Play UP!
September 25, 2009
In Today’s class we talk about goals; specifically how do you achieve those goals. This means not being scared to accomplish your goals. First step, stop playing DII teams and start playing up. Don’t keep doing the same old thing if you are trying to improve; instead, start taking the steps needed to reach your goal of playing in the FBS
Yes, we need attendance to reach our goals but it is not total attendance for the year; yet, it is the average attendance for home games that matter. I don’t mind 5 games a year if it means playing Rice, UNT, or SMU, all teams we currently would be competitive against. The game is not that far away and we have sizable Alumni bases in the area. After all, we need to continue to build our alumni base and one way to get the alumni in Houston and Dallas interested is to play football games in their city. Get them interested and then you can get them to make the drive back to the mother ship. And I kid not when I say that with our alumni base in Houston and the passionate student body and alumni that would be willing to make the trip we could possibly have 7,500 to 10,000 Bobcat fans at a Rice / UofH game. You don’t have to believe me but think about these facts; Houston has the most living alumni out of anywhere and the Houston Alumni Chapter is our strongest chapter.
Take the next step. If you want to eventually play in the FBS then we need to start playing FBS games. Play 2 a year, but at least 1 has to be very winnable and hopefully the second one isn’t a forgone conclusion. Don’t be a scared ninny and no conference is impressed with playing Texas Southern, Southern Utah, and Angelo State. We need to remove Southern Utah and Angelo State. The key is at least 1 of the FBS games has to be against a Texas FBS team and it should be a winnable game. Also, if we can get UTSA on the schedule that is a bonus, with the game either to be at a sold out Bobcat Stadium or just up the road in San Antonio. Obviously if you played at UTSA you would need to schedule an additional home game, probably Texas Southern. Playing UTSA would help to develop a regional rivalry, but we will get into that in a future class.
Proposed 2011 Schedule
3 out of Conference Games which are to include 1 FCS and 2 FBS teams
Texas Southern/UTSA
North Texas/ UofH / LA Tech / LA Monroe / LA Lafayette
Rice/ SMU / LA Tech / LA Monroe / LA Lafayette
Southland Conference Games would include – 4 at home and 4 Away
Sam Houston
SFA
Lamar
McNeese
Northwestern LA
Nichols
Southeastern LA
Central Arkansas
This schedule is a lot more attractive to students, alumni and prospective athletes. FBS is potentially around the corner and we need to prepare ourselves for that and not be a bunch of sissies. The way I see it either we start steeping up to the plate and give it our best shot or we get complacent. TXST has to keep pushing itself and that includes not being scared to play up.
As long as we are in the FCS our goal should be conference championship and/or playoffs with a chance to win the national championship. By playing two FBS schools we lower our chances of going to the playoffs since one of the requirements is 7+ wins against D-I competition. Look at Northwestern St (currently 0-3 soon to be 0-4) as an example of what happens when you play a tough a non-conference schedule. Playing instate FBS opponents is a great idea, but it has to be tempered with the knowledge that the ultimate goal is playoffs and national championships.
While I agree we need to learn to compete at the next level and “Play Up.” There are several factors that also should be considered. These FBS Level teams have to want to play us and give us the ~$250k for us to go to the game. Teams like UNT, LA Laf, and LA- Monroe are all trying to make their own paydays and may not want to pay us.
I also agree with Vince McNeil that our number one goal should be winning at our own level and not cut off our nose to spite our face in regards to FBS. Winning at the FCS level and scheduling (and hopefully beating) FBS opponents will get us there.
Playing Angelo State is not a DI win, all this does is replace the Angelo State game with a potentially winable FBS game.
FBS teams are not concerned about how we play against other FBS teams, they know they have a huge advantage with almost a dozen more scholarships, and are not going to invite you to their conference because of how you played against them.
What will get us invited to an FBS conference is to develop a football teams that consistently wins at the level we are right now (FCS). And a strong support showing at home games. The one thing that playing the FBS schools can help with but just a little, is to show the FBS schools that we do travel well, but that will only help at all if the conference that is looking at us consist mainly of Texas schools.
The ONLY people that you are impressing by playing multiple FBS schools are a few of the fans. None of the schools in the Sun Belt Conference for example are going to care one bit what the score was against TCU this year or what the score was against SMU. Nor will they care one bit what our schedule was. The only thing that they are going to be concerned with is what our record was as a whole the past several years. And how many fans butts are in the seats. We will get alot more butts in the seats playing IN SAN MARCOS, and winning games and getting to the playoffs and getting playoff games in San Marcos.
There are MORE than enough people in and around San Marcos, from which to draw, and they are a heck of a lot easier to draw than someone who lives 3 or 4 hours from San Marcos. The playoff run in 2005 shows that if we win games and put a quality product on the field, that the attendance numbers will follow. We just have to keep winning, and not start losing games the following year like we did in 2006. And while it is nice to talk about for a few days how we played against TCU, ect. But. when push comes to shove the only thing that matters is what your record is. A team that is 4-0 will certainly get more people attention than a teams that is 2-2 even if the two loses were both to FBS teams.
I couldn’t agree more with both sides. It’s important that we become excellent enough to play FBS, which means that we have to win where we are, however, we also have to set the flag in the ground that we are running toward.
Bottom line, excellent coaching and excellent recruiting will give us both a conference championship and make us competitive with fringe FBS teams.
I like it. Replacing D-II with the likes of Texas Southern or PV A&M is great because it gives us everything we want out of a DII. Home game and a very winnable game. Heck since we are playing 2 FBS (I-A) we could afford to make it a little more worth their (TSU or PVA&M) while to come visit us.
The only problem is that there are a lot of things that need to work out to make this a good schedule. Scheduling is hard enough as is, and wanting to do so many things can further complicate things.
My requirements for future schedules would be simple. All in Texas. The recent games in Fort Worth, Dallas, Waco, have all had great turnouts and extra media attention.
Our FBS and FCS non conference should all be from Texas. We should look to Texas Southern or PV A&M every season. Same for SMU, North Texas, Houston, or Rice. There are so many FBS schools in Texas theres no excuse to travel out of state.