untjim1995

So does Indiana...probably the best in the country among public institutions. And if you ask anyone what they think of about Indiana, the most prevalent answer will always be that they are a basketball school with an incredibly passionate fanbase.

UNT90 basically answered it for me, but yes, we are known for our music and arts programs. Its what we do best and its what we love being recognized for. For that to change, it would require a complete re-focusing on other areas, whether athletically or in other parts of academia or the arts. Look, you have to be well-known for something. At most state schools that are large, like we are, you are known for certain academic criteria. For a school like A&M, its engineering and science. At Texas, they are well-known for just about everything--from business to engineering to law. UH has a great business school. We are excellent at education (teachers) and have a solid reputation for our business school in the DFW area. But the other schools I mentioned have all decided to pour their heart and soul into athletics, since its a big way to get alumni and students involved together at the university. We have never done that--and I'm not even saying we are wrong because of it. The world loves music and arts just as much as athletics, or at least its close, depending on who you talk to. I just happen to be the guy who loves sports, just like most guys in Texas. That's what I was trying to convey. Its not a knock on being a music and arts school, but it is talking about what UNT puts its resources and heart into outside of academic interests.

Arkansas already plays a game in the Metroplex every year going forward. They will be back to playing the Aggies at JerryWorld every year again for the next 10 years. Its doubtful they'd schedule a game in the Metroplex again, but if they somehow did, they'd call their SWC buddies at SMU or TCU first.

BYU will never go to the Pac, for the reasons mentioned, but the Sunday thing gets overblown--I believe it is a smokescreen for the real reason that people don't want them out west, which is the Mormonism. And I truly believe that is why Baylor better hope that the Texoma schools never run to the Pac, either, because they won't accept Baylor's baptist theology out there, either. BYU would be a great addition to the Big XII and I think they will get invited--along with Cinicinnati. That will get them back to 12, give WVU a travel partner out East with a good TV market and you get BYU's national program that always draws well whereever they play in football or basketball.

This... Women's Basketball draws about 1/10th of the interest that men's basketball draws. Plus, comparing anything to Shanice Stpehens is an obvious ender. Look, this was basically foretold after Year 1 of being Benford'd. PLayers don't want to play for coaches that are basically in over their heads and have no idea to run a program. That happens everywhere when losing happens. What doesn't happen everywhere is to absolutely know, without a doubt, that the head coach who is leading this mess WILL be back at a bare minimum of another season, but most likely two more years. He just flat out costs too much for the university to buy him out before that, based on their views of athletic spending. Now, with the accountintg mess that the university is dealing with, it just confirms that Benford will be here for a while longer. Anywhere else in college athletics, with a school this size, there would be so many changes, it wouldn't even be funny. Not here, though. I've gone on record as saying that RV should be fired for this mess--if you cannot fire Benford because he costs too much, then fire the guy who hired him and gave him a contract that looks like an albatross right now. At different points, he has hired Todd Dodge, who pushed the snowball down the mountain and caused an avalanche leaving as the worst coach in school history, hired Shanice Stephens who was the worst coach in school history in that sport, and now has Benford on the list, who can only thank Vic Trilli right now for being a worse coach record-wise here, but Trilli didn't take over a program that was on the rise like Benford did. Again, anywhere else in America, the AD would've been fired years ago for having two of these hires, if not just one, but here at UNT, we keep the guy in charge, let him keep making hires, and extend his contract. And that's why we will always be known as a music and arts school to the rest of the state and country.

I tend to agree with your post. Since football is what drives this bus, I think that the NCAA Tournament and College World Series are not really players in this equation for the P5. Are they for the NCAA? No doubt, which is why the NCAA will never let the P5 major players get probation that hurts the school for too long (see USC, Penn State, Miami, etc...) The NCAA knows it will basically go under if the majority of P5 powers leave their organization. The fans, media, and players want to be associated in any way possible with those P5 programs, especially the big name powers. I think they will get the Division IV thing going very soon, possibly wihtin the next 2-3 years. Will it change anything for us or most of the G5 schools? Nope. If you're BYU or Boise State, its real bad news, but to us in CUSA, or the SBC, or the MAC, or the AAC, it won't change much.

