If We Hurry We Can Still Make... Laramie?
by awiggo on Apr 3, 2008 7:13 PM CDT
in Texas Longhorns Football
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PrintThe Austin American Statesman is reporting that Wyoming will replace Arkansas on the 2009 football schedule. If you have September 12th open in 2009, go ahead and pencil in a road trip to Laramie. The Razorbacks previously asked for the 2009 game with the Longhorns in Fayetteville to be postponed until 2014 due to their new series with Texas A&M in Dallas.
The road trip to Wyoming will not be the first game of the season, however. Bohls is also reporting that a directional Louisiana school could be paid to visit Austin on September 5th, 2009. Yeah!!!!!!
Texas will reportedly get two homes following their trip to Laramie.
2008 Schedule
8/30 Florida Atlantic
9/6 @ UTEP
9/13 Arkansas
9/20 Rice
10/4 @ Colorado
10/11 Oklahoma (Dallas)
10/18 Missouri
10/25 Oklahoma State
11/1 @ Texas Tech
11/8 Baylor
11/15 @ Kansas
11/27 Texas A&M
2009 Schedule1
9/5 Directional Lousiana
9/12 @ Wyoming
9/19 Central Florida
9/26 UTEP
10/10 Colorado
10/17 Oklahoma (Dallas)
10/24 @ Missouri
10/31 @ Oklahoma State
11/7 Texas Tech
11/14 @ Baylor
11/21 Kansas
11/27 or 11/28 @ Texas A&M
1The 2009 Texas Tour, Sponsored By Bill Snyder
--AW--
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Um
Here's to hoping the Alabama in the Super Dome rumors are true for the 2009 opener. Because that's a pathetic slate so far.
Faaaaaacck
'09 is a joke if this comes to be. I'm fine with the cream puff being the first game, but putting wyoming as our big non-conference opponent is sad.
by Longhorn in LA on Apr 3, 2008 11:31 PM CDT up reply actions
Bama
I'd like to see them on the schedule, or any non-conference team in the preseason top 20 for that matter.
That said, considering that Louisianans still cared enough to adorn their homes with anti-Saban stuff this Mardi Gras, after LSU got a MNC, I'm curious if Saban would actually consider the Super Dome a neutral site. It would be a helluva time though.
laramie
I was unfortunate enough to spend some time in laramie wyoming. Let's just say its not quite Austin. In fact let's just say its a shithole. For the town being as small as it is you would think that the football team would shut down the town on saturday,(for lack of anything better to do-minus sheep f@#$ing) but no, It's as if it doesn't even matter there. I was there from Sept. to June and lets just hope there's no freakin snow.
Awww C'mon Man
Laramie ain't that bad. I used to live up there, too (UW Grad School in Infrared Astronomy). I totally remember the town shutting down when the Pokes were playing. I remember walking down Grand St and seeing the team practice, and thinking to myself "Damn...these guys are small."
I lived there for 2 years before the snow started making me homesick for Austin. Laramie is a small town, to be sure, but there are some pretty damn good bars up there: The Library (best Nutty Brown Ale in the history of microbrews) is my favorite. Plus, Ft. Collins is just about 75 mi south and is the home of New Belgium Brewery (makers of Fat Tire) and Colorado State.
The Snowy Range Mtns west of Laramie are spectacular (the drive from Centennial into Saratoga is beyond beautiful). People are idiots, though. I mean, these people really are yokels. You have to bear in mind, though, that Laramie is the 3rd largest town in WY (around 30K people - Casper, then Cheyenne are larger) so the exposure to other people, cultures, and their ways of life is trumped by wanna-be rodeo stars, mormons, drunks, and meth-addicts.
Other than that Laramie is pretty.
Lived in Wyoming, too
Not in Laramie, but I have a few childhood friends who attended UW. Another good friend is on faculty.
You are pretty much accurate on the insular community and the town people in their own world. The town I lived in was even smaller – and you pretty much experience the smallville mindset anywhere in Wyoming (smallest pop state). Not a lot of culture seeping in to the Equality state.
Overall it could still be a fun weekend trip if you could take an extra day to drive around and go down through Northern Colorado.
I’ll probably go and stay with a friend in town. Aggie played them a few years ago and almost lost.
Cool!
Why'd you quit the JWST project? I mean, that's the hot shit right now!
sigh
Same old, same old. Now people can no longer even cling on to that Arkansas game as an example of Brown's 'unjustifiably criticized' tendency to schedule pathetic games for the fans and for the kids. I'd love if somebody did a really extensive spreadsheet comparing the OOC schedules of Mack, Stoops, Carrol, Tressel, and a few other of America's most successful coaches. My inclination is ours has to be one of the worst, but maybe not, obviously we see Ohio State whooping up on teams like Troy and Akron in the early part of the season, but a complete look at their history would be interesting.
