[DRC: UNT announces deal with Learfield (updated with info on impact on BTG, radio talent)]

13 hours ago, meangreen16 said:

KNTU is a public radio station. They get funding from UNT to basically keep the lights on. The rest of the money to operate the station comes from listeners giving money, and a pretty limited amount of underwriting. 

At last check, NTTV was on Verizon and Charter -- but only in Denton County. They have started to do a lot more shows centered around UNT sports. When I was there, they could only broadcast the games that weren't already being televised. They aired the Portland State game. I helped on Mac's final Spring Game broadcast on NTTV. 

KNTU is not a public radio station as in they are not an NPR affiliated station and doesn't get funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

[DRC: UNT announces deal with Learfield (updated with info on impact on BTG, radio talent)]

KNTU is not a public radio station. 

I was only ever able to get NTTV while I lived on campus. I could never get it from any cable company when I lived in the rest of Denton. 

As for if they showed games, I dunno, I was always at the games and never home to see.

[New unis?]

6 hours ago, meangreenlax said:

Here's hoping that they go for a classic look. When big budget teams with supplier connections like Maryland or Oregon go outlandish, they can get away with it as they're designed well. Take a middling team and try to be all fancy, and it looks cheap, and like a bad high school uniform. 

Or when middle of the road teams get together with a young trendy new uniform supplier. See this junk from 2007-2010.

(Not pictured, the long list of stupid foot injuries caused by the horrific Under Armor cleats.)

[IPF is happening]

If we're talking about building an indoor facility and hanging with the big boys, then it means it should be paid for like the big boys. With a big-ass gift. No student fee BS, no 50-50 matching crapola: big gift in exchange for a name. Like the "Brint Ryan Family Indoor Practice Facility". 
 

[IPF is happening]

The Jim McIngvale "Never on Back-Back-Backorder, Saves You Money Today!" Indoor Practice and Couch Financing Facility.

 

[IPF is happening]

13 hours ago, UNTLifer said:

I like the fact that we used our familiarity with the hot weather to beat down Ball State a couple of years ago.  Practicing in A/C for an outdoor sport is ridiculous.  The sad thing is that this is what kids expect these days.  

I used to think this way too until I actually stepped foot in a college indoor facility in August.


A lot of em ain't cool and comfy even with exhaust the fans goin'. But that's also not the point. Schools with indoor facilities still also use their outdoor practice fields to do stuff like acclimatize to extreme heat, and conversely to extreme cold. 



Reasons to have an indoor facility in a place like Denton:

1. Provides a weather-is-not-a-factor practice area for multiple sports. It rains a lot in Denton, and lightnings and hails, and vicious wind. If the weather is crap and everybody is miserable, they don't practice well, they just wanna get it the hell over with and go home. This solves that situation and yes we've all seen what a difference one good or bad practice in a week can mean for Saturday. Soccer and softball can also use the place in those situations. Also, Green Brigade could potentially practice there in garbage weather.

2. If said crappy weather mucks up the practice field, you don't have to continue tearing it up or go tear up the competition turf in the stadium. You don't want to throw a tackling sled on the nice expensive turf in Apogee if the Dickey fields are muddy AF. 

3. Provides a cheaper option for practicing later in the season when it gets dark at 5pm. Instead of using the Apogee and turning on the big field lights, you can use the indoor which isn't gonna spin the meter as fast. 

4. It's just one more tool to use to try and convince a fickle-minded 18 year-old high school jock to come to UNT. It's a player ego-booster and a fan/alum/donor ego-booster. 

5. In the future, once Jerry Jones dies (providing he doesn't find a way to become a cyborg) and the NFL collectively forgets the complete disaster that was the prep and execution for Super Bowl XLV and decides to gift AT&T Stadium with another Super Bowl, then UNT with it's D1 indoor facility can host the practices for one of the teams instead of freaking Highland Park HS. Same for big time soccer or any other number of things. 

[IPF is happening]

7 hours ago, BTG_Fan1 said:

Also, with it connecting to the IPF, I would like to see improvements made to the weight room with them moving the Football Meeting rooms into the connecting area hopefully. 

 

Weight room, maybe. But they just spent a buttload of $$$$$ renovating and improving the team meeting areas in the AC. Don't see why you would move them after you just rebuilt them.

[What about McCaslands Staff?]

15 hours ago, GreenMachine said:

Too much ice, not enough ice. Popcorn too salty, not enough salt. Cheerleaders too pretty, don't show enough, show too much. We didn't win by enough points, we won by too many points. Even if a certain person comes back, they chose not to be happy anyway.

The wrinkled $100 bill paradox, which I believe is mentioned in the legendary missing stanza of "Glory to the Green".

