It’s been an interesting couple of weeks in UNT land, a time that illustrates a universal truth in college athletics:
Don’t overreact to a game — good or bad.
UNT played really against Kansas State considering the circumstances.
I could see a mile away what was coming next. People started talking about the possibility of UNT winning out, saying that the rest of the games on the schedule were winnable, talking about partying it up on Bourbon Street, just like in the Glory Days of the bowl run.
Was what went on encouraging? Sure.
What people failed to think about was that Kansas State came out as flat as a board and was probably looking ahead to Oklahoma. It sure looks that way now.
Which brings us to last week and a close loss to Troy.
In the wake of a 14-7 setback, the pendulum has swung the other direction — mass panic about the future, wondering if anyone will show up for the ESPN2 game against Louisiana-Lafayette.
In the words of Dennis Green, “They are who we thought they were.”
Or at least it’s starting to look that way.
At the beginning of the season, most people had UNT pegged as a four-to-six win team. UNT had a good offensive line coming back, but no proven running backs and an entirely new secondary. A tough schedule didn’t look like it would help matters either.
I went all homer and picked UNT to go 6-6. To get there, I had to pick UNT to win some games I thought were toss-ups up and games that I wouldn’t normally pick as W’s.
Troy was at the top of the list.
UNT lost, but still isn’t far off from where every reasonable person out there thought the Mean Green would be.
If UNT beats Florida Atlantic this weekend and wins its other have-to-have it game against South Alabama and then wins a couple of “call it maybe” games against at Middle Tennessee, at Louisiana-Monroe, at Houston and at home against Louisiana-Lafayette, it can still get to five wins, maybe six.
That’s who we thought UNT would be.
No reason to get too high or too low yet.
Now, if UNT loses this week to the Hooters?
Yeah, then go ahead and panic.