure just about everyone on this board including me has big dreams for UNT, conference title, BCS buster type dreams but those dreams aren’t realized without obstacles. We are making progress. Maybe the progress is slower than some of you would like but it is much faster than the folks outside of our green bubble would’ve expected out of us. Just think, last year we very nearly had a school pay us to take our coach away rather than us having to pay them to go away as usual. We have also had assistant coaches poached by P5 schools every year Seth’s been here. To me, that is a welcome change and I have faith that regardless of what happens with Seth, Wren Baker will keep us on an upward trajectory for the rest of his tenure here.

Because that’s all they know and don’t ever want to change.

This is what I'm saying....in much less words. Thank you.

how many did we win that we should have lost? 2016 probably about 4 (1-11 team without a returning QB and not much besides Jeff WIlson) 2017 probably about 4 (fluky 5-8 team beats SoMiss, Army, La Tech) 2018 probably 2 (beat SMU, Arky, FAU) 2019 we'll see, currently, we have won a game we were supposed to and lost a game we were supposed to...

I really miss the certainty of a 3-win season. Are we a 7-win team, a 9-win team? Sucks, man.

I halfway agree with that statement. Hamilton was the only defensive presence (maybe Cam), but SMU on every 3rd down would target Harvey no matter if there was pass rush

He's also 5-0 in bowl games at LaTech Seth Littrell is 0-3 in bowl games. Almost losing means he still won, and he still wins more than Littrell when it counts

Hey Mean Green fans! Just wanted to drop in and say hello! Hope to see you all out in Berkeley for our game! Let me know if I can recommend any places to check out while y’all are out here! For those that can’t afford tickets to the game we also have this big hill called “Tightwad Hill” that overlooks the stadium and the bay for your viewing pleasure free of cost!

Apparently all it takes is some grad transfers. Who the hell knows what will happen.

I've stuck by them so far. I'll stick by them another 50 years, the good lawd willing. But the tuition cost of 3 degrees says I get to complain a little bit too.

My man, the trend is: 2015 (before he got here): 1-11 2016: 5-7 2017: 9-5 2018: 9-4 3 straight bowl games and 2 straight 9-win seasons. I happen to like the trend.

Y'all seem like the type of folks that would trade JuJu away after last night's game

Man, this fanbase will turn on you in a heartbeat. Maybe DD was right and we are a bunch of MF'ers

Hate to say it because I really like him, but it might be time to put English on the "Could have been" list. No doubt the talent and desire are there but his body is not able to support his efforts.

Some thoughts. 1. What happened to the TE's after week one? 2. How in the world do they completely take Bussey out of the game? No catches is crazy. 3. The announcer mentioned we really needed to run some crossing patterns and rubs to get our WR's open and I would agree. 4. Any time we ran press coverage, Buechele just lofted up a "fade" and let either his WR's to make the play or our DB's to get called for interference. Why did we not go away from the man and run a zone with safety help over the top? The lack of adjustments was mind boggling to say the least. 5. The officials were pretty ticky tack with their calls. I am curious, but I think I only remember one penalty against smuT for an obvious roughing the passer. 6. Harvey got left on an island and drew the ire of the fans, but Jameel Moore was a liability at nickle. I don't really like calling out players but why didn't we try Whitlock or even one of the heralded freshmen like Gaddy? 7. I was excited about the Reeder hire, but last night was a surprise and a concern. Time for him to open up the playbook and get creative. We have the talent to perform much better than last night. I really hope the coaches make adjustments because that type of loss can be demoralizing. I trust Littrell and staff to make the necessary adjustments. On to Cal.

The NT offense was bad, therefore it is because they changed the offensive coordinator. Logical to some degree, but way too early to call. I think many of us are underplaying the emotional factor in this game. After last years' debacle for SMU, they came out on fire. The game was basically over, before NT woke up. NT has some glaring holes on defense, and until those are fixed; there are going to be few wins. NT for some reason played to stop the run and left the corners totally exposed. No only didn't stop the run, but got killed on simple out throws.

