My thoughts on saturdays loss, coaching situation and where NT goes from here.

outoftown · September 5, 2022

There is a talent difference, and that one is not actually much on SL. NT has the players it deserves and is willing to spend the necessary NIL on. that is the era CFB is in now. When your opponent is a complete unknown, that is a bigger problem for the defense than it is for the offense. With the offense you can force the defense to adapt to you. To do that with the defense is much harder, it is primarily your job to adapt. I will therefore give the defense and its coordinator a bit of a pass. SMU was changed so much, it was very hard to game plan for. The next team on SMUs schedule will profit from already having some game film. Plus SMU is particularly strong in its passing game, sadly a place where NT often simply didn't have the horses. However on offense we saw that the problem was not primarily talent. it was not even primarily game planing (although there are plenty of gripes there too). It was primarily completely coachable stuff that has a lot to do with getting synchronized. 4th down false starts after timeouts. Bad snaps in goal line situations (and goal line and short yardage situations have never been good under SL). getting to the red zone and then not scheeming a way to find the last 5 yards. That is primarily on coaching. This game could have been much closer, despite the talent gap NT easily left 24 points off the board in the redzone alone. It was an ugly loss, and it did not need to be ugly, and that has a loooot to do with coaching.

However how i will feel about the loss has a lot to do also with what SMU will turn out to be. It is not a good measuring stick right now, because we simply don't know if this is an 8-4 SMU that burns a lot of NIL money or a 11-1 SMU that challenges for a new years bowl. In a way I am still where I was to begin the season, just with the observation that the same coaching strengths and problems still seem to be present.

I would have been ok to move on at HC after last years bowl loss, despite the late season surge. I did manage to understand though how WB could arrive at different view. Still SL needs to be continously evaluated. UTEP was ok, but nothing SL hasn't done in the past. the problem is usually that his teams are rarely any good at punching up with last years UTSA game the only arguable exception. And saturday exemplified that again. Could he go 9-3 this year. its imaginable. Could he win the conference? harder to see that. It just seems there are some clear limits with him. If he is at the upper edge of those limits that is good enough because it prepares the field for the next coach by showing that winning seasons can be had here. But the next time he gets back to the middle of his range (6-7 wins) NT needs to move on in my mind. NT doesn't owe SL anything. For what it got in return NT paid him handsomely, better than any other team in conference (until UTSA this year) without getting a single championship in return. He needs to live up to his salary or the next contract needs to reflect the market. Even at say 8-4 a new contract - if given - absolutely needs to reflect that he has not won a conference championship and barely challenged for one in several years and make it possible to move on should NT feel like it (Harbough 2021 style). stagnation means getting overtaken. Also it is part of WBs job to have a plan b. In many ways he is an excelllent AD, but I think that is the part he is least good at.

Edited September 5, 2022 by outoftown

meangreenfaninno · September 5, 2022

1 minute ago, outoftown said:

There is a talent difference, and that one is not actually much on SL. NT has the players it deserves and is willing to spend the necessary NIL on. that is the era CFB is in now. When your opponent is a complete unknown, that is a bigger problem for the defense than it is for the offense. With the offense you can force the defense to adapt to you. To do that with the defense is much harder, it is primarily your job to adapt. I will therefore give the defense and its coordinator a bit of a pass. SMU was changed so much, it was very hard to game plan for. The next team on SMUs schedule will profit from already having some game film. Plus SMU is particularly strong in its passing game, sadly a place where NT often simply didn't have the horses. However on offense we saw that the problem was not primarily talent. it was not even primarily game planing (although there are plenty of gripes there too). It was primarily completely coachable stuff that has a lot to do with getting synchronized. 4th down false starts after timeouts. Bad snaps in goal line situations (and goal line and short yardage situations have never been good under SL). getting to the red zone and then not scheeming a way to find the last 5 yards. That is primarily on coaching. This game could have been much closer, despite the talent gap NT easily left 24 points off the board in the redzone alone. It was an ugly loss, and it did not need to be ugly, and that has a loooot to do with coaching.

However how i will feel about the loss has a lot to do also with what SMU will turn out to be. It is not a good measuring stick right now, because we simply don't know if this is an 8-4 SMU that burns a lot of NIL money or a 11-1 SMU that challenges for a new years bowl. In a way I am still where I was to begin the season, just with the observation that the same coaching strengths and problems still seem to be present.

I would have been ok to move on at HC after last years bowl loss, despite the late season surge. I did manage to understand though how WB could arrive at different view. Still SL needs to be continously evaluated. UTEP was ok, but nothing SL hasn't done in the past. the problem is usually that his teams are rarely any good at punching up with last years UTSA game the only arguable exception. And saturday exemplified that again. Could he go 9-3 this year. its imaginable. Could he win the conference? harder to see that. It just seems there are some clear limits with him. If he is at the upper edge of those limits that is good enough because it prepares the field for the next coach by showing that winning seasons can be had here. But the next time he gets back to the middle of his range (6-7 wins) NT needs to move on in my mind. NT doesn't owe SL anything. For what it got in return NT paid him better than any other team in conference (until UTSA this year). He needs to live up to this. Even at say 8-4 a new contract - if given - absolutely needs to reflect that he has not won a conference championship and barely challenged for one in several years and make it possible to move on should NT feel like it (Harbough 2021 style). stagnation means getting overtaken. Also it is part of WBs job to have a plan b. In many ways he is an excelllent AD, but I think that is the part he is least good at.

Great post and I agree but you never speak to the fact we are indeed moving up in conferences and Littrell needs to be held to that same standard.

meangreenbob · September 5, 2022

So what ever happened to all those great #1 and #2 CUSA recruiting classes?

Seriously, do any of you remember us ever competing for a conference Title because of those “particular” classes. Did those recruits ever win a bowl game?

Of course not. Why? Because the problem is at the top. The head coach and individuals responsible for keeping him there.

Edited September 5, 2022 by meangreenbob

Wag Tag · September 5, 2022

We can't get average qb play and we can't get game time or half time adjustments.

Herman mentioned the qb play as politely as possible, there has never been YAC yardage with Aune.

To me the wildcat play after the time out by SMU sums up Seths in game capabilities. As we all know our play did not changed.

NorthTexasWeLove · September 5, 2022

I quit reading right when you said we can give the defense and DC a pass. We can never just get in the business of handing out passes. My goodness, we weren't playing in Tuscaloosa. We were playing at home vs a team patched together vs a 1st year HC. Also, the reason for your pass? The offense SMU runs is the same they ran last year and the 2 years before that.