Reality Check

Cougar Football
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There have been a lot of comments this season relating to the Coogs’ competition in the American Athletic Conference. Over and over again - typically from the same handful of posters - there have been comments suggesting that: there is no excuse to lose against X-team; X-team is barely above a high school team in talent level; if X-coach doesn’t win the conference championship this season, he should be fired; we are going to lose against X-teams, there is no chance for us to win; etc…

I will say first, that accepting mediocrity is unacceptable, and I believe our Chairman of the BOR (Fertitta) President (Khator) and VP of Athletics (Pezman) will not accept mediocrity. We should all hope and work towards Houston being invited to a perceived bigger/better/richer conference, we should all hope and work to be perennial championship contenders, and we should all hope and work to compete to retain our successful coaches. However, at this point in time, these things are NOT OUR REALITY!

Houston, since the fall of the SWC, has won three conference championships: 1996 (CUSA), 2006 (CUSA), and 2015 (AAC); has played in four conference championship games: 2006, 2009, 2011, and 2015; has gone 4-9 in bowl games (qualifying in most years since the Briles era). Hell, even in the SWC, we had only one outright championship, 1978, and three shared championships, the last one being 1984. That is one conference championship per decade. Rice has more SWC championships than us!

So, who are we on par with? Tulane has as many CUSA championships (in the pre-CUSA championship game era) as Houston, the Tulsa Golden Hurricane in the championship game era of CUSA had more appearances (four) in the championship game and won more of them (two), UCF has more appearances in CUSA and AAC championship games and has won far more championships than us in that same time (five in seven appearances), Temple has more appearances than we do in the AAC championship game. Tulane and UCF have enjoyed undefeated seasons in this time, where we have never had one.

People need a reality check, some sort of anchor to how ludicrous and foolish their statements are. I don’t say any of this to send anyone into a massive depression, but on what eff’ing Earth do we as Coogfans get off thinking we are better than our current conference mates?!? Where in the hell does anyone get off on talking smack about teams in our conference when faced with the reality of our history as a football playing university?!?

The West is open for the taking this year, and I think we will make it to the championship game! Having said that, there are plenty of reasons we could lose some more games this year, just like there are plenty of reasons we lost at Tech, and that doesn’t mean we need to immediately fire the HC! We might not win the conference championship, and that doesn’t mean we “played down to our competition.” Judging by our history, the competition has been pretty good actually, or maybe we haven’t been that good. Either way, this is where we are as a program. It isn’t an excuse for fans to NOT show up to games, because these teams supposedly have no cachet. Most of them have just as much if not more than us.

Yes, we are one of the few who was in a power conference and lost our spot (Temple, USF, Cincy, and UConn - our conference mates being others). Yes, it is painful to know that we have competed at top levels, but now feel relatively stuck. We have now been playing outside of the SWC longer than we were in. The time has long gone by that we need to stop disrespecting our conference mates, because we only are disrespecting ourselves, our coaches, our players who have chosen to represent our university, and the University of Houston itself.

Now… Let’s go win the American this year.

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Good post I must admit but I disagree big time.

You mention the amount of championships each team in the conference have but its a difference. UH now is in a much better situation than our CUSA mates. Gone are the days of Robertson stadium and practicing in the AAC and sharing facilities with the other sports programs at the school. We have a beautiful stadium and a very nice indoor practice facility. Both are on par with a lot of P5 programs. We should be able to use that to our advantage.

As far as the expectations are concerned. You are right, we shouldnt settle for mediocrity however, the previous coaching staff set the standard of what this program can and should become. Why should we expect to take a step back? Thats why the administration made the comment “we fire coaches for going 8-4”.

Also there should be no reason to not win the West on a yearly basis. I understand that is impossible but who can you seriously think is a threat to us in the division? SMU? Tulane and Tulsa? Navy? Memphis?

The goal is to win enough so that we can get into a major conference. The facilities are already in place for basketball and football and soon to come baseball. Now all that is left it to win consistently.

Also let me ask you this. Do you think UCF fans are settling for mediocrity right now after coming off a Peach Bowl win? No.

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Perhaps because UH is favored to win by Vegas in almost every game.

All seven of Major’s losses came as a favorite.

Last night, we were 17 point favorites vs a team that was 2-13 since the start of 2017 against FBS competition.

We shouldn’t feel superior to them? We shouldn’t be upset when our team sleepwalks to a 9-point 4th quarter deficit against that level of competition?

Thank goodness we pulled it out.

