Who is to blame?

It’s been a tough year for UNT football fans. What seemed like a promising year has quickly vanished. Panic and doubt has crept into almost every fans mind. We are all left wondering who is to blame for what has transpired. Well, wonder no more because I have your answer.

#1.  Dan McCarney

You know that moment when you were younger playing sports or really anytime in life and you made a mistake. Your coach, parent, or teacher asked why you did what you did. You would answer back with a response, and they would give you that classic line of “If you know then why did you still do it”. That would be my comment to Coach McCarney this week. If you knew, and you told us that your team was playing poorly, why didn’t you fix it? You’ve given us the similar statements after 3 losses this year. You’ve told us that the play was unacceptable and embarrassing.

Well, I don’t need to hear those things anymore. Fans don’t need to hear those statements anymore. We need to see results on the field. We need to see you show improvement. If you want the fans to buy into your program you can’t go on the road, and consistently get yourself embarrassed by average teams. Right now last year looks like a fluke, and that’s hard thing to say, because it seemed like UNT was headed in the right direction.

Fans also don’t want to hear about how its tough to recruit players to UNT. We know that our school is less fortunate, and that we weren’t good for many years, but we don’t need to hear it from you. You are the leader of this program, and leaders don’t make excuses. Leaders find solutions. Part of Coach Mac’s recruiting vision is “Why Not North Texas”. Well perhaps he has answered that question himself. ITS TO TOUGH. What exactly are we trying to sell here at North Texas? I sure don’t know. It seems to me like North Texas has lost its program identity in about 8 months.

All momentum from last year’s bowl victory has “up and vanished like a fart in the wind”. Any hope of getting it back rest solely on Coach McCarney’s shoulders.

If you struggle to recruit then you better be putting a great emphasis on development. Right now the way UNT develops players its looking like a winning season once every 3 years. Can you live with that?

One thing I know you can’t do if you want to get back to a bowl is yo-yo at the QB position. Opening up the completion is the WORST thing UNT could do this week. Pick a guy and prepare him properly. Coach Mac and his staff failed to do that coming into this season, and now they are doing it during the season. The way the QB situation has unfolded is an accurate reflection of this team – UNPREPARED.

Every position group has looked unprepared this year. Yes they are young and inexperienced, but we’ve gone through 6 games already. We should have started to see improvement. We should have seen the little light click on for some of these players, but we haven’t.

UNT fans have taken pride in their team being a physical tough fundamentally sound football team. That too has gone out the window. The fundamentals on this year’s UNT team are atrocious.  Coach Mac talks about taking guys with average talent and skills, then turning them into good college players with good fundamentals and effort. Well where is that this year? I would say that your average talented players are looking below average, because they aren’t playing with good fundamentals.

All UNT fans remember your quotes about being undersized and slow when you took the job. Yet, we are still undersized on the DL, and still slow in the secondary. It seems like every team will be able to just throw their fastest guy out there and say just go run by them and we will throw you the ball. UNT can’t stop it. It hurts to say it, it really does. The situation doesn’t look like it’s getting better anytime soon.

We all expected to see a young aggressive defense get better as the season progressed – Hasn’t happened.

We all expected to see a veteran OL dominate- Hasn’t happened

We all expected this team to be well coached – Hasn’t happened

We all expected to see a tough physical team- Hasn’t happened

We all expected to have the embarrassing losses to stop- Hasn’t happened

Dan McCarney is a great person. He is a very hard working coach, and he has been pretty good for UNT so far, but at the end of the day it’s about wins and losses. To add to that its not only about losses it’s about how you lose. UAB was an okay team. No way should they have beaten UNT 56-21. Louisiana Tech is a pretty decent team, and no way should they have beaten UNT by 21. It’s your 4^th year here at UNT and it’s not like we are in a tough conference. The competition is not that much different from the Sun Belt. We should not be losing to conference foes by an average of 28 points.

The reason Dan McCarney was brought here was to clean up the mess left behind by Todd Dodge. It was a pretty big mess, and no one expected it to be cleaned up right away. After last year we thought the mess had been cleaned up, and that it was time for Coach Mac to start really turning UNT into a program that could compete year and year out. Now we are left wondering where this program goes from here. There are major question marks all over this program.

Can UNT develop a quarterback?

What happens at the defensive coordinator position if Skladany retires at the end of the year?

Is Mike Canales the right answer going forward at OC?

If the OL has disappointed this year, what’s going to happen when they all leave?

Can UNT recruit better size and speed?

Why are we relying so much on JUCO recruits when Coach McCarney said he was all about just bringing in high school players?

If this season flops will fans ever trust this program again?

The secondary has struggled severely what happens when you lose James Jones and Lee?

Is Dan McCarney a developer, recruiter or neither?

Was McCarney deserving of the extension without having multiple winning seasons?

 

 

I’m rooting for Coach Mac to do well. I like what he stands for. I love the mentality he wants his teams to have. I want him to be successful here at UNT. I don’t want to be changing coaches all the time. I’m a Browns fan I’ve seen that doesn’t work. You need consistency in your coaching staff. I also know that you have to win games and right now UNT isn’t.

Coach shake off the bad start and rally the boys. Lets bring up that performance.

 

 

Just for fun lets grade out Coach Mac’s recruits since he got on campus

A Recruits:

2011 – Derek Akunne

2011 – Laramie Lee

2011 – Cyril Lemon

2012 – Carlos Harris

2012 – Marcus Trice

 

B Recruits:

2011 – Antoinne Jimmerson

2011 – Daryl Mason

2011 – Chad Polk

2013 – Sed Ellis

2013 – James Jones

2013 – Darvin Kidsy

2013 – Fred Scott

 

C Recruits:

2011 – Alex Lincoln

2011 – Zach Whitfield

2011 – Austin Orr

2011 – Andrew Power

2011 – Freddie Warner

2012 – Malik Dilonga

2012 – Jamal Marshall

2012 – Ryan Rentfro

2012 – Jarrian Roberts

2012 – Rex Rollins

2012 – Connor Trussell

2012 – Sir Calvin Wallace

2012 – Dutton Watson

2013 – Chad Davis

2013 – Shawn McKinney

2013 – Calvin Minor

2013 – Sydrick Moore

2013 – John Schilleci

2013 – Turner Smiley

2013 – Dajon Williams

2013 – Quenton Brown

2013 – Darius Terrell

2013 – Reggie Pegram

 

D Recruits:

2011 – Brent Osborn

2011 – Andrew McNulty

2011 – Cooper Jones

2012 – Mustafa Haboul

2013 – Wylie Reinhardt

2013 – Harrison Sorge

2013 – Andrew Tucker

2013 – Dominic Walker

2013 – Chris Loving

 

F & Not on the team:

2011- Terrell Brooks

2011- Grant Shaw

2011 – Jamone Greer

2011 – Chaz Sampson

2011 – Michael Stojkovic

2011 – Kerry Swarn

2011 – Micah Thompson

2012 – Dylan McDorman

2012 – David Busby

2012 – Dustin Clark

2012 – Devante Davis

2012 – Boone Feldt

2012 – Cam Feldt

2012 – Brad Horton

2012 – Jarmarcus Jarvis

2012 – D.Q. Johnson

2012 – Xavier Kelly

2012 – Roderick Lancaster

2012 – Mark Lewis

2012 – Nick Schrapps

2012 – LaJaylin Smith

2013 – Justin Manu

2013 – Cody Nelson

2013 – Brock Berglund

2013 – Zed Evans