Skip Holtz barely beat Grambling and Bill Clark barely beat Alabama State.

This game felt like #olddenton

My one thought I woke up with this morning before heading off to work..., ....”Did we really go for a 4th and one and fail from our own 45 with a pass out of the shotgun...while down 14-0,....then later settle for a field goal facing a 4th and 3 down 35-17 late 3rd quarter?” Rick

Let me start by saying I hope this post doesn't age well.....meaning I hope someone is throwing this in my face as we hoist the conference championship trophy later this year. However.... Watching that debacle on Saturday got me thinking about Seth Littrell's tenure here and got me wondering: "How many games has he won that he "shouldn't" have won? How many games has he won as an underdog? How many games has he won with something on the line?" And conversely...."how many games has he LOST that he shouldn't have?" Obviously, the Arkansas game sticks out but in hindsight....that Arkansas team would've been beaten by half the teams in CUSA. Their QB play was so bad that the guy that we destroyed last year is now starting for them....think about that. But what is Seth Littrell's best win? Arkansas aside, I think his best win to date is 2017 @ Southern Miss. I was actually at that game and we looked bad in the first quarter, cut the lead before half and then pretty much dominated the 2nd half. (they could not guard Guyton). That win was the spring board to making us conference contenders. The gut check win later that season at La Tech was big as well. I would argue that's his big win with "something on the line" However if you look at his losses since his 2nd year (I'll cut him some slack on year 1) Most were important games with something on the line. He's lost more of those than he's won. And all of them were either complete melt downs (ODU, UAB, La Tech last year) or he gets his doors blown off (SMU 2019, FAU x2, Troy, Utah St). Those losses shouldn't happen like they did. In 2017, he lost 5 games (I won't count the Iowa game...I'll just count games we should supposedly be equal to talent wise). Those 4 losses were to SMU, FAU twice and Troy. Average score: 54-28 In 2018, he lost 4 games. The bowl game to Utah St and 3 2nd half meltdowns. In 2019, Year 4 coach vs year 2 coach....we were never in the SMU game and got embarrassed They're not just losses...they're complete disasters. Now looking at his wins....and there have been plenty. He beats up on FCS teams and lower tier CUSA teams. (a lot of those wins were closer than they should've been) He beats teams he has a distinct talent advantage over. Which, admittedly, is more than I can say for the previous 2 coaches. And I guess it also says something that he DOES have more talent than some...which means he's recruiting better than.....UTEP and Rice...that's something I guess. I've been following UNT football since the late 90s. I know there are many here that have been following for a lot longer but I really think the "modern age" of college football started with the BCS era and has exploded since then. High school recruits are treated like draft picks by the media, facility wars, more TV, more money. UNT has done a really good job shifting with this new world of college football as of late. One advantage UNT has had (and I've been saying this forever) is our built in, natural infrastructure. Our location, size, and alumni base. We have advantages that La Tech, USM, even Marshall, etc. don't have. The narrative here that was set by Darryl Dickey 20+ years ago is "we do more with less." Well I say given our natural, built in infrastructure, we've done less with more. That's due to the poor leadership we've had up until now. Hence the "sleeping giant" term we've thrown around for years. La Tech does more with less. They have support and some history sure....but would you trade locations with them? I'm going to guess there are A TON of programs in the country that would love to have what we have. The land with which we sit. We are a large university right in the middle of the most fertile recruiting area in the nation. Our leadership is finally catching up and taking advantage of our location with the money and facilities. My point is this regarding what Seth Littrell is teaching me about North Texas: Nine wins a season at UNT should not be that hard to do. Not now. Not with what we have to work with. Not with our level of competition. CUSA is no question the worst conference in FBS. If you're not a total disaster (like Todd Dodge or Dan McCarney) you can win nine games a year here given