TO ALL COLLEGE FOOTBALL FANS...
UL_RAGIN_CAJUN posted this oringinally on the Delphi forum:
"Dear College Football Fan,
With a college football playoff system, a true national champion will be determined on the field, and not by monopolistic business deals or computers. If the CF16 Playoff Tournament Format were implemented in the year 2002, the following teams would have had a chance to play for the national championship: Miami, Ohio State, Georgia, USC, Iowa, Kansas State, Washington State, Oklahoma, Penn State, Texas, Notre Dame, Boise State, Florida State, Michigan, Colorado State and Marshall University.
How can you get involved? By simply going to Join The Coalition, you can register your vote to become a part of the growing CF16 coalition for reforming the current BCS system."
Click link for full story:
http://www.cf16.org/ .~.
North Texas delivers big plays
<blockquote><p align=justify>DENTON, Texas — Champions make big plays when the game is on the line, and the North Texas Mean Green showed Saturday night why they’re two-time winners of the Sun Belt Conference.
In the 44-23 victory over UL Lafayette, UNT had touchdowns covering 29, 54, 39, 14 and 37 yards.
They also tied an NCAA record with three safeties.
That was enough to hold off coach Rickey Bustle’s Cajuns, who played with spirit but still fell to 0-5 overall and 0-2 in SBC action.
“Those big plays were incredible,” Bustle said. “I thought we played with a lot of effort, but they kept hitting those plays on us.
“There were times when we had people in the vicinity, but they just made the plays.”
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Bruce Brown
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UNT junior Scott Hall hit 9-of-16 passes for a career-best 222 yards and touchdowns of 29, 54 and 37 yards to redshirt freshman Johnny Quinn, often using play-action and pump fakes to good effect.
“I thought they would take some shots,” Bustle said. “On the first one, we manned-up with him, but he just ran away from us.
“And, we probably peeked into the backfield a little bit. Give them credit, though. They made the plays they needed.”
It was especially damaging for the Cajuns after they battled to within 30-23 after three quarters, only to have the Mean Green hit two more big scores. The last time here, the Cajuns took a 17-14 fourth-period lead, only to lose 42-17 on a 28-0 UNT blitz down the stretch.
“We felt real good at that point (30-23),” Cajun quarterback Eric Rekieta said. “It’s been a while since we had been in a game, and we were pumped up.
“You’re on the sidelines, and it’s third or fourth down and you’re figuring what you’ll do when you get in. And then they hit that big play.
“At that point you just try to pick it up. You try not to watch, so you can avoid that emotional roller coaster and stay level. But, it does make you want to get out there and hit a big one of your own.”
“You have to take it in the context of the whole game,” said linebacker Ross Brupbacher, who had a big early sack and also recovered a fumble. “It’s only one play, and you try not to get down about it.
“You try to put it behind you.”
That’s hard to do, especially after that 30-23 juncture.
“We were in high spirits,” Brupbacher said. “Everyone was upbeat. We felt we could come back and still win.”
The Cajuns did play hard, and at times played well and with spirit. But they couldn’t overcome the big plays produced by the Mean Green throughout the evening.
“Maybe it was a step in the right direction,” Brupbacher said. “There were moments.”
Just not enough of them.
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Northern Illinois discovers formula. The Cajuns can do the same
<blockquote><p align=justify>Not that long ago, people wouldn't cross the street to watch Northern Illinois play football.
Now the Huskies are part of a mid-major resurgence by Mid-America Conference members.
NIU improved to 4-0 Saturday afternoon with a 24-16 win over Big 12 member Iowa State and is currently the No. 20 ranked team in the nation, owning earlier victories over Maryland at home and Alabama on the road.
Suddenly, a ticket to a Huskies game is a hot item.
UL Lafayette played NIU for nine straight years beginning in 1988, first as intersectional rivals and then as members of the Big West Conference.
The Cajuns won six of those contests, and two of the three defeats were controversial, close losses in DeKalb.
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Bruce Brown
bbrown@theadvertiser.com
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I remember the first trip to DeKalb in 1989, Brian Mitchell's senior season at UL.
As the buses neared the NIU campus, we saw what looked liked a high school stadium rising out of the cornfields. Surely there had to be another facility nearby.
No, that was it.
Huskie Stadium is on campus, a short stroll across the street from student dormitories, much like old McNaspy Stadium was on UL’s campus. On a bright fall day, it seemed like a good opportunity to see a game.
But the seating capacity of 30,000 was less than one-third full by kickoff.
Apparently there was something really good on TV, or the students went home or it was too much trouble to cross the street.
The Cajuns had thumped the Huskies 45-0 the previous season at Cajun Field, yet no one seemed intrigued by the possibility of revenge.
NIU option quarterback Stacy Robinson led a late drive for a 23-20 win, and a mini-rivalry was born.
The most memorable game came in 1991, when 40 mph winds whipped across the field and frozen players on both sides suffered frostbite. Cajun coach Nelson
Stokley didn’t even have his team practice on the Friday before the game for fear they’d want to stay in the hotel the next day.
