VideoEagle

NT was the only1A school willing to let Scott Hall try to be a QB. We were also the only 1A school willing to take a chance on Booger Kennedy at his position.

As one who was on the North Texas Debate team back in the 70s, I can assure you that every college debater would use any and every technique to gain the upper hand. Just win was the motto! There is a small group of people who dislike DD’s coaching so much that any accomplishment he makes must be bad because DD did it! For example, the New Orleans Bowl must be bad because DD got NT there. Or, beating SMU can’t be a real accomplishment because DD managed to do it. Those are the one’s to whom I was referring. As for where I heard that Darrell was told not recruit JUCO transfers, it was at a meeting in the Super Pit back around the time he was hired. I can’t remember who was doing all of the talking, although Gene Stallings was doing a lot of it. At the time the audience was told we had two main problems for football success: the schedule and the facilities. After the discussion on stopping scheduling all of the OCC games against top teams and mixing in some more “winnable” games and the need to upgrade the facilities, the discussion turned to recruiting. Matt Simon’s over recruiting of JUCO players who only had two years of eligibility was killing us, as was his insulting of high school coaches all over the state. Stallings pointed out that we had to stop depending on JUCO transfers even though it would hurt our record for a few years. I understood from that meeting the new (and I think still unhired) coach would be told to follow Stallings suggestions. I know that DD did reduce in fact the number of JUCO transfers significantly in his first years. Thinking long term did hurt the short term record.

See what I mean. Hayden was a much more experience head coach when he took over at NT. He did go 5-5-1 that first year. He went 2-7-2 the next including losing 31-6 to Tulsa, 27-7 to Lamar, 41-0 to Memphis and 35-19 to Long Beach State. The year we beat Tennessee we also lost 61-7 to Oklahoma State. And that 10-1 season included a “win by forfeit” over Miss State. And, Hayden was not told to avoid recruiting the JUCO players that could help “win now” to build the team for the future. Darrell was. I remember being excited about football when Hayden was the coach. I also remember being more people being even more excited about football when we got to our first New Orleans Bowl. I should also point out that Darrell has a better record after his first 8 year as a head coach than Hayden did. Darrell has gone to 4 bowl games, including one with a losing record. In his first 8 years, Hayden went to 3 including one with a losing record. Is being blown out 61-7 by an OSU team that finished 5th in an 8 team conference really better than being blown out by a Tulsa team that won it’s division, won it’s league championship game and won it’s bowl game? Yes, at the end of a career that included Rose Bowls for Iowa, Hayden was a Hall of Fame coach. But Darrell is just starting his career. Obviously, it is not absurd to compare the two coaches.

I hope he knows what he’s doing!

A newspaper story comparing Darrell to Hayden! The blood pressure of the Darrell haters must be going through the roof! I've already see messages implying that since Darrell Dicky beat SMU, then SMU must be a truly awful team and we should dismiss the win. None of the newspaper writers seem to think this. When Hayden came to NT in 73, I don't think he was told by the University to avoid recruiting JUCO players with experience and concentrate on building a recruiting network in the high schools as Darrell was. This takes a long time to build, especially when the previous coach killed the relationships! It is also a big reason for the number of losses in the first three years. At the time, I remember hearing that this rebuilding effort would hurt the win/loss record. But, it seems many don't remember that detail. Perhaps, just perhaps, Darrell does know something about coaching after all. As Hayden Fry put it, "I am very impressed with what coach Dickey has done. They have done very well in their conference and have won some good out-of-conference games as well.”

Of course, you can join the Mean Green Club and gain access to the deck where they sell beer.

Back in the Pony Express Days, SMU had bumper sticker that read "My maid went to Texas."

Maybe they will off themselves in University Park and you won’t have to worry about it!

Remember that the spread is NOT how they think the game will come out. The purpose of a spread is to get an equal number of bets placed on both sides!