our location, facilities, and competition. That's what I'm starting to learn. And before anyone reads into this.....I AM NOT ADVOCATING GETTING RID OF SETH LITTRELL. That would be ridiculous. But what I am wondering at this point, in year 4...are we going to take the next step? We're at the cusp but at some point....are we going to raise expectations even higher? We got a taste of it last year....are we going to take a step back in year 4? The year we're supposed to hit on all cylinders? The senior year of the greatest QB we've ever had? I saw someone on twitter refer to this as a rebuilding year? Are you kidding? This should be our prime. NEXT YEAR will be rebuilding....we've seen G5s splash on the scene recently only to fall off the map. We have an infrastructure in place that should help us avoid that. There are two ways to look at North Texas football. 1) through the context of our history (which ain't good) or 2) through the context of what we have in place now. Those outside the program look through #1. (I can't believe that North Texas is winning football games!) I look through #2 - I can't believe we haven't won more football games. I see our current success not as some miracle but more of "finally we're living up to our potential." There are LOADS of other programs that don't have what we have. This post may be a little premature but man we didn't look like we took 1 or 2 steps back on Saturday, we looked like we took 8 steps back. Hopefully this is a blip and Littrell could come back and beat Cal and/or UH (now I'm not sure about the UTSA game) and then we're off and running....but they have a long way to go after what I saw the other night. Frankly my confidence in this coaching staff is shaken right now. This staff doesn't get the benefit of the doubt from me because they've never shown they can recover from something like that or get the team ready to compete in games like that. They simply HAVE NOT ever done it. Watching that game was like watching the first FAU game from a couple of years ago. I asked "did we even practice this week?" That shouldn't be a question with this coaching staff in year 4. And if we get destroyed by Cal, look like crap against (or God forbid get beaten by) UTSA....we're not going to sell out the UH game (which is what the AD is banking on) What happens then? We're at best 2-3, possibly 1-4 and then we're going on the road to Southern Miss as an underdog. You want 13,000 in the seats for MTSU? Come back from Hattiesburg 2-4 or 1-5. That's absolutely a possibility given what we saw the other night. This is why that SMU game was sooooo important. Not just for the rivalry but more importantly for what it says about our season. That was the closest thing we had to a 50/50 game in the first half of this season, so much riding on it, and this staff absolutely blew it.....AGAIN. But where are expectations for this program right now? Where should they be? Is #hit6 still the bar here? Or is 9 wins an acceptable standard to hold Seth Littrell to? Given what he has to work with, and his salary, 9 wins a season should be the bar. (I still say he never seriously considered KState. I think his agent used it to get a raise.) He's now the highest paid coach in the conference and he's never won the conference. Forget #hit6, he needs to go out and #hit10. Everything is in place...all the surrounding stuff. Now the coach needs to go win games, win big games, win championships, win bowl games. That's the expectation. If it's not...why are we spending all this money? Sorry....7-5 this season might as well be a losing season given what we have here. If you don't look at everything regarding this program through the prism of "we just moved up from FCS and we've been bad for so long" then the expectation should be higher than 7-5. But.... I don't see 9-10 wins coming out of the team we watched the other night. And that should be unacceptable. If this team, led by Mason Fine, goes 7-5 or 6-6...we're in a world of hurt the next couple of years. That SMU performance was embarrassing for this program and this coaching staff. That was a lost team out there the other night. They need to fix it and fix it in a hurry. If this coaching staff is as good as we think it is (and as good as it's being paid to be)....my expectation is they'll turn it around. I sure hope they do. There's a feeling from many that "Oh, Littrell will be on to bigger/better things probably next year or soon after." When I hear that, I hear basically: "Littrell is too good for UNT." That's what they're saying. Welp....we shall see....

