Mean Green Blog

As usual, the UNT softball team was at its best in the Sun Belt Conference tournament. The Mean Green lost its first game this year before coming back to win a pair of elimination games. UNT’s run finally came to an end today against Louisiana-Monroe.

The loss ended the best season in school history that saw UNT post a 27-33 record. That might not sound all that great, but no other team in the history of the program won more than 22 games. UNT posted that mark under first-year head coach T.J. Hubbard, who added players like Mallory Cantler, Mariza Martinez and Courtney Bradshaw to UNT’s roster. All three were among UNT's best players in their freshman seasons. Cantler was an all-conference pick.

There is little doubt UNT took a step forward this season under Hubbard, which bodes well for the future of the program.

Posted by Brett Vito  at 10:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I have a feeling most UNT fans are tired of hearing about the football and basketball teams' APR scores, but there was one really interesting tidbit that came up at the Board of Regents meeting today.

I wasn't there, but our man on the scene Dan McGraw said that UNT officials noted that the school did have its original penalties from the NCAA reduced. UNT was supposed to lose eight scholarships in football and two in men's basketball.

UNT will have some obstacles to work through just losing five scholarships in football. Eight would have been even worse. Losing two scholarships would have been tough in basketball as well.

UNT officials were able to get some appeals through that helped reduce the hit the athletic department took in both sports.

Posted by Brett Vito  at 9:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Questions continue to roll into the Mean Green Blog on UNT’s APR score, the penalties it received in football and men’s basketball and a few other aspects of the process. I am trying my best to run down all the answers. Here is what I came up with today:

The most often asked question is why UNT received such harsh penalties while other schools with programs that have lower scores were not punished as severely. One factor is the number of 0-for-2 athletes UNT had during the last four years. Athletes earn a point for being academically eligible and another for remaining in school. Schools lose a scholarship for each 0-for-2 athlete if it is under the 925 benchmark set by the NCAA. UNT had multiple athletes leave the school while ineligible and didn’t make it over the 925 mark. Other schools either didn’t have 0-for-2 athletes, were granted waivers or made it over the 925 mark.

As I already mentioned, some schools received waivers if their estimated graduation rate for athletes is 10 percent higher than its student body or because they showed that they are under funded.

Another question that came up today is whether student athletes’ actions in the 2006-07 school year affected UNT’s score. The answer is yes. The report ran through that 06-07 school year. If a player left UNT in the spring of 2007, he cost UNT a point toward its score, two if he left while ineligible.

And finally, a blog reader wanted to know how all UNT’s sports fared. Here is a list:
Men’s cross country – 929
Men’s golf – 961
Men’s indoor track – 938
Men’s outdoor track – 951
Women’s basketball – 979
Women’s cross country – 977
Women’s golf – 977
Women’s soccer – 990
Softball – 942
Women’s swimming – 969
Women’s tennis – 967
Women’s indoor track – 979
Women’s outdoor track – 979
Volleyball -- 984

As usual, UNT’s soccer team led the way. When it comes to the APR, we spend a lot of time talking about what teams don’t do well. It’s worth the time to point out that John Hedlund’s team not only wins year in and year out, it is also consistently one of the school’s top performing teams in the classroom.

And for a parting shot, I thought this quote from UNT director of compliance Daryl Simpson was a key point in today's story that might have been overlooked. UNT might have a hard time getting out of the hole it is in and over the 925 mark, which means each 0-for-2 athlete UNT has will come back to haunt the athletic program.

“We are definitely headed in the right direction,” Simpson said. “But once you start off in a hole — we have been around 915 all four years — it’s going to take a couple of years to get out of it. It’s a four-year average. Can I say next year we are not going to have penalties? I don’t know. It’s an average that takes a couple of good years and dropping off a couple of bad years to correct.”

Posted by Brett Vito  at 9:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

It has been a tough week for the Sun Belt with the release of the NCAA's Academic Progress Report that ended up costing several programs scholarships. UNT lost five in football and one in men's basketball, Florida Atlantic and Florida International lost three each in football, while FIU and South Alabama lost one each in men's basketball.

As if that wasn't tough enough on the league, the NCAA came down like a ton of bricks on FIU today, putting the school on probation for four years for rules violations. FIU will now be on probation until May 19, 2012.

The following is a link to the Associated Press story:

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/news/story?id=3385865

Posted by Brett Vito  at 5:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

One of the Mean Green faithful posted a comment -- make that a question -- on the blog today, and since we encourage that sort of interactive activity here on the Mean Green Blog, I thought I would try to answer.

The question had to do with the scholarship penalties UNT suffered as the result of its APR score and why other schools with lower scores were not penalized or penalized as harshly.

To tell you the truth I had the same questions when it came to how the penalties were handed out, so I went to the man with the best handle on how the process works that I know of -- Daryl Simpson, UNT's director of compliance.