Exactly.....
This is just more of the same. History shows us this is a 20+ year pattern for Mack Brown's scheduling. In fact, prior to UT going to Columbus in 2005 Mack Brown said, "We (current Texas administration) didn’t schedule this game and we don’t want this game. This was done 10 years ago and if we could get out of it, we would."
.
Here is a list of every OOC game played during Mack Brown's final 9 seasons at North Carolina. You won't find much competition on this list, including 3 Div.1-AA opponents.
VMI
(2)Kentucky
(2)Navy
(3)S.Carolina
Miami,(OH)
UConn
Cincinnati
(2)Army
William & Mary
Furman
(2)Ohio
UTEP
(2)Tulane
(2)TCU
SMU
(2)Syracuse
(2)Louisville
Houston
Indiana
Stanford
Oh, and his AD forced him to play an (8-5)USC team in a PigSkin Classic for the money.
Lame, lame, lame
Still playing not to lose. I guess South Florida was a little to close for comfort.
re:
..by South Florida, I'm sure you meant Central, but that just makes me want to play South Florida now. Weak Mack...weak!
what?
no rice in 09? what is this?
So what part of the UCF game did Deloss miss?
I would venture that it was the part where we almost lost to a cruddy team playing out of their f-ing minds because we'd just scheduled the biggest sporting event in school history for them! So this year we play @ UTEP... I'm sorry, but what part of UT @ UTEP makes any sense at all? Then the next year we'll travel to fabulous Wyoming to sit in the snow and play in front of 12 to 13 crazed Cowboys fans. Because that's what Texas football is now. Freaking at Wyoming.
Let's get jacked, Longhorns! This is why you came to UT! To play in front of empty bleachers in the freakin' snow!
What's a little altitude adaptation.
War Memorial Stadium was built in 1950 with an original capacity of 20,000 fans. The stadium sits at 7,200 feet above sea level, and is the highest Division I football stadium in the United States. Currently the stadium holds 32,580 fans. From Wiki
That's 1.36 miles above sea level, 1,920 feet higher than Denver.
Sounds like you fly in and play within 24 hours. Does anyone know what we do at Boulder when we go to CU?
Coming from Texas in early September, where the highest temperature that I've personally witnessed a team practicing in full pads was 112 degrees, the Horns could be in for a little shock.
Average Laramie high temp in September is 71 and the average low is 38. Seeing how it's semi-arid and gets only 10 inches of precipitation a year and only .7 of an inch in the average September, that doesn't seem so bad. (However, that could be seven inches of snow; add in 35+ mph winds and you have a blizzard.) The big guys will like it, at least as long as they can breathe. (Note to Mack: expand traveling team and take every lineman available.)
So, shit, Brain, you were onto something. What does it take to corner the 02 market in Wyoming?
On the positive side, the booze should work much better.
Bolivians scoff
at 7,200 feet. They will then raise you 5,000 feet and a 90 minute soccer match.
So would the Nepalese and Tibetans
But going from 450-500 feet elevation to 7200 is a pretty serious jump. No nosebleed altitude sickness but this will affect some regular players late in the game.
Just a consideration which may well have no bearing on the outcome of the game. If the Horns take control early...
UTEP
I think it's cool that we're playing UTEP at the Sun Bowl.
by cortexas on Apr 3, 2008 9:57 PM CDT reply actions
Agree
2) With that said, the last time Mack and Texas played at the Sun Bowl, Mack suffered a loss as Priest Anthony Holmes flew five yards.
I'm not bothered that we're playing UTEP...
... because we might run into a buzz-saw, but because it's a stupid risk to take. If we win, big deal, we beat up on baby brother (like A&M), but if we lose, HUGE deal (like A&M). If, on the other hand, we're playing Ohio State or USC in September and we lose, everyone will talk all year about us having an "acceptable" loss when it comes down to rankings. We're not going to learn jack about how to play tough games in conference in 2009 when all we've seen is a half-bowl of bleacher seats in Laramie.
Yes, this sucks...
...but what happened to all the wait for 2009 talk from Tuesday?
Overall, my big thought was: patience for 2009. This can be a very good team in 2008, but the stars seem to be aligning for '09 more than this year.
Yes, the out of conference schedule is shit, but if the team is going to be as great as we all think and hope it is going to be, then does it really matter?
Ohio State had a weak-ass out of conference schedule this year and look where they ended up, playing for a national championship. Yes, they got their asses smashed against LSU, but hey, that's what Ohio State does. They got their asses smashed in the 2006 national championship and they had a No. 1 vs. No. 2 against Texas in week two. I do understand that a lot had to happen this year to put Ohio State in a position to go to the National Championship.