A well coached team that is paying attention should never have a delay of game penalty. But, the coaches must choose a play to send in, the QB must check that the correct players are on the field to run that play. I have heard from a great many players who played in both college and high school that the play signaled in could not be run with the players on the field. Matt Simon did this on a regular basis! The QB had to change the play on the fly to match the players on the field, even if it would not work against the defense on the field!!!

No, they are no longer in the Big East. Nor are they in CUSA. They are an "affilitate", but not a member of the Mac. And ESPN ranks then the worst team in America on the Bottom 10!

Yes, it is an OCC win for the SBC. ULM won as they were suppose to. If they did not, you would read message after message about how bad the SBC is. But since they won - as they should have - there will be complete silence on this game!

So all of those Baylor fans who have sworn for years they got in on their own merits did not get in because of Ann are at least partially correct. It was not Ann Richards, but it wasn’t their merits either. Bob Bullock, as Lt. Governor would have had more “purse string” control the the Governor anyway!

We have a dB of limited experience who is not the most mobile behind an untested line going against one of the highest rated pass defenses in the country. Or you have a RB who lead the nation a couple of years ago. You have to mix things up some, but one of those two is going to be much more likely to be successful than the other!

There’s no guarantee he will be able to play this year. The NCAA has to have THEIR investigation and THEN decide his punishment! While he might be eligible under transfer rules, I think he’s still suspended for knowingly violating student benefit rules. The NCAA is not in any rush to do their investigation. There’s a reason both TCU and Texas State publicly said “no” to him. I wonder how many other did so privately.

This includes the OCC games. The football conference is relatively compact.

195? I think I'd like to weigh myself on that scale. I suspect it would make my diet be unneeded!

I think someone read the weather report! It’s still hot at 8am!

Come on! You they were college students. You can’t expect them to be sober any more than necessary!

La Tech keeps saying they would rather drop football than come back to the Sun Belt. Ever people on their own bulletin board acknowledge the dollars from the WAC just don't work and they can't keep it up after the extra money from New Mexico, Idaho and Utah States admission fees dry up. By the way, those three are not actually PAYING their admission fee. Rather, they are forgoing the money they would get from the WAC for 1 or 2 years. That means instead of dividing conference money by nine, it's getting divided by six. When they start dividing by nine, La Tech will start to feel the pinch. Besides, Western is better at Men's basketball!

First, I found the TExas State coaches comment “these are good kids who got bad advice” interesting. I wonder if they are saying the OU coaches told them it was OK to take $18000 for a 5 hour a week summer job washing cars! If that is what they are claiming, his actions suggest he isn’t buying the story. The NCAA hasn’t started it’s investigation yet. I can’t imagine the NCAA is going to clear the players till it investigates. Everything in the newspapers that OU has released shows the kids were told NOT to take the payoffs. They did anyway. They can’t reasonably claim they didn’t know better. Student athletes have four calendar years with out red-shirts from the time they start till their eligibily runs out. The clock is running on these guys!

I hope they don't read "North Texas State!"

For the record, this Crown and Coke Bear is responding to a post which reads: I never said that Baylor was going to be bad this year. I never said NT would win more games than Baylor. I never even wrote the word "homecoming." SMU is my least favorite school. I have several dozen alumni among my friends. I try to help the misguided when possible. Frankly I don't pay a lot of attention to Baylor. The last time I saw Baylor play was in Denton and I'm reasonably sure the team has improved. At least I would hope so! Now, I can understand that a fan of Baylor is a bit sensitive. Before we went to four bowl games in a row, NT fans were a bit sensitive. But most of the Baylor fan I know are at least literate.

It's a little early yet to say the kid is a waste. There have been a number of kids at NT, athletes and others, who did things that were bad, got probation and never did anything bad again. Of course, there are others who think society "owes" them and end up in prison. Don't do much till this plays out. Saving a few scholarships till the Fall is not always a bad thing as we've found out this year!

I would not want to be at either end of that list! java script:emoticon('')