We will run it successfully,...run it right down your throat,.....for one series. Then go back to passing and that’ll be it. Rick

no, but show me all the schools in the country where 9 wins is 'not that hard to do' or a 'basic' expectation.

I guess my point is that everyone always wants to think that things are linear... UNT won 5 games in 2016 than 9 the next year, so we should win at 10 the following year UNT went to the conference title game in 2017 so they should win it the next year to think that improvement is a straight line is crazy. once you start winning 9 games, the steps to climb to 10, 11 and 12 win seasons just get harder. We won 9 games last year, our 3 losses in the regular season were by a total of 13 points. Then we lose our starting QB early in our bowl game and get smoked by a damn good team that ended up ranked #22/21. Now you want to retroactively say this was the beginning of a trend?

I’ve only been affiliated with North Texas since 2014, so I haven’t gone through decades of trauma that others have experienced. But I was at the Portland State disaster, so I think I can appreciate what it’s been like to be a long term UNT fan. Things are generally trending upwards. The university is investing, and we pulled 26k to Apogee to watch a FCS matchup. All good signs. However I’m just worried about the fact that we haven’t capitalized on the opportunities we’ve had over the past 3 years and—while it’s very early in the season—things aren’t looking great right now. But as is stated here and other places, it is incredibly frustrating to have to watch this team win 80 percent of the games it’s supposed to, 0 percent of the tough ones, and get blown out in bowl games. It’s become a pattern, and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to acknowledge it. The season won’t be over if we drop to 1-2 or whatever heading into C-USA play, but we will be looking back on what could have been.

I wish these fans would go back and read the message boards from Southern Miss and Eastern Carolina about needing to replace coaches that win consistently but don't always win 'the big game'. Seth is a very good coach, still learning, but a very good coach. He's quickly transformed an awful program into one that is competitive on the field and competitive in recruiting. So we've gone to bowls three years in a row and lost; a heartbreaker to Army featuring our backup quarterback, and lost to both Troy and Utah St, competing against each's best team in history. SMU cheats, and they have always cheated, from getting caught for paying players on their very first squad through today. With the exception of what the smart SMU fans refer to as the" Miracle Season of 2017" coached by Chad Morris, every single winning season that they've had was coached by someone found guilty of recruiting infractions. Think about that, every coach since the NCAA started recording violations. Now we're being told that a plethora of graduate transfers are walking away from full ride scholarships at P5 schools to pay their own way at one of the more expensive schools in the country. SMU may say there's nothing inappropriate happening, but with their consistent lack of integrity they certainly don't have history on their side. As SMU's former athletic director Bob Hitch famously asked "who should you believe, a strung out drug addict like David Stanley, or SMU?" Well Bob, that's an easy one. .

how can i prove you right or wrong? i love the fact that we have a high profile team that won 9 games last year and are bringing in some of the best recruiting classes of all time, while our QB gets national attention and our team is constantly being talked about. Did i like losing this weekend? obviously not, but i dont think this is part of a trend or a sign that this coaching staff can't win games.

Mediocre is a good starting point after going 1-11 with a depleted roster (arguably one of the worst rosters in FBS). I'm not saying I'm happy receiving L's. Far from it. I'm just happy that we're mad about it, and it's not just another day in North Texas football.

taking it one game at a time

I would respectfully disagree. The deep fade/go route to either Proche, but more commonly Robertson killed us. The long completion/pass interference penalty kept too many drives alive. If we pressed they ran that route. If we dropped off they ran the quick timing out route. We were out-coached.

It’s strange to me that every time we play at Ford that SMU seems to come out with much more energy, focus and physicality. You’d figure the Mean Green players and coaches, coming out of the tunnel and seeing around 40% of a stadium forty five minutes from home filled with their fans would be enough to “lock in” and get excited. It’s not like it’s a house of horrors from an atmosphere standpoint to overcome. In fact on TV, it often sounds like a UNT home game. But we come out FLAT at Ford every time.

So you’re telling me that this guy named Harvey is our only option back there? No one else can play the position?

After last night a 12 point loss to Cal would be progress. Sad but true.

Give the points and sleep well.

No, damnit! That is not acceptable! Fans and students have, for the most part, have been very supportive of NT football. We provide scholarship money/donations to these student athletics. Two families provided millions of dollars to help fund a beautiful, comfortable indoor practice facility for our athletics. I expect players to give 110% effort the whole damn game! And the coaches should do the same. We pay Littrell a ton of money to lead our football team and make good “in game” decisions. Do your job coach! Saturdays effort may keep me from attending the Houston game.

We also have a bad habit of laying complete eggs in front of big crowds (whether it be at home or large traveling crowds).