Simpson said that there are a number of ways that schools can appeal the penalties they receive.

One way in which a school can appeal penalties is through a chart that takes an athletic department's APR score and estimates the graduation rate that score equates to. The APR is based on an athletic department's ability to keep athletes in school and eligible. If the graduation rate based on a school's APR score is 10 percent above the school's overall graduation rate that school will not be penalized by the NCAA.

That rule doesn't help UNT because the school has a high graduation rate for its general student body.

Another rule that can get a school out of hot water is based on its funding level. If a school can prove that it is under funded, it can avoid penalties.

That rule doesn't help UNT because it is in a good financial situation compared to some other schools out there.

Schools can also appeal individual student's cases. UNT went this direction in basketball because it only needed one more point to get to 925 only to be denied.

Schools can also appeal based on the progress they have made toward reaching the APR benchmark and improving their academic program. UNT appealed its football penalty based on the investment it has made in an academic center and academic personnel dedicated to athletics. The NCAA didn't rule in UNT's favor on that one either.

So when it comes down to it, UNT has a lot going for it in terms of the graduation rate of its student body, the funding it has to work with and has had good APR scores in the past.

Most of the time those assets are something to sell. This time it ended up being what did UNT in.

Post your thoughts on the blog. How much will these penalties hurt UNT?

Posted by Brett Vito  at 9:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

There will be a story in tomorrow's edition of the Denton Record-Chronicle that will go over where UNT stands after the release of the NCAA's APR report.

Here is a quick and important point: UNT will take its scholarship penalties next season through attrition. In other words, the Mean Green will have 80 players on scholarship in the fall instead of 85. Five players who were scheduled to come back, but have since left due to injuries or other factors will not be replaced with another scholarship player.

UNT will still have a full allotment of scholarships to give in its next recruiting class, although with only a handful of seniors on the team, it could be a small group.

UNT will not fill its final open basketball scholarship for its 2008 class.

Posted by Brett Vito  at 4:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

UNT has just released full details of its performance on the NCAA's Academic Progress Rate report.

As we reported in the Denton Record-Chronicle yesterday, the men's basketball team will lose one scholarship.

UNT took a far bigger hit in football with five scholarships lost. For more, check back on the blog and tomorrow's edition of the paper.

Posted by Brett Vito  at 12:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The UNT men's basketball team will lose a scholarship today when the NCAA releases its annual Academic Progress Rate report, a source close to the situation has told the Denton Record-Chronicle.

The APR measures a school's ability to keep its athletes in school and eligible. Each team is also rated on an individual basis. There will be a story in tomorrow's edition of the paper that goes through the specifics of how the APR works, but the general formula is each athlete earns a point for remaining in school and another for remaining eligible. Programs are not penalized as long as they earn 92.5 percent of the possible points. Players who transfer out while ineligible are particularly costly for programs with smaller rosters because those programs lose two points on the basis of one player's actions.

UNT has already used three of the four scholarships it is supposed to have for its 2008 recruiting class. The fourth will now go unused.

UNT head coach Johnny Jones went on record when he announced his three-man class that includes Paris JC forward Eric Tramiel, Arkansas-Fort Smith point guard Dominique Johnson and Arlington Grace Prep forward Ben Knox that he believes he had addressed all of his team's needs in recruiting.

UNT essentially lost a spot it could have used on a high school player to develop for the future.

The tough part about the APR hit for UNT is that Jones does a great job of keeping the players who stick with him on track to graduate. Calvin Watson and Kendrick Davis graduated and a host of other players, including Ben Bell and Rich Young are about to earn their degrees.

The problem with the APR is that if a player decides to transfer and slacks on his academic commitment, he can hurt the program he is leaving. That turned out to be the case with the UNT men’s basketball team.

UNT did very well as a whole a year ago when all of its programs met the APR standards after the NCAA made its final adjustments. Tomorrow we will find out how the athletic department did this year.

Posted by Brett Vito  at 10:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A source close to the situation has told the Denton Record-Chronicle that new UNT women's basketball coach Shanice Stephens has settled on her first two assistant coaches.

They are former Wichita State assistant coach Erika Lang-Montgomery and Wiley College coach Johnetta Hayes.

Lang-Montgomery has more than a decade of experience as an assistant on the Division I level, while Hayes is a younger coach and Houston native who graduated from Rice.

The following are links to their bios from their last jobs. Post your thoughts on both on the blog.

http://www.goshockers.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=61202&SPID=2852&DB_OEM_ID=7500&ATCLID=639710&Q_SEASON=2007

http://www.wileyc.edu/athletics/teams.asp?SportTypeID=4&SportYear=2008

Posted by Brett Vito  at 10:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)