Venson

I hope Independence Bowl myself. I have no desire to go to New Mexico plus I do not think as many kids pay attention to that bowl like they would Independence. I also think we would travel well to Shreveport.

Exactly.

I think this team is great. We may not win a championship this year, but no one on this board can honestly say they thought we would even be competing for championships or in the conversation about one in year three of a rebuild. We were 1-11 in 2015, 5-8 2016, 9-5 2017, and now 6-2 so far with the most difficult part of our schedule behind us. We have 5 more games left because we should beat everyone else and have a good chance of winning our bowl game. That would make for an 11-2 season. We still have McCarney era players on this team. We have a lot of Littrell players as well, but really how well could he recruit when he came to us mid December and had a very short time to convince kids to come to a school that was really a dumpster fire? He had to take what he could get. He took what he inherited and coached them up to exceed expectations and came away with a 5-8 season. After that season, his staff was raided and he had to reset. Plus 5-8 doesn't convince a lot of 3 star kids to come to a place that has been losing for years. He coached them to a 9-5 season and the result is now we have the number one recruiting class in CUSA coming in. Next year all of McCarney's players will be gone and this will be completely SL's guys and a huge recruiting class coming in. If he cannot start winning championships in the next two years, then I would worry, but right now I think he is moving this team right along nicely. I think we as fans want more sooner because we are just so tired of losing.

No I would not. My reasoning may be a little different than anyone else. My reasoning is because of recruiting. Although a conference championship would be nice, but let's be honest, high school football players probably do not pay too much attention to CUSA let alone our championship game. Secondly we are not in competition with UAB for recruits, but we are with SMU. If we want to dominate this 4 county metroplex for players, we better beat SMU. I got it that we have to compete with P5 schools coming in here, but we shouldn't have to compete with SMU or any other G5 that hits this area. I do not think there are many kids from Texas who want to go to Alabama unless they are going to the Tide or Auburn, which if they have a shot at one of those schools, we probably do not have much of a shot to land them anyway. Sure we compete with LaTech for a lot of the east Texas players, but there again, how many really pay attention to LaTech until Tech contacts them? I guarantee you that they pay attention to Arkansas. Them seeing us beat Arkansas carries a hell of a lot more weight than us getting beat on BEiN sports where no one probably saw the game anyway other than die hard UNT and UAB fans. The game that we really need to win now is the game against FAU because that will be primetime on a night when we will be the only game on. We need to dominate FAU and show all potential recruits that LaTech and UAB were anomalies. Because honestly, I doubt any kid from Texas will watch the CUSA Championship game that will probably be Marshall vs UAB. I doubt any kids saw us get beat by LaTech or UAB other than the kids who have already committed to us. Then I do not think those two losses changed their minds. I can almost guarantee that they saw us beat AR especially after the Brewer punt return. So, no I wouldn't trade it.

I understand that Littrell wants to allow his OC to call the plays because he liked the fact that all of his HC's when he was an OC did not bother him, but GH's play calling baffles me a lot of the time. Like that pass play on the 1 yard line resulting in a safety was crazy to me. With our suspect offensive line, why keep calling plays that have long developing routes. Fine has shown that he can see the field quickly so why not call plays that gets the ball out of his hand quickly to slow down their pass rush? It's as if GH doesn't trust him to get the ball out quickly to the right guy. Then two designed QB runs as we are closing in on the endzone in the closing minute. Fine is great and all, but that's why you have running backs. I don't know, but again the play calling was suspect in my opinion.

That pretty much sums it up.

I wanted to see Nic Smith more because he has better vision than Torrey. Torrey is more powerful, but when you need to slip a tackle to get one yard, I think Smith would have been a better option.

I think that was our last loss. I think we go 11-2 because we will win our bowl game.

Our offensive line is the weak link. I just do not know if we will find what we need in recruiting. I also fear what we are going to lose defensively. After this season, we lose Ejiya, Garner, Brooks, Hall, Tauaalo, and Young. I think that may be too much to make up. I hope not, but the thought certainly scares me. I believe the guys we have coming in will be great players, I just don't know if they will have an impact next season. Hopefully, what we have as back ups now can replace the guys we will lose.

This game should not have been this close. I hate to say this, but it felt like UTEP lost this game more than UNT won it. We have got to play better. I do not know what was going on, but we did not look good at all. I saw SL's interview at the end and he was pissed and I can understand why.

Not at first. I thought I did until someone reminded me of the old Animal House line. So it went right over my head.

I know now. I had forgotten that line in Animal House. Haha.

Damn dude. The sky is not falling. We lost. We can only control what we can control. We can win out. LaTech could lose a couple. Have some faith. Before the season I predicted 10 and 4 because I thought we would play in the Championship game and a bowl game for a total of 14 games so I still believe we will be in the championship game because I believe LaTech will lose 2 games in conference.