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Great discussion and I didn’t see any references to time spent dissecting game film. Can these comments be right withOUT the analytical prowess of the chosen few??
YES, YES it can!
Go Coogs!!

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Agreed that we are ahead of almost all of conference-mates in facilities, but many of our conference mates have also improved their facilities, sometimes significantly, as well. Cincy (major stadium renovations), UCF (Just about everything is new), Tulsa (Major stadium and field house renovation), SMU (stadium and other facility upgrades), Tulane (new stadium), USF (Athletic facility upgrades).

Scumlin or Judas? I agree with you, that is the standard, but it isn’t the norm. One good season does not make the next season abject failure, just like one bad/mediocre season isn’t justification for firing.

Don’t disagree with any of this.

No. Which is why what Judas did in 2016 was so disappointing.

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Those are not a reflection of reality, but a sales pitch to get people to bet. I don’t disagree that those losses were disappointing, especially Tulsa and Tulane, but as my post indicates, these teams are not below us.

Tulane regularly upsets heavily favored teams, especially in New Orleans. Tulsa (two years ago), Houston (last year), Memphis (this year). Tulsa has a history of playing well above the size of their student population. They have legit NFL talent year after year. Good for them!

How many times do they have to do that before people realize that crap happens sometimes. These are kids playing football.

and we won by 15.

No. Historically, Tulsa has always played us close, even in our best years. However, thank goodness we did pull it out.

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2015 while magical wasnt exactly as easy as some of you guys make it out to be. We barely won against Louisville (34-31), Cincinnati (33-30), Memphis(35-34) and lost to Uconn (20-17). Are those highschool teams or teams we should absolutely win against every time? idk maybe. But, we also demolished UCF that same year and they were champions last year and look to be just as good this year. Its momentum, you can be good one year and bad the next just because we improve does not mean that the competition doesnt. Its always anybodys ball game.

Also, Tulsa played with either a new RB and/or QB or both. I would say that when that typically happens teams dont react well. Take us against Tech for example. There are concerns for our D but dominate and feel entitlement and fire coaches come on…

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if you want to play that game.

remember levine’s second season as hc? all of our losses (byu, louisville, ucf, and cincy) were close losses. i’lll take a close win anyday.

to counter your point, we know the real reason why we lost to uconn. ward and postma was hurt. the louisville game was going to be hard regardless. it was herman’s 2nd game ever coaching. memphis was ranked so lets not act like they were a bad team or anything. it was 30-14 at one point in the cincy game. Also, we didnt play UCF that year. We played them the year after (frost’s first season there).

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We did play UCF 59-10. And close wins are still wins but the argument is that we shouldn’t have to compete against “highschool teams” (which no one in the american is) or teams with a record of 1-3. They’re trying to get that next W also. Its not supposed to be easy thats why its Football. Which is my whole point with the entitlement or the we should dominate talk.

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You could have left out the statement about Rice winning more SWC championships than UH…

I mean, I am sure at some point in history France had won more wars than the US also !!!

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yeah you are right. i forgot we destroyed them at ucf.

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Everyone beat UCF that year icluding Furman

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Everyone beat us in 2001 including an awful Army and Tulane team. It happens.

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And yet everyone from UT to OU to TT are afraid of us. At least according to a handful of posters.

We’ve had potential for 40 years so everyone has been scared of us since then.

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Everyone wants UH to be a top notch program and in the P5, yet complain endlessly about opponents, the time we play, the day’s we play, our recruiting, the coaching, the facilities, the temperature… you name it, it gets complained about.

Great coaches don’t stay here because of the P5 cartel. And if we are not winning every game by 50 points and we aren’t winning 13 games a year, the school and kids get rewarded with tens of thousands of empty seats. Which doesn’t help us at all get into a better conference.

You can’t have it all ways.

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and UCF beat everyone last year. Things change

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you dont think TDEDU would sell out if we had conference schedule featuring BIG 12 opponents or even SEC and the pac 12? Mostly every G5 school has that problem. Opponents to the casual fans matter. If UH played Texas last night I guarantee TDECU would be sold out.

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Also you can look around CFB. Thursday night games usually dont draw well even when P5 schools play. Plus it was 1-3 Tulsa.

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“We deserve to be P5! We don’t act like it but we promise we will!”

Look I get it. Been involved with UH a looong time now, and I also know the Houston area sports psyche… just seems kinda silly to me that we act entitled, but then come up with a litany of excuses.

My larger point. Celebrate the good, and keep working to get better.

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winning cures everything.

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