The top Texas High School players (think 4 & 5 Stars) have to wait in line to play for him. These players have to take only one recruiting trip, and that location is Austin, Texas. These players want to die for the opportunity to play for him. These players tell all their friends and family that playing for him is a dream come true. Early and mid Mack Brown had this quality. I believe Urban Meyer has it, too. James Franklin, maybe. Lincoln Riley, probably. The list is short. Until the top talent begs to play for UT, the tide will be slow to turn.
I have always been amazed at how, apparently, it is the lesser paid and lesser known HS coaches who have Texas head coaches by the balls and not the other way around. You'd think maybe they want to move up the ladder to the college ranks and not piss off college head coaches. But, apparently that isn't how it works. Texas head coaches have to grovel to get the HS coaches' approvals.
I don’t think it will ever be like that. Or really that it ever was. We as Texas fans have an over inflated opinion of a team that has, for an 18 year old, a 2-7 records against TCU. There is nothing special about Austin now. It’s a slightly smaller version of Houston, with more bums under the bridges, but nicer views of hills to the west. I saw on the game telecast that He-Man had 45 or 50 4/5 star players. Must all 85 be 4/5 star before Texas can dream of beating TCU? Texas need a coach that respects the fans, teaches blocking on the OL and tackling for the defense. Position is current open.
The only problem is there isn't enough winning. I just believe that Herman has maxed out his winning.
Duck you are correct. Between the tents - everywhere - and the uber liberal admin we are losing our appeal, that and playing as we have the last two years.
The top talent begs to play for USC/OU/Alabama/Notre Dame (threw that in for old times sake)/Clemson/Ohio State because those teams care about winning football games. Some may know of instances where each one of these programs has racial issues or liberal issues or who is president issues etc etc. HOWEVER, they're main focus is winning football games, hence the multiple national championships in college football. It drives me insane that, in Austin, there's always some underlying political/social issue/or something only Sabre knows that keeps Texas from bonding together as a team and whipping the other team's butt week in/week out. 2000-2009 was awesome as far as winning games but Texas got whooped by OU juuussstt a bit in all of that and got two conference titles and one national championship (thank you, Vince!). The aforementioned universities seem to care about winning it all a bit more. Texas does have a lot of victories but when it comes to winning it all, the desire seems to not be there. So, we're not going to get the recruits that'll beat everyone else who is trying harder, so no winning anytime soon.
This will be heresy to many, I'm sure, but let's face it, Texas really ain't The Joneses. 4 NCs, 3 in the 60s, really. 35 year dry spell and now that is 15 years ago already since the 2005 NC. Texas dominated the weak *** SWC and with ou in the same conference, has been its whipping post. Can anyone change my mind?
I think (sadly) you are absolutely correct horninchicago. I’ve felt this for the last several years. Watching who we miss out on in the recruiting battles mainly raises my concern but this year with the turmoil really brings it home.
Which begs the question - bring in a big name HC with no ties to Texas and how do you stop the talent drain?
Academics at UT have improved over the years. For now, at least. There is that. Perhaps the UT institution cares more about that than winning football games at all costs. Just a thought. I realise this is a bit off topic. UT seems to be having the Rice and Stanford problem of recent years. How do you move toward and maintain elite academics while also building and sustaining a competitive football team? This is a tough and complicated problem.
40,000 students. Roughly 100 football players. Elite academic standards don't preclude having a few dumb jocks in the mix.
Mack used to pull an offer on a kid that verbally committed and then later started taking visits to other schools. Those were great days.
I think there is a lot to this. I'm basically a lurker on 3 Longhorn message boards and this is the single most overrated item people talk about. I don't think Austin necessarily turns anyone off, but the city a school is in is pretty far down on most top recruits list of where to go. I've been to a lot of college towns for games and there is a lot of stuff to do in all of them, and no shortage of women.
Ok so how did Kiffin manages to get his guys to play hard for the "Rebels". Are you kidding? And we have players that run off the field during the dang game. And run on the field after the national anthem and run off before the Eyes of Texas is played. This is coaching pure and simple and a complete lack of awareness.
I know this is picky but speaking of the team ‘running’, I seem to have noticed players ‘walking’ to and from sideline quite often. This is one of the things which caused me to post about body language during last two games looking to me like we were not into it.
The number 1 requirement is to win and Urban is the only coach out there (available) with enough skins on the wall to cure the SJW scene going on at UT.
BALL That assumes he would have the power and freedim to cure the wokeness going on with the program. I do not think he or anyone will.