I do think last night hurt him. If I am a P5 I am looking at the fact that UNT has yet to win a bowl game, they beat a injury plagued LaTech team last year by one, and then when LaTech is healthy you cannot beat them in with home field advantage and a record crowd. I think that has secured him to be with us for at least two more seasons. Until he can consistently beat Skip Holtz, I think he is safe. Skip can't get a P5 offer and SL can't beat him when he has a healthy team says a lot. I think P5s shy away from that. I may be crazy, but I do think it hurts.

I agree. Our fans are not accustomed to winning so I think they do not quite know what to do yet. They will learn. They will learn that when the opposing teams offense is on the field is when you won't to crank it up so loud that you wake up people sleeping in Fort Worth. Then when the offense is on the field and needs it to be quiet that we should be so quiet that you can hear a rat piss on cotton. Well maybe that's too quiet, but you get the point.

I still believe. I believe we will win out. I believe LaTech will get beaten twice. I believe they will lose to FAU and USM. Lane Kiffin is too smart not to take advantage of the offensive mismatch he will have. We proved last night that we could run the ball on them. FAU with Devin Siingletary will certainly take advantage of that and will not force the pass like we did last night and USM, just always seems to find a way to beat LaTech. They have beaten them the last 3 years.

Okay. Now I got why he used that. I have not seen Animal House for over 20 to 30 years. Damn and here I was thinking he actually thought the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor. LOL.

I was with you until you said the "Germans bombed Pearl Harbor" LOL. The Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, but I knew what you were getting at.

I honestly think that LaTech is better than any other team remaining on their schedule, just like I believe we are better than any team we have played so far or will play, but this is football and you can be beaten any given Saturday. I mean did anyone honestly believe Old Dominion would beat Va Tech after being walloped by Liberty? Did anyone believe Texas would actually beat TCU? That just goes to show that LaTech could lose two more games in the west and we could be back in the driver's seat if we play like we are capable of playing. They have Rice, UTSA, USM, and UAB remaining in the west and none of those will be easy. All of those teams have the capability to beat them if they play well especially USM and UAB. UTSA will be tough in San Antonio and Rice will not just rollover for them. We are okay. We got punched in the mouth last night. How you respond to that is what will tell if we are building champions. We will be okay.

Thanks for a voice of reason this morning.

This. The attempted fair catch at the 5 was a bad decision and was the most costly. It is demoralizing to a defense. You come off the field thinking you are about to get a little breather, take your helmet off and have to put it right back on and trot right back onto the field to stop an offense from gaining 5 yards without so much as a sip of water. Whatever happened to put your heels on the 10 yard line and if the ball goes over your head, let it go?

The injuries were key in our loss last night. Kemon Hall going down was probably the biggest. EJ Ejiya was in and out as well. Mason limping and Easly going down may have been the biggest blow of all because it could be season ending. It was a brutal game for us. Hopefully these guys can recover.

Great thoughts and you were spot on.

I honestly would not count him out. It's football. Those things happen. It even happens in the NFL where you should have the best kickers. He has missed one FG all season and now we are ready to throw him under the bus. Sure it was a FG that we wanted him to make because we wanted the win. However, this loss was more than Cole Hedlund missing a 46 yarder. Defense was not getting pressure on the QB, injuries started to mount, turnovers, Ferguson being unblockable and Mason having to tun for his life. Graham Harrell forcing the pass when the running game was effective, etc. There were many reasons we lost, but Cole Hedlund missing one FG is not a time to give up on the kid.

I may be naive, but something tells me that SL will stay here for awhile. I listen to him talk, watch his eyes, and watch his body language and they all say to me that he wants to stay here because he loves where he is. When I hear him speak, he often brings up how OU football was down in the dumps until a guy named Bob Stoops showed up and turned things around. Stoops is of course a legend in OU football now. I believe SL wants to do the same at UNT. When Stoops arrived at OU, he was doing a rebuild, but let's face it, OU had been national championship winners before so the potential was certainly there. UNT has never been national champs and have never even sniffed a top 20 finish. This is a much tougher hill to climb. To even get UNT to a top 10 finish would send that coach into CFB history forever. I think SL wants to make history and build a program, that some people probably still thinks is in the FCS, into a perennial power. He has an Administration, AD, Regents, City, and fan base that is 100% behind him. He is getting facilities that he wants. Donors are starting to come out big time. He is getting paid well and depending on how this season ends, I can see his salary being pushed to 2 mil or just north of 2 mil. When I was in the Army, I had one of my Soldiers talking about Memphis and how large the student enrollment was. He asked me who was my team. I said North Texas. He asked why and I said because that is my alma mater. He asked why I went to such a small school. He was shocked when I told him their enrollment was larger than Memphis'. That is what people think of UNT or that it's just liberal arts and music with no real athletes. For SL to turn UNT into a nationally prominent university that all sports fans talk about in the same breath as Texas, OU, Auburn, Alabama, LSU etc would be historic and would be talked about long after many of us are gone. I think he wants that and may only leave if OU opens up. Again I may be naive.