[MGB: McCasland news items from first day]

On 3/16/2017 at 8:09 AM, MCMLXXX said:

You left out Texas Tech (15,098)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Supermarkets_Arena

 

and Lamar (they also have suites)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montagne_Center

 

and Baylor

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrell_Center

Ok I missed Tech. But the other two are still below us in basketball seating capacity (10,500), at 10,080 and 10,284.

So we're behind two BIG12 schools, an SEC school and a conference mate who's arena is named after their coach from WHEN THEY WON A NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP.

[MGB: McCasland news items from first day]

20 hours ago, Harry said:

Luxury suites generate more dollars for the program so that needs to happen.   When you factor in the aged electronics and other building issues it may be better to build a new one over at Eagle Point.

Updating the electrical system in the Super Pit shouldn't be too bad. It's built as a giant shell over a block of concrete, most of the wiring is in conduit that's easy to access. Hell we were told for years that it would be too difficult and too costly to install new arena lights because they'd have to upgrade all the wiring in the catwalk area. And don't forget the line we were fed by RV for years about the superstructure of the building not being able to hold up a center court video board. 

There are a ton of things in the Super Pit that are holdovers from bygone eras that can be and should be done away with. The spotlight cages that hang down from the catwalk that have 30 year old spotlights covered in dust and trashcans with 20 year old soda cups in them, the massive stage light flying array that probably hasn't been used since Pearl Jam played in the Pit in 1993, (http://www.setlist.fm/setlist/pearl-jam/1993/university-of-north-texas-coliseum-denton-tx-23d65cf7.html Hot Damn that musta been a badass show!), the control room at the top of the seating section on the east side of the arena is full of obsolete equipment that isn't used, the decorative features of the concourse are super dated looking, the bathrooms on the concourse need a huge makeover: lots of stuff. But nothing that means the place needs to be replaced. 

We have a 10,500 seat arena that we can renovate in any number of ways. It's bigger than the Allen Events Center, Verizon Theater in Grand Prairie, Dr Pepper Arena in Frisco, The Arena at the Dallas Convention Center, Moody Coliseum at SMU (which hosts concerts), College Park Center at UTA (which hosts concerts), Music Hall at Fair Park, Schollmaier Arena (formerly Daniel–Meyer Coliseum). It's bigger than Hofheinz Arena in Houston. The only college basketball arenas in Texas that are bigger are UT, A&M and UTEP. 

[MGB: McCasland news items from first day]

21 hours ago, Army of Dad said:

Agreed.

@TheWestie did you get a chance to check out the new lighting before you migrated?

Yeah dude, I only moved in September. I got to see horrible basketball in nice light all of last season.

20 hours ago, Harry said:

No I agree it looks much better.  The external lighting is what needs a facelift.  It is dark and not very inviting.  I have more extermal issues with that Pit than inside.

Lighting? Let's think basics first. Place needs a pressure washing (inside and out) and some paint. Then we can talk making it look good at night.

22 hours ago, UNTFan23 said:

It might be "too large" for basketball but it works great for other events like graduations where it gets packed to the limit.

Exactly.

If they drastically reduce the capacity for the Super Pit, then it's appeal as a high school graduation facility goes away. Right now it has large capacity and amble parking close by, which is why it gets booked solid for almost a month every spring. And that is a huge chunk of revenue that the University isn't gonna give up.

[where does benford go from here?]

On 3/11/2017 at 3:04 PM, texmusic said:

Men's Wearhouse

"Anything wrong with these suits sir?"

"Nope, just never got to wear em."

[where does benford go from here?]

Rock and Roll Sushi

[MBB Candidate could be Ray Harper]

If I remember correctly, Ray Harper's first game as head coach at WKU was in Denton against us.

[Villarreal to open sushi restaurant]

I think we'll all do our part to make sure this business succeeds:


By drinking in the parking lot while talking about how much we love sushi, and then never going inside.

[MBB Candidate could be Ray Harper]

Somebody get Jerry Scott on the phone.

[Coach Candidate]

Is Fran still getting that cushy ESPN $$?

[Sample images of other college track and soccer stadiums]

All my Google Maps screen grabs are the same scale. 

https://osmp.unt.edu/sites/default/files/UNT Denton Master Plan 2013.pdf

The plan for the Fouts land, since about 2005, has been for it to become a parking garage, a dorm, and several other buildings. At one point an opera house was in the plans but on the revised 2013 Master Plan it got scraped. It was changed to a large parking garage, surface parking and intramural fields and new dorms.

Note that this includes not just the land the stadium itself is on, but also the whole parking lot and old football practice fields around Fouts.

