What would our record be?

[MeanGreenTexan]

You guys are all forgetting about Brelan. Add just him to this year's team and we win at least a couple more. He was a true game breaker. We have NOBODY like that this year. Even our terrible QB play would look better if we had Brelan creating short fields with his punt and kick returns and all around playmaking ability on offense. The only consistently good receiver we have now is Carlos Harris. Add Brelan and now you've got 2 receivers, instead of one, and one that's a true deep threat. Not to mention your run game opens up as teams have to at least worry about Brelan taking one to the house on any given play. Also, our TEs last year were a much better group overall than we are fielding this year---their blocking ability definitely stands out as something we've missed.

No knock on DT, but he had a more explosive group of skill players around him last year.

That's not even getting to the defense, which last year was one of the one or two best defenses that we've fielded in 20+ years. I think we're looking at 8-9 wins again. We'd still lose to Texas b/c Greer and McNulty were just completely inept in that game. We probably can't outscore Indiana, but outside of that there isn't a team on our schedule that would have moved the ball on that defense we fielded last season.

I think this is one of those 'moving target' arguments. People are arguing different semantics, so no one is going to be satisfied.

I can assure you, I havent forgotten Brelan's contributions, nor Trice's, nor Orr's, nor Abbe's, etc...

If you boil it all down though, take away any tertiary arguments about if you "miss" DT, "miss" other players more, HOF, whatever... It's hard to look at the QB play this year, and look at DT's QB play last year (not setting the world on fire by any means), and not see a regression & possible record improvement.

I'm just trying to honestly answer Emmitt's honest question.

To keep re-hashing though is dumb, because each time the topic comes up, the same people keep chiming in with their tertiary points.

[GOMG2013]

Indiana has one of the worst defenses in college football. We couldn't outscore them because we didn't have a quarterback who know how to play the position. Our choices for that game were Greer, Williams, and McNulty. We went with Williams and we behind 21-0 after the first quarter due to his turnovers, and 42-10 after the third.

Indiana's defense in 2014: 97th overall, 103rd against the pass.

Anyone with a decent QB has diced Indiana this year.

Our defense was trash against Indiana.

DW threw a pick on the 1st drive on 3rd and 15. 1st down was a 5 yard loss by Harris. The INT gave Indiana the ball at the 30.

On side kick. Indy converted 2 4th downs on the drive to go up 14. They had no respect for our defense.

Next 2 drives on offense, 3 & out...Indy post route, TD...21-0 1st quarter.

5 yards rushing in 3 possessions for UNT...

DW did not lose Indiana. Not even close.

[Travis]

Our defense was trash against Indiana.

DW threw a pick on the 1st drive on 3rd and 15. 1st down was a 5 yard loss by Harris. The INT gave Indiana the ball at the 30.

On side kick. Indy converted 2 4th downs on the drive to go up 14. They had no respect for our defense.

Next 2 drives on offense, 3 & out...Indy post route, TD...21-0 1st quarter.

5 yards rushing in 3 possessions for UNT...

DW did not lose Indiana. Not even close.

I agree. His efforts just didn't help much that game with all the turnovers. We were going to lose it by our defense anyway. He just made it even worse. Perhaps, he tries too hard and is not content with just settling for a zero sum play. That seems to hurt him most.

Edited November 24, 2014 by Travis

[GOMG2013]

I agree. His efforts just didn't help much that game with all the turnovers. We were going to lose it by our defense anyway. He just made it even worse. Perhaps, he tries too hard and is not content with just settling for a zero sum play. That seems to hurt him most.

What happened to our powerful run game? 2nd and long...3rd and long...

[UNT 90 Grad]

If you take away the pick 6's and instead assume we would have scored on those drives, what would those scores have looked like? Then again, what if we had Ditka at QB?

[emmitt01]

No difference, except for perhaps So. Miss. Otherwise,we were in no other game that we lost. We just didn't get the play we needed from defensive front 4 and Q.B.

And bringing back the entire defensive front four that we had last season (all seniors) wouldn't affect this?

[vpackrats]

If you take away the pick 6's and instead assume we would have scored on those drives, what would those scores have looked like? Then again, what if we had Ditka at QB?

If you take away the pick 6's and instead assume we would have scored on those drives, what would those scores have looked like? Then again, what if we had Ditka at QB?

That's a no brainer actually. If we had Ditka at QB I say we'd go 12-0 and would have met up with Florida State in the championship game. It would have been a close game but Ditka's 5 TD passes and his QB sneak on 4th and 1 from the goal line gives UNT a 42-35 win and we claim the crystal ball.

[TIgreen01]

I think this is one of those 'moving target' arguments. People are arguing different semantics, so no one is going to be satisfied.

I can assure you, I havent forgotten Brelan's contributions, nor Trice's, nor Orr's, nor Abbe's, etc...

If you boil it all down though, take away any tertiary arguments about if you "miss" DT, "miss" other players more, HOF, whatever... It's hard to look at the QB play this year, and look at DT's QB play last year (not setting the world on fire by any means), and not see a regression & possible record improvement.

I'm just trying to honestly answer Emmitt's honest question.

To keep re-hashing though is dumb, because each time the topic comes up, the same people keep chiming in with their tertiary points.

Maybe go back and read Emmitt's question again? I read it as predict our record this year, if you had all the seniors from last year's team minus DT. Isn't the point to argue what our team looks like without DT? I think it'd look a hell of a lot better than this current 2014 squad. Straight-forward enough? Edited November 24, 2014 by TIgreen01

[UNT90]

And some still wont admit that the defense was the main reason we had a good season last year.

Im still waiting for the we miss Orr, trice, Abbe, Wright, belazin, McCoy, etc articles and threads. Each one deserves their own article and thread.

Holy crap, dude. Where have you been? Maybe you just don't care to remember that I've posted on numerous occasions how much we miss Zach Orr and 6 of the front 7 on D.

Good God, man. Talk about a distraction technique. Try and stay focused, will you?

[gradumacated]

With everyone back bar DT this year...

I think we pick up two more wins, but it's still close. Even with playmakers on offense there's no guarantee our current crop of QBs could find them, especially with Canales still hamstringing the offense with his boneheaded play calls.

Defense and Special Teams were important but the offense still has to do much of the heavy lifting and I'm not convinced. Still think we'd be closer to .500 then we currently are though. USM and UAB the most likely games that we'd win with the team from last year. Rice could be a sneaky W but UTEP was too strong in their backyard.

[wardly]

I was at the game, and Indiana, who had beaten Missouri, flat kicked our ass.