With the SEC's recent rant about creating a Division IV within the NCAA or going with the nuclear option of separating from the NCAA, what does the NCAA look like for football in the next five years? I suspect the Division IV will be a trial balloon to see if the AQs like what they see from the NCAA fiefdom. If they don't like what they get, they will leave. The NCAA cannot have them leave, if only because they will take the NCAA Tournament and College World Series with them, which covers a massive amount of the NCAAs budget. As if Texas, Alabama, Notre Dame, Michigan, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Florida, etc...didn't run this thing enough, now they are probably going to get their way with a tighter division with higher payouts for created bowls and playoffs. As for North Texas, what would it mean to us? Will we see a huge drop in attendance or will it be about the same? Would you expect to see different conferences start up if the AQs pull away fully from the rest of us, just to keep costs more controlled? Very interested to see what the board thinks this will mean for us, since the smoke is getting pretty thick concerning this Division IV setup.

Our new conference is fine for us--its the best we've ever had by a mile in the modern era of college football. But Southern Miss, Louisiana Tech, and Marshall are the best known teams in the league from a reputation standpoint and all three are in small markets within smal populated states that give 99% of their attention to the big AQ schools in their state. Its a huge stepup from the SBC in prestige, but its waaayyyy behind the AAC and the MWC on the conference ladder. A good conference doesn't add FCS startups to their league when they didn't belong there already in the other sports (i.e. South Florida, UAB, or UConn). The new SBCUSA added a ton of Belt teams, but when you throw in UTSA in just its second year of FBS football and then prepare to add in Charlotte and Old Dominion, while replacing East Carolina, Tulsa, and Tulane and all those who ran off to the AAC before we even got invited, its pretty easy for any media outlet to look down on that league--until they do something about it to change their minds.

I think McCarney and his staff have earned that trust, both here and from his stint at ISU.

McCarney is a legitimate coach at the FBS level. He did the same thing at Iowa State, while playing in the old Big XII, which was at its strongest when he was coaching in the league. Dodge was a good recruiter of skilled players, just because of his offensive reputation. But his lines were just woeful and his defense was absolutely atrocious. We get McCarney in here, after we have suffered 6 horrible seasons in a row, and in his first two seasons, he wins 9 games--or as much as we won as a program for the previous 5 years combined. Of course recruiting was going to stink here in his first few years--UNT had the absolute worst reputation in the state as a football program at the FBS level. Even Texas State and UTSA had better reps than we had among Texas HS coaches, recruits, and their parents. And with all of that, McCarney takes those players from the Dodge era and some from his first two classes and turns it into a 9 win season and a bowl win in front of 40k people in our own backyard on New Years Day. Is it fair to ask the question of how are we going to react to losing some great players? Of course it is. But its just as fair to look at the coach in charge, the personnel he has hired to coach up the talent, and the kids that are here and are coming aboard this fall and say that we should (finally) be on a path that keeps us on a winning trajectory. Yes, we could lose to Texas, SMU, Indiana, and the best of the league...and we would still be where we were in the Dickey Years, which many on this board label as glorious. We will win 6-7 games this year, unless we just fall apart, which I don't see happening under Coach Mac. I see wins against La Tech, Nicholls State, @UAB, Southern Miss, FAU, @UTEP, and FIU. That's 7 there, so even if I miss on one, we are at 6. Now, throw in the fact that I think we will beat SMU at home, that gets you to 8. I see losses at UT, Indiana, Rice, and UTSA. I don't think its hard at all to see us with 7-8 wins and being bowl bound again. And I'm not exactly known for being an optimist or a homer when it comes to UNT Athletics. I usually expect the worst. But, with a real coach finally at hand, I expect 6 wins at a minimum, just based on the schedule we play this year and the remaining talent we still have to start the year. This is all assuming we don't get a year like 2010, where every QB gets hurt for the year before we finish the first month of the season...

I think so, too. Not because I think we are going to be great, but I just think we are better than them and are playing them at home. Their program took a pretty big drop back last year, while ours took a big step forward. All things being equal, playing at home at Apogee, I expect us to win that one.

In 2013, in a seson where both Rice and UH were bowl participants (i.e., they were both good), the annual Bayou Bucket game was played at Reliant Stadium, a place that fits over 70,000 people, and resides in the SAME TOWN as both universities. The ANNOUNCED CROWD was less than half of capacity, just over 34k. Keep in mind, these two teams play each other every year, had been in the same conference for many, many years, and share the same coverage from the local press, unlike UNT and SMU in every single way. Yet this idiot thinks its says A LOT about both programs (SMU and UNT) that it might not be a sellout at our place. I'd venture a wager that a game at the Cotton Bowl between SMU and UNT would fill the damn place more than half and it seats 92k. I know it was a troll post--and a bad one, since only I have responded to it, but my goodness, even after a long layoff from posting, you still suck at this...

A lot of youth sports are getting played on Satrurday mornings...that won't help the alumni turnout.

