Team You Miss The Most...

[BIG DAWG]

New Mexico State - Best Sunbelt rival???

Idaho - Something to the Kibbie Dome???

Utah St. - Always enjoyed playing these guys from some reason

[stebo]

Don't really miss Idaho or USU. Both were expensive as hell to get to - minimum of a grand for one person to travel to either away game. Boring opponent at home. NMSU - good games. Nice little stadium and great fans. Wouldn't mind scheduling a home and home with them to see how we both measure up against one another. I would guess that we are both equally as bad. They are starting over yet again this year with yet another coach.

[emmitt01]

Easily NMSU. 12 hours away by car but I can't say that my one trip down there in 2001 wasn't worth every single second of that ride.

[Quoner]

Gallery Furniture

[greenminer]

Cobbs.

[Arkstfan]

ASU and NMSU played some fantastic games. They rallied once to beat us in OT, another time we were down 21 with 13 minutes left and won in OT. One year we went for two and the win and they stopped it with a fumble return for 2 points, then there was the time we scored 14 unanswered to win by 11 out there. Just a bunch of great games.

Here's the interesting thing about NMSU.

The closest WAC school to NMSU is Utah State. The second closest is La.Tech (about a 20 mile difference). From a geography stand point the two leagues make no difference for them and their attendance has fallen since going to the WAC.

[Cerebus]

The closest WAC school to NMSU is Utah State. The second closest is La.Tech (about a 20 mile difference). From a geography stand point the two leagues make no difference for them and their attendance has fallen since going to the WAC.

They competed in the SBC. They never should have left.

[GreenFlag]

NMSU

[foutsrouts]

Old Dominion. Tough in basketball, but they haven't won a football game since 1940 and we might have a shot at a win.

[risinggreen]

Speaking of Old Dominion, they're starting up their program again this Fall and I'm wondering how long it will be until they come knocking at the SBC's door? Seems this conference has about a half a dozen schools that will likely be trying to move up and gain entrance over the next five years or so. On the other hand, Old Dominion has quite a few successful programs and might have an eye on USA membership down the road. If things follow their historic pattern around here, their future USA membership could come at our expense.

[shaft]

LA Tech.

[NT80]

The closest WAC school to NMSU is Utah State. The second closest is La.Tech (about a 20 mile difference). From a geography stand point the two leagues make no difference for them and their attendance has fallen since going to the WAC.

I'm guessing that their record has been bad while in the WAC and is the main reason for the attendance loss?

[BIG DAWG]

I must admit...it is definitely NMSU...those games at Fouts are some of the ones I will never forget

[ADLER]

They competed in the SBC. They never should have left.

Well, like they say, hindsight is 20/20.

The situation has changed quite a bit for NMSU since they committed to join the WAC. Initially the strongest lure for NMSU to the WAC was finally getting to participate in a conference with one of their two heated rivals. Unfortunately for NMSU, UTEP quickly bolted for CUSA when TCU vacated that league to join NMSU's other rival New Mexico in the Mountain West Conference.

Once again, New Mexico State was left out, only now with even larger travel expenses and little exposure, other than some bodybag games, in their primary recruiting area, Texas. They experienced a brief financial windfall from the Boise and Hawaii BCS games, but their on field performances have gradually become less competitive during the last several years.

[NM Green]

NMSU hands down. They hate Texas anything and we played tough games with them.

GMG

[GreenStreet]

I would like to miss UNT in the Belt. Remembering NMSTU, Idaho, heck even playing Baylor or Texas Tech gets me more excited than Both FAU/FIU or MTSU. No offense to the belt, I just don't feel the tradition with these guys.

[NT80]

I would like to miss UNT in the Belt. Remembering NMSTU, Idaho, heck even playing Baylor or Texas Tech gets me more excited than Both FAU/FIU or MTSU. No offense to the belt, I just don't feel the tradition with these guys.

There is definately something to be said for playing known opponents. Most 'Belt teams are just trivia questions to college football fans.

[Arkstfan]

Anyone who misses playing Idaho never traveled with the team to Idaho.

[Arkstfan]

There is definately something to be said for playing known opponents. Most 'Belt teams are just trivia questions to college football fans.

That can be said for any team outside the BCS AQ leagues. The six AQ leagues could pull out and form their own association and the bulk of the viewing public would never notice.

[Green Lantern]

That can be said for any team outside the BCS AQ leagues. The six AQ leagues could pull out and form their own association and the bulk of the viewing public would never notice.

Minus national interest in a couple of the top Non-AQ teams, you're right. And even those top (Utah, TCU, Boise ect.) non-AQ teams are just a couple of crappy seasons away from irrelevance. Not that I see any of those teams tailing off in the near future.

[Arkstfan]

Minus national interest in a couple of the top Non-AQ teams, you're right. And even those top (Utah, TCU, Boise ect.) non-AQ teams are just a couple of crappy seasons away from irrelevance. Not that I see any of those teams tailing off in the near future.

And none of them were in the top 50 in attendance, only Utah was even in the top half. Boise was 70th and TCU 74th. BYU is the only one drawing really big crowds (more than TCU and Boise combined).

Sad part is TCU, 74th in the nation in attendance is in the 5th largest TV market and Utah at 51st in attendance is in the 33rd largest TV market so they both have large population bases to draw from. Admittedly Utah is hurt considerably by BYU who is just a skip outside of Salt Lake.

[GreenStreet]

That can be said for any team outside the BCS AQ leagues. The six AQ leagues could pull out and form their own association and the bulk of the viewing public would never notice.

I think this notion is slowly changing. While back in the day, for a small team to beat a big school, it was a big deal for the big team and fans only, I see more and more people watching for small schools to upset. This could give them leverage to argue a play off system. I have family who went to TCU and while the fan base does not show it, they are just as passionate about football at the next team. Not to mention take a stroll down to SMU, you would think every year they were going to play for the national championship. So while it appears the College Football fans do not care about the smaller schools, I think it is the media. And again this is only speculation, but then again Fox Sports Southwest refers to UNT as Northern Texas State University. ( This was said, durning the 2006 Texas game.)

[rcade]

The Belt rival I miss the most, hands down, is New Mexico State. They are the closest thing North Texas has to a historic rival. We've shared a conference with NMSU three times (Sun Belt, Big West, Missouri Valley) and have played them 32 times, compiling a record of 21 wins, 9 losses and 2 ties. We also met them in a bowl game, the 1959 Sun Bowl at El Paso. The five years since we played them last is the second-longest span in between our games. The first was from 1983 to 1996.

[gksmith]

New Mexico State was always a tough game and I hated to see them leave.

I was never really happy with UNT in the Whatever Conference that was when we played all our away games in the northwest. No rivalries there. Too far away.

[oldguystudent]

From the Big West days, UC Irvine, but I'd avoid scheduling them for the first game in the new stadium. They've never lost a football game!