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CALLING IT QUITS
There come certain times when you see a bad situation not changing. At that point, youeither choose to continue onward or you stop wasting your time with it altogether. I have cometo that point with one of my alma maters, the University of North Texas.After consecutive football seasons of 2-10, 1-11, and 2-10, North Texas decided not only to keep head coach Todd Dodge, but to also allow him to keep the same coaching staff fully intact. The absurdity of it escapes common sense. However, common sense has been in shortsupply in the North Texas athletic department for decades.Last night, I took my wife and kids up to the basketball game between my other alma, theUniversity of Tulsa, and Oklahoma State. The atmosphere was raucous! Reynolds Arena wassold out, and it rocked as the Golden Hurricane stomped the Cowboys from start to finish.Earlier in the fall, my brother and I had gone up to see the Tulsa-Boise State footballgame. Again, this game was sold out. And, it was on ESPN. While Tulsa did not win, they didgive Boise all they could handle.With those two games in mind, I sat down this morning and made a contribution to theGolden Hurricane Club. I had never contributed to TU before in any way. I used to contributeannually to the University of North Texas.However, I can no longer justify sending money to the University of North Texas. Norcan I justify spending any more money at all by going to the games and buying tickets at the gate -for any UNT sport. I am tired of giving money and time to a program that makes excuses forlosing.Part of the problem is that North Texas is mired in a culture of losing. The other part isawful customer service and terrible (non-existent) marketing. At North Texas, the alumni andfans are taken for granted as far as the athletic department is concerned. Why would I want to bea part of rewarding that?In comparison, look at the UNT's closest geographic Sun Belt Conference foe. Just a fewhours east of Denton, the University of Louisiana-Monroe fired their head football coach after hissquad posted a 6-6 record. The season before, they were 4-8; in 2007, 6-6. Their three year total16-20.That is not a bad stretch for ULM. A win over Nick Saban's first Alabama squad isincluded in those 16 wins. And, yet, less than 48 hours after their season ended, ULM fired head
 
coach Charlie Weatherbie.I guess the stunning thing to me is that ULM is lower on the totem pole financially thanNorth Texas is in every way. Yet, they have decided to try and raise the bar competitively whilewe accept the status quo. It is disheartening.Therefore, I will stop trying to understand it. The best thing I can do is throw the fullweight of my financial support behind the alma mater who knows what it is doing. I know Tulsaathletic director Bubba Cunningham and his staff will not waste it.Cunningham was a shrewd fund raiser, money manager, and good marketer at bothNotre Dame and Ball State. In his five years as athletic director at Tulsa, the Golden Hurricanehave upped their game in both of the real college money and prestige sports - men's basketballand football.The basketball game we attended last night is a good example. Oklahoma State had notplayed Tulsa at Tulsa in over 80 years. Athletic director Bubba Cunningham got it done.In Oklahoma, that is a big deal. Oklahoma State is the school with the most successfulbasketball history in that state. They were 6-0 going into the game against Tulsa. Getting OSU inReynolds Arena is tantamount to getting Texas to come to the Super Pit. The last time thathappened was 1998, when UNT supposedly had a athletic director who was bad.In my heart, I would like to go see more North Texas basketball games. But, I cannot ingood faith do so. Doing so would be supporting an athletic department that will not commit to ahigher level of competitiveness. No big deal, Tulsa is close enough for a drive, and they play onegame a year at SMU as well.Tulsa's football program was at a very low level when I was in grad school there. Thebasketball team was being led by a coach whose claim to fame was as a high school coach. Thefootball situation was so bad that they were considering dropping down to I-AA (now calledFCS). The basketball program tanked shortly after I graduated due to poor recruiting by the localhigh school hero of a coach.Since 2002, though, the athletic department at Tulsa really stepped up their game. Thefootball program hired an NFL quarterback coach, Steve Kragthorpe, who turned around theprogram's fortunes then handed it off the Todd Graham. Graham has continued the success thatKragthorpe began.The basketball program is now under the leadership of former Navy, Notre Dame, North
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