I'd take either bowl right now, but the New Mexico Bowl against San Diego State would be a nice matchup and location for us. Albuquerque is a quick flight from Dallas and is also driveable for our fans.

What absolutely amazes me is that SMU went from 1989 to 2008 with one of the worst FBS football programs that existed, yet they still go decent to good media coverage in the DFW Metroplex. They might have about 5000 people at The Cotton Bowl for a game against Tulane, but the local media was there to cover it in full, as if 50,000 people were there instead. ANd when SMU has about 5000 people at Ford Stadium while playing Tulsa, it still gets full video coverage on all the local networks. I don't care if they have SWC legacy or not, that team didn't deserve any more publicity than we got when we sucked. I just think the SMU name and money carries a lot of weight with the local media outlets. But usually, media members hate monied and well-heeled groups, which makes the SMU coverage even more unbelievable. And its not like SMU has a lot of journalists in the DFW media, ceratinly when compared to us. It really doesn't add up.

That will never happen at UNT. The school's history is from education. The citizenry and the administration love being renowed for music and arts. Athletics isn't anywhere close to being high on their agenda or their liking.

I agree with the premise of just how important this game is to the season and especially for recruiting and local media coverage. The only thing I disagree with is the fear that the fans won't get up for this game. Its the home opener, against a team that no one in Denton likes, that no one from UNT likes, and we are always behind them, perception-wise, by the local media and, more improtatntly, by conferences around the country. They will be up for this game. In 2006, when we were just terrible, we still pounded SMU in Denton, when they actually had one of their best teams since the Death Penalty but before June Jones got there. We were so amped up for that game that we pounded them and cost them a bowl berth at the end of the season. In 2007, again, when we were just awful--and they were too--we both played a huge pillow fight of a game in Dallas between teams that won 1 game (SMU) and 2 games (us). I think we will be ready for sure--McCarney knows it, too, that this game resonates with the Mean Green faithful, which is saying something, since he has seen just how little this place has cared about the majority of the teams we have played in his three seasons here. He knows this one will be easy to get up for.

Oh Lord...get the popcorn ready. Either this is an A+ troll or we are about to see internet poster homicide.

RV wasn't anywhere near that election...he laid low before and during that election. The campaign was labeled "stealth" because so few people really knew about it. Sadly, we all know that if we had really promoted this stadium, it would've failed--again. So I stand by that point. UNTFlyer did the heavy lifting on this. Maybe UNTFlyer can come on here and tell us how much influence RV had with him as he spear-headed this effort, but that has never been made public to my knowledge. And, lastly, I don't discount Todd Dodge at all on this. He was an articulate speaker, he made the UNT family feel like he cared about them, and he made no bones about the fact that he was promised a new stadium when he got hired. And it still took Dodge consistently bringing up in the media and having this "stealth" election to get it done. As far as the suite level stuff, that is his job, especially to get high donors on board. That is probably what he has done the best of consistently at UNT. He certainly has your support and the other millionaires that support this place substantially. If Gretchen Bataille said we will never pay more for a head coach than what she makes, RV should have made that clear to everyone that was the payscale and where it came from. He is the perfect AD for this administration and BOR. He does their bidding, he doesn't rock the boat, and he doesn't cost too much. There's a reason he hasn't gone anywhere else. Don't fool yourself into believeing that if the AD at UNT turned everything around here to the degree that you all say he has, that he wouldn't be crawling up the career ladder to go somewhere else. ADs do the same thing that coaches do. Yet, here RV is--as the perpetual AD at this place, with little pressure. To me, that's not comedian material--its pretty damn frustrating. It is very telling, though, that you didn't mention anything about his hires in your post...I'll just assume we agree on that topic.

I, too, think CUSA is a great setup for us right now. We play more in state teams as conference mates in a FBS conference than ever before. We also play La Tech and Southern Miss, both of whom have solid reputations in college football for non-AQ programs. I just go back to TCU. If they could build a winner int he fashion they did, while playing in the MWC, then I am convinced any Texas team could do the same if they hire the right guy and fund the program the right way. Gary Patterson is a great defensive coach and he had Texas HS talent to go up against the teams out west--bingo, you have a team that consistently gets ranked, gets invited to BCS Bowl games, and ends up winning a Rose Bowl to finish #2 in the final poll. I realize TCU has a lot of major advantages ($$$, Ft. Worth support, name recongition) that we don't. But I think, long-term, we need to either be in the MWC or AAC down the road or we aren't going to be moving upward as far as a non-AQ can. The MWC will get back into Texas. Its just a matter of how they will do it. If BYU ever comes back, I see them adding 3 other Texas teams. To me, they go hard after UTEP, UH, and SMU. IF either of the last two won't go, then you go next to Rice, UNT, and UTSA. If we got to go play in the MWC with UTEP and Rice, for example, who wouldn't be in favor of that? You get two teams in Texas, replace La Tech with UNM, and then move up for better football and MUCH better basketball. That is what I think is the dream scenario for UNT in about 5 years or so. We gotta win in both sports to have a chance for this to occur, but its probably the best non-AQ situation we could possibly get.

