untjim1995

When the SWC fell apart, TCU was really a bad program. But the City leaders in FW, knowing that TCU was central to their city, came up with a plan for making them the Hometown Team. TCU used their best asset at the time, money, to buy away Franchione from New Mexico and bring him to FW. And it worked. He got them turned around and when he left for Alabama, his Defensive Coordinator was ready to move up. And Gary Patterson did just that. And the next thing you know, FW goes crazy for them, that leads to a Rose Bowl win and top 5 finish, then getting into the Big 12, which led to another top 5 finish, and then making a hire in Sonny Dykes to pump life into the program and he immediately leads them to a national championship game. What Fort Worth has done for TCU is what Denton has not done or will ever do for UNT. Dentin’s citizenry either ignores or openly loathes our program’s existence. We have yet to ever have one sellout at our stadium—that seats a little over 30k. It is what it is.

If you’re a G5 program, you’d be really smart to look at a great regional FCS program to poach their coach and get their players to transfer. As was mentioned earlier, getting upperclassmen that are used to a coach’s system and moving them up against G5s that aren’t really good, you’ll do fine. Texas State is showing just that. We just didn’t look at that when we hired Morris. Doesn’t mean he will fail, but it makes his efforts to recruit and develop HUGE!!

If you go to this game, I feel bad for you…on many levels, actually

It all depends on your perspective. Our leadership is great at what the community and UNT Family overwhelmingly ask them to do, which is offer a great value for educating a ton of people and making sure the artistic vibe of Denton is celebrated greatly. It’s absolutely irrefutable that we have been a major success at both of these. When I went to school from 1991-1995, our enrollment was around 26k. Our music program was bringing home Grammy’s. Football was quarter-assed. We have now grown to 47K in enrollment, still have the music and arts promoted greatly, and our football program now is about half-ass compared to most other Texas FBS programs. Some things are just set in stone. It’s what the university wants. They don’t care if football wins or not—they just want it be there for the 10k people that support this place with dollars and season tickets.

Good for the players, I guess. They got cash in their hands. I’d imagine they sleep pretty well at night knowing they got $$$ they wouldn’t have ever gotten here. Stupid system is stupid.

They will both be gone. The P5s NIL will buy them off just like we saw last off season when Arkansas and Auburn, among others, came shopping in Denton with lots of dollars. Absolutely hate what has happened to this sport...

Wanting people to care about football or athletics when they absolutely don't want to is just something we all have to accept. For decades and decades here, the viewpoint of the university's leadership has been to offer athletics to those who want it, but to also make sure that the focus of our pride will always be to educate a lot of people and to celebrate the arts and music. It's what we are overwhelmingly known for. What we need to do so badly here is to hire a big name football coach that would bring in some new fans in the region, as well as alumni who want to see how a Gary Patterson/Bob Stoops type name would do at a place like this. The only hire we have ever had that worked here since the Vietnam War broke out was Hayden Fry. Well, he fit everything I listed above as an example. And it worked amazingly during his tenure here...until the lack of support from the university and its fans and the lack of attention from the SWC and Texas media finally did him in. Since he left, we hired an OC from Nebraska in Jerry Moore who got hired away by Tech in a few years, a retread bad hire in Bob Tyler who almost go the program on probation, a DC from Baylor in Corky Nelson to run a program that was nuked by the administration, a Texas HS coach who never coached a down of college football in Dennis Parker, the OC from New Mexico in Matt Simon who was crazy and never became a head coach anywhere again, the OC from SMU in Darrell Dickey who was as bland as dishwater with everything, TX HS Coach Todd Dodge that also had never been a head coach at a college before, then we hired a former head coach at Iowa State who was older and more frustrated the longer he was here, the OC from North Carolina in Seth Littrell who started off incredibly well and then grew complacent. And now, the OC from Washington State and former FCS head coach at Incarnate Word in Eric Morris. All of those names have been usually cheap hires, easy to get to come here. But the one way that has worked here big time is the one we haven't tried again...but amazingly, we could have that chance again IF we dreamed big enough to find a way to convince a guy whose statue is in front of a local stadium in FW, where the guy lives. Yes, it would cost a lot. Yes, it would be tough to convince him. And yet it could be done with the right vision. Or we can just keep on this same track of hiring mostly unknown dudes that have no connection to the university or the region.

McCarney had the right idea with size and power. He zigged while others zagged. Unfortunately, his offensive mindset was having your qb as the bus driver. So teams could put 9 in the box and overwhelm us when we didn’t have a good QB. But our defense could hit and tackle because we had physical practices, which the Spread offense coaches won’t do. It’s a miracle we had Mason Fine for 4 years. Our OLine blocking led to him being crushed over and over. Once he get to his senior year, and as the OL play really deteriorated, poor Mason looked like a shell of himself. Gio Vizza was crushed so hard under Dodge’s OLine that he literally quit the sport. That’s the hard part of having a QB that can’t be protected enough and plays on a team with a defense that can’t stop anyone and forces you to have to throw a ton to come from behind all the time.

This is easy: Total announced attendance—22k UNT contingent 10k SMU scores quick in the first quarter. Entire program and fanbase immediately go into the fetal position as we fall behind. Final—SMU 66, UNT 30

So Dodge 2.0

Well, we also won't be playing SMU anymore after this season...so while the ass-whippings will end, most of our fanbase will have to focus on UTSA as the replacement of that anger.