The bottom line is that under the current system, strength of schedule is extrememly important. And our 2009 out of conference schedule is looking like it will lack that strength. However, it's most likely a given that OU will be in the top 5 when we play them, and hopefully Missouri and Kansas will continue to head in the right direction and be in the top 10 or at least top 20. So maybe the strength of our conference play will make up for our candy-ass out of conference schedule. Of course, this discussion is moot if we don't win.
Just win, it will all work itself out. Hopefully.
Drop Prices
At the very least they should deeply discount tickets for season holders when we play those out-of-conference patsies.
This is sad...
We've had some pretty weak non-conference schedules in recent memory, but that has to be the worst of the bunch. Get ready for the same BS that OSU had to put up with last year...
Even Bill Snyder...
...would scoff at that OOC slate.
Bad Schedule
Yes, the out-of-conference schedules stink! Plus, I am curious as to why no K-State or Huskers for two years in a row?
Re:
Big XII rotates its schedule, so a South team (Texas) plays the same three North teams each year for two years straight. One game is at home, one game is away. So '08 is @ CU, @ KU, Mizzou. '09 is CU, KU, @ Mizzou. We continue playing KSU, Nebraska and ISU in 2010.
Could be tough
Maybe Directional Louisiana means we have to play all of them one right after the other on the same Saturday. Or for an even tougher challenge, all at the same time. How many are there, anyway?
Directionals
Northwestern State in Natchitoches and Southeastern La Univ. in Hammond ... both are 1-AA
UL-Monroe (Formerly NE La) and LA-Lafayette (formerly SW La) are the others.
If memory serves correctly, UT beat La-Lafayette on the first week of 2005 season. I think things turned out pretty good that year. The conference sked is identical to 2005 in 2009.
Laramie
Laramie was one of my favorite stops on the Oregon Trail.
Scared Piggy
I guess Arky and there boy Petrino are already scared of getting there hat handed to them. COWARDS!!!!!!!!!!
It occurs to me
This topic ties directly to the one below about having to win it all to count the season as a success. Doesn't it seem like the weak schedule is just an attempt to insure that the team does not pick up an out-of-conference loss?
As long as the supporters measure success by winning the national championship, a weak schedule is probably inevitable. If on the other hand, fans would accept a good team that goes up against equally good competition, then we would have exciting games and satisfying victories along with occasional losses. We might even be ready to play Oklahoma.
Look at the USC schedule--Virginia, Ohio State, Notre Dame. Playing good teams out of conference does not seem to have hurt their title hopes all that much. And it might have contributed to bringing them players that make the titles possible.
We suffer from confusion
Collectively, as a fan base, we demand 2 things: we must win and we must win against worthy opponents. I sort of agree that the "we must win" mentality might contribute to the weak ooc schedule but given that fans weren't TOO upset about the OSU loss in week 2 of the 2006 season, we might be okay with a tougher pre-conference schedule. I just wish the teams weren't as lame as they are. I like when we play real competitors from 1-AA, like TCU and hell even UCF. But I think Mack is under the delusion that all teams really are able to recruit good players and play tough football so he sees no problem in playing some of those other weaker schools and guaranteeing an undefeated pre-conference. The only problem comes when we don't destroy those weak OOC opponents and almost lose to them because it doesn't make them look strong, it makes us look weak and that hurts our rank more than anything short of a loss to those teams.
Either way, we should just play to win (and not to not lose, which is something we got away from in 2005 and have since reverted back to in 2007, frustrating) and hopefully our new crop of players and coaches will bring some excitement back on the field. At the very least, I think we'll see a defense ready to destroy anything that comes in their path and maybe even get an occasional "Boom!" out of Muschamp. Should be fun.
Can't wait for August.
by Katie McBeast on Apr 4, 2008 11:18 AM CDT up reply actions
why the hate
It isn't as if Deloss tried to avoid playing anyone of note in '09. As far as he was concerned, he got a game in Fayetteville and then moved on.
So thank Arkansas' fear of losing an out of conference game for our weak schedule.
by Bdub on Apr 4, 2008 11:18 AM CDT reply actions
sort of
the issue is whether they could have found a better OOC opponent than Wyoming. HC I'm sure has a database of each school's OOC openings because he's posted them before. I believe he said that a few big-name schools still had open dates.
The problem with scheduling one of those teams, though, is that they would demand a home and home while Texas's schedule is pretty much set for the next few years. Well, it's "set" in the sense that Texas already has a BCS school on the schedule for every year through 2013. Of course we could add a second BCS school, but that's another issue (i.e. the balancing act between creating an interesting/challenging schedule and creating a schedule that's conducive to a national championship run).
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