Amazingly, the Cajuns won 13-12 on two long field goals in those brutal conditions.
UL wrapped up the nine-year series with a 45-31 win behind Jake Delhomme in 1996.
The Huskies were 1-10 that year under coach Joe Novak, and 0-11 in 1997. They kept losing, too, with a losing streak reaching 23 games the next season.
They were 2-9 in 1998, 5-6 in 1999 and had a winning campaign in 2000, the first in 10 years.
Novak is still there, and now the Huskies are winners. They’re also preseason picks to win the MAC.
Novak was the only coach to offer a scholarship to running back Michael Turner, a Chicago kid who dreamed of playing in the Big Ten. Now Turner is the key to NIU’s attack and an underdog Heisman Trophy candidate.
There’s no logical reason why the Huskies should be so revived, other than
Novak’s pedigree as a product of Miami of Ohio — the “Cradle of Coaches’’ — but here they are.
The Ragin’ Cajuns beat Texas A&M in 1996 in the program’s most memorable achievement, yet finished 5-6 that season and haven’t had a winning record since 1995.
Going into Saturday’s game at North Texas, UL was 12-59 since 1996.
There’s no way DeKalb has more resources than Lafayette does. No reason Rickey Bustle and his coaches can’t equal what Novak’s staff has done.
It looked bleak in DeKalb just a few short years ago, like that day in 1991, but the Huskies survived and are flourishing.
The Cajuns can do the same.
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Rekieta outdueled in first start
<blockquote><p align=justify><b>Scott Hall wins the quarterback battle over Cajuns’ starter.</b>
LOUISIANA La. — Two experienced quarterbacks made their first start of the season last Saturday night in Denton, Texas, and Scott Hall was the victor over Eric Rekieta.
Hall led the surprisingly explosive North Texas Mean Green to a 44-23 victory over Louisiana as UNT opened defense of its Sun Belt Conference title, while UL senior Rekieta battled uphill all night as the Cajuns remained winless.
“I could have played a lot better,” said Rekieta, who hit 21-of-35 passes for 192 yards and a touchdown but was intercepted three times and called for a safety for intentionally grounding the ball in the Cajun end zone.
“I let them read my eyes a lot. We were able to move the ball pretty well, considering the situation we were in.”
The “situation” was the Mean Green’s refusal to let the Cajuns run the ball, as evidenced by UL’s 31 carries and 27 net yards. Being one dimensional is usually fatal against a defense as good as North Texas, and that was the case last Saturday.
<center><p><a href="http://www.theadvertiser.com/sports/html/FDECDD2F-AF23-4802-A778-6BA9C865355C.shtml">The rest of the story</a>
Bruce Brown
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UNT tallied an NCAA record-tying three safeties on the night, once dumping Travis Smothers for a loss, once on the Rekieta mishap and once when a deep snap went over punter Grant Autrey’s head in the back of the end zone.
Rekieta scored himself for an early 7-0 lead, only to have the Mean Green tally 26 unanswered points before a pair of Sean Comiskey field goals drew the visitors within 26-13 at the half.
The second and third safeties made it 30-13, but Rekieta rallied the Cajuns with a two-yard touchdown pass to Bill Sampy and another Comiskey field goal to make it 30-23.
But UNT kept coming up with big plays.
Hall, who threw for a career-high 222 yards, opened the fourth quarter with a pump-and-go hit of 40 yards to Johnny Quinn to help position a 14-yard Patrick Cobbs TD run. Then, one play after Rekieta was picked off, Hall found Quinn for a 37-yard score to decide it.
The Mean Green touchdowns covered 29, 54, 39, 14 and 37 yards, an average of 34.6 yards per scoring play. The 40-yard Quinn setup gave UNT six snaps averaging 35.5. In addition to that, the home team ripped off gains of 15, 17, 17, 10, 16, 10, 13 and 11 yards — eight plays at 13.6 a pop.
In all, 14 of UNT’s 63 plays gained 10 or more yards and 322 of its 451 total yards came on those 14 plays.
“Hall played well,” said Cajun linebacker Ross Brupbacher. “There wasn’t a lot they did that we didn’t give to them. We blew some coverages, which makes a quarterback look real good. But he made some nice throws.”
The loss dropped the Cajuns to 0-5 heading into next Saturday’s road game at Big 12 member Oklahoma State. They are sure to be challenged by Josh Fields throwing to Rashaun Woods, as well as by running back Tatum Bell and by a nationally-ranked OSU defense.
It’s enough to test the patience of Rickey Bustle and his UL coaching staff, not to mention the road-weary Cajuns.
“This has been a resilient bunch all year long,” Bustle said. “We want them to know we’re not giving up on them.”
“We’ll keep working, keep trying to get a win,” Rekieta said.
CAJUN CLIPPINGS — Senior Fred Stamps is No. 3 in UL history in receptions (137) and receiving yards (2,084, passing Wayde Butler’s 2,076 on Saturday) and fourth in TD catches (13) ... both UNT coach Darryl Dickey and noseguard Brandon Kennedy offered words of encouragement to Stamps on the field after the game ... Sun Belt teams are 6-31 overall this season.
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