 

 

Look on page 64 of the Master Plan. It has a map of campus with a track stadium at the corner of Wildwood and Bonnie Brae. 

And a baseball stadium. Which is why I photoshopped Disch-Faulk where I did.

 

Page 118 shows a proposed indoor fieldhouse south of the Mean Green Volleyball complex. The site of the former Liberty Christian baseball or softball field. And it looks like they planned something either the size of TCU or smaller. This is in the "Long Range Plan" section.

Page 120 shows a proposal for an indoor tennis facility in the middle of the Warranch Tennis Pavillon and elsewhere says that a center championship competition court is no longer needed nor desired. This is all in the " Beyond Long Range" section of the Master Plan.

[Sample images of other college track and soccer stadiums]

So I did a thing...

We've all been talking about what we want in a track stadium to go south of the Warranch Tennis Pavilion, and started to worry about how much room there actually is there. So I screen-grabbed a bunch of places on Google Maps and overlaid them onto that piece of land. I got mad Photoshop skills, yo.

Here is what it looks like with a track the same dimensions as the track around Fouts. We almost all know what it looks like, many of us have even run it.

 

Here is what it looks like with the track layout from Mike Meyers Stadium at UT in Austin. That stadium has more rubber surface surrounding the track than Fouts.

And here is Hayward Field in that spot. Hayward is longer and narrower than the Fouts track.

Here's Hayward but laid out East/West.

Here is the Darrell R. Dickey Football Practice Facility with TCU's 80 yard indoor field the Sam Baugh Indoor Practice Facility,  the turf from Apogee, the Argyle High School Indoor Activity Center, and UT-Austin's 100 yard with two full end zones Indoor Practice Facility "The Bubble", all shown for size comparison. I think where I put The Bubble is exactly where we should build ours.

Here is the Mean Green Village with the UT Bubble where the Mean Green Soccer Stadium is. Note that a full 100 yard with two 10 yard deep end zones facility is significantly longer than the existing soccer field.

And with TCU's Baugh Indoor. Which fits the space nicely.

And the Argyle Indoor Activities Center. 

And just because, here's Disch-Falk Field if it were put north of Lovelace Stadium and close enough to share bathroom facilities.

And here's Apogee inside of DKR. 

[Villarreal to open sushi restaurant]

Keiichi will never play Rock and Roll Sushi at home, no matter how nice and new their facility is.

[Possible indoor practice facility location]

Current location of the overflow parking for volleyball, soccer, softball and basketball practice parts of Mean Green Village. Former site of Liberty Christian softball stadium I think. 


For a while before we found out that the Track and Field stadium was just gonna have soccer practice in the middle and not a new soccer competition field, I thought the current soccer field would be the perfect place for an indoor practice facility. It's right across from the Athletic Center and right next to softball, soccer, volleyball, golf, tennis etc. 

Point being this isn't the SEC where every sport gets their own individual indoor practice place. A lot of places with indoor facilities use them for multiple sports.

[Villarreal to open sushi restaurant]

Another venue he'll never be able to fill to capacity?

[Here is why you leave Benford to finish off the season...]

On 3/1/2017 at 0:36 PM, Harry said:

Benford is a good recruiter and it won't take him long to find a good assistant job.

But is he really?

What I've seen is someone who has brought in:

1.) A bunch of HS fixer-upper players who got passed over by other schools because of behavioral, academic or attitude problems, lauded them as the solution to our problems.

2.) A bunch of "meh" HS recruits who only have offers from Sun Belt schools or FCS schools, IF they even have other offers.

3.) Add in a seemingly endless parade of college transfers who either got booted from somewhere because they were the #1 category above when they got recruited there and were such a piece of work that their first school said enough is enough or were just such a locker room cancer they got run off. 

 

I've never really been impressed by anybody Benford has brought in, and Combs seems like the only player who has actually improved substantially since arriving. His resume after his years here is a god-awful losing record and a string of recruits who never did anything, got injured constantly, and left in frustration soon after.

Here's a good analogy for why Wren/Smatresk didn't fire Benford.


Your parents just bought you a laptop for your birthday and a car for graduation. They probably can't afford to get you a pony for Christmas too.




If Dan McCarney is still getting checks from UNT does he still have an EagleMail account?

[North Texas Ranked No 125 in ESPN Preseason Rankings]

To the buttmunch who made the list:

 

 

[Craig Robertson]

22 minutes ago, UNT Five&Dime said:

I thought this thread was supposed to be about how awesome Craig Robertson is?

Craig Robertson is awesome. 

Also, I just had a hazy 2004 New Orleans Bowl related Bourbon St. flashback.