The Power Conferences can't even let the mid majors have an automatic bid to the NIT Changes to postseason NIT made in response to new tournament - ESPN

I can’t stand the sport anymore. I follow it, but it’s a terribly boring sport when half the teams can’t compete for a national championship, and within the other half, there are about 8 schools that have any shot for the playoff.

Maybe so…but it hasn’t been cool for as long as I’ve followed the program, which is since 1990. And I can’t imagine it was much better if we couldn’t get a ranked 9-2 team back in the 70s into a bowl game because of lack of support back then, causing Fry to leave to Iowa.

Not a one of the FBS teams in a league below the AAC will ever play yall. Enjoy recruiting Texas kids to play Boston College, Syracuse, and Wake Forest...because when this thing is all done, the FSU, Clemson, Miami, UNC, Duke, NC State, Va Tech, and UVa combo will be all gone. That GOR ain't keeping them all from leaving until 2036. The fact is that your money bought you a spot in a great conference that is about to fall apart within 3 years. Enjoy it. I mean it. Those are gonna be some fun matchups in football and hoops. But you're gonna feel like the SWC explosion is occurring again when those teams leave to the SEC, Big Ten, and Big 12.

Good riddance. Enjoy your in state games in the 2025 and beyond against Houston Christian, SFA, ACU, Incarnate Word, and Tarleton. I doubt anyone will ever play you again from this great state that plays FBS now. Maybe SHSU, Texas State, or UTEP, so congrats on those wonderful matches.

This is my take. You cannot make people care about something that the culture that surrounds the place discourages any interest to the sport even if you like the sport. In that regard, the university rally attracts the student that either doesn't care about sports or absolutely loathes its existence here. Not much you can do about it.

Whatever the reasons, we had no business being a 1-AA program for 12 years. That killed our meager fanbase that we already had by nuking the few that gave to the program as grads from the 50s thru the 90s. That we have anyone from those years to still attend or give to the program is simply amazing. That’s why you get 18k for your Homecoming against Memphis with an enrollment of 47k and 300k living alumni in a gigantic metro area.

What we made the mistake of doing was not leveraging the Old Big Eight against the SWC. Had we showed the Big Eight that we would entertain joining them, as well as the SWC, that league could’ve finally gotten into Texas for everyone to recruit and get TV markets for their schools, too. It may very well have made the SWC reconsider listening to the private schools. Rice couldn’t keep UH from joining and they immediately won big in the SWC. SMU and TCU were both bad at the time and the idea of Hayden Fry bringing NTSU into the SWC and having success like UH did was terrifying. But the better play would’ve been the Big Eight. We would’ve had Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Colorado at their heights over the next decade and a half. We would’ve had Kansas, OU, Missouri, OSU, K-State, and Iowa State as great basketball opponents. To me, that was the greatest mistake Hayden made. He knew what the MVC couldn’t do for the future. He knew the SWC was king to the region and he shot his shot. But we never had a chance with the leadership and citizenry he and Nolen faced. Denton has either been apathetic or actually loathing of our athletic department for its existence. It loves being the little Austin, just without care for sports. I’ve long come to realize that the location’s culture is what will always hold us back. You cannot have as large of a university as we do, from enrollment to alumni, as well as a large metro area surrounding it, and think getting an announced crowd of 18k for Homecoming against a very recognizable opponent in a conference game in October is acceptable. But it is what it is and we can do nothing but just accept it for what it is.

At this point, just accept it. Where else can you go and get to watch your team play for such a large value? It’s not any other school near here. Those 47k that attend UNT pay for this thing. If they don’t care about it, then don’t worry about it. We are never gonna be an athletics school. We just aren’t. We are an affordable option for students who want a quality education close to DFW. We are an arts and music school first. That our window to the university and it’s the one the leaders have preferred for decades. I used to get embarrassed by the lack of support and attendance. But now I just want their dollars to keep flowing here. None of us can make students, faculty, alumni, or Denton citizens care about this place’s teams any more than we have tried before. So just accept and move on. Enjoy getting great seats at DATCU Stadium without a hassle. And just enjoy that there are about 5000 or so folks who get to enjoy the program to themselves.

Because he will raise his price for NIL with any kind of achievement here.

Somebody like this is almost certain to go to the portal within 2 years to some power school with major NIL. Better to let him go on down the road now.

La Tech always acted like they were bigger and better than they were. Because of that thinking, they are now stuck in the worst conference in FBS. And ULM is now in a better setup. What has happened to them is what we could only dream would happen to SMU. And I guess, from TCU's persepctive, it has...

We “earned” where we are because of literally where we are. Our football history in the last 40 years is borderline atrocious. We dropped to I-aa for 12 years in the 80s and 90s. When we moved up, it was to make more money being a bought game for OOC opponents. The only conference that would ever take us was the original Sun Belt. Only reason we got to move up to CUSA was because SMU went to the AAC. Then, we moved up to the AAC because they didn’t want the MWC to get into Texas. We didn’t earn it from anything accomplished on the field or from attendance. We have exactly 6 winning seasons since 1995.

I think we all just need to realize that this is just how it is at UNT until we win and see more interest. It used to bug me so much to see such sparse crowds, but I’ve now come to realize that getting the athletics fees is 1000x better than seeing students at games.