UNTFlyer got the great new stadium done...they had to keep RV hidden away to make that happen, BTW. The athletic complex is very nice and I do credit him for getting that done. I think its the biggest achievement of his career here at UNT. The hire report card is not good. Like it or not, at UNT especially, the hires in revenue sports are all you need to grade. Football: Grade D Failed to fire Dickey in 2000, extended him and then fired him with two years left on his contract, hired Todd Dodge and allowed him to bring in HS coaches as assistants, kept Dodge for a 4th year after he had won all of 5 games in the first three years, and then finally hired McCarney and got him an extension after he won the HoD Bowl. Mens' Hoops: Grade C Kept Johnny Jones as long as he could until LSU came calling. Hires an assistant coach known for being a great recruiter and had no head coaching experience in Tony Benford. If Benford gets off to a great start at UNT with the best collection of talent we have ever had, he's probably coaching at his alma mater (Texas Tech) right now, meaning we didn't go with a guy who would stay here as a successful coach for any length of time. In the end, it doesn't matter, since he has sucked royally in two years as coach and doesn't look to have a bright future here in his next two years as head coach. Women's Hoops: Grade F Shanice Stephens...enough said. I knew when we lost a preseason game to Texas Womans University, that was all I needed to know about her "coaching". An absolute disaster as a head coach. Replaced with Karen Aston, who showed great promise, but got bought by UT after just one year. Petersen hasn't shown much in his years as coach. The move up to CUSA was solely because SMU left--not because of anyhting we or RV did. We aren't even in CUSA if SMU doesn't leave--which just scares the hell out of me, since we would have been in a WATERED DOWN SBC...that's where you have to ask yourself if FBS is really worht it, if the best you can do is be in a conference with ULM, Texas State, Troy, Georgia State, etc... The APR is something to be proud of, but the hole we dug out of was also under his watch when Dickey was the coach here. His second major achievement was to simply allow tailgating before games--that has galvanized the fans who like to enjoy this activity, even if a lot of them don't go into the game. To me, his grade is a C, at best. He looks much better than any other ADs at UNT, since we simply didn't even try to fund the AD before RV got hired, as well as the fact that the previous ADs didn't allow tailgating (Seriously, who is that stupid?) and scheduled us out in the revenue sports to fund the entire department's budget. But at UNT a C grade in athletics earns you a great job. From the BOR standpoint, RV's greatest achievement is that he does the job just like they want him to, so he has been rewarded with many extensions. At any other major university of our size, there is now way he'd have survived that many bad hires in those revenue sports. That alone would have gotten him fired many, many years ago.

This. Games today against Boise State, Nevada, and Utah State are about 180 degrees from what they were like in the Big West days, when we played in a toilet of a stadium and were brand new to FBS ball after a 12-year demotion to 1-AA purgatory. If anyone thinks that a game in Denton against Air Force, Colorado State, or Fresno State wouldn't get more attention from the DFW public, which still includes most UNT fans and alums, than a home game against most of CUSAs teams, I don't know what to say.

If RV came out and said we have 5 games in Denton in these two seasons because we need the cash to pay the bills and SMU as a road game helps us to at least alleviate some of the pain of our fans not having an extra game at Apogee, I'd accept it, even if I didn't want to hear it. Otherwise, there is no other reason that is acceptable at this point to have only five home games in Denton. I really don't understand why we cannot get a better OOC opponent than SMU or Army scheduled at Apogee, but it is what it is, I guess. I always figured that with Apogee, we could get a decent home-and-home series scheduled with teams from conferences other than the MAC or the AAC. So far, aside from Indiana, we have hosted or will host teams in OOC at Apogee from the AAC (UH and SMU), the MAC (Ball State), Independent (Idaho and Army), or FCS (Texas Southern and Nicholls State). I thought we would see more Indiana-type teams from AQ leagues or a BYU or Boise State every once in a while. IIRC, we were told this new stadium would allow us the opportunity to bring in more recognized teams to Denton.Instead, we have OOC games with teams that Fouts hosted or easily could have hosted, even in its decrepit state. Very disappointing...

The SMU game in Dallas will get sold as a "virtual" home game because its so close...just wait.

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