Anything and everything about Liberty Flames football. Your comments on games, recruiting and the direction of the program as we move into new era.

Moderators: jcmanson, Sly Fox, BuryYourDuke, Class of 20Something

By Chris Lang
Registration Days Posts
#557227
Chippy wrote:
Jonathan Carone wrote:In doing the research for another post I made tonight, I found out that since the year 2000, the average first year FBS school has won 2.75 FBS games.

Four have won zero.

The most has been 8.

If you take out those extremes, the average is 3.2.

With those numbers in mind, a 5-7 season is what we will need to be an average first year FBS team.
Great point! Coastal Carolina was a dominant FCS team with a lot of talent and a good coach that has struggled since going FBS. 3-9 last year with a win against FCS Idaho 13-7.
Idaho was still FBS last year. That was a conference game for Coastal. Just FYI.
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By BJWilliams
Registration Days Posts
#557234
GoMeanGreen wrote:
BJWilliams wrote: 09/22 North Texas
The Flames conclude the first of two two-game homestands with a visit from the Mean Green, who went to the CUSA championship game last year. The boys from Denton will have a new QB as well, but he will have had a few games to get acclimated AND has some very good skill players coming back as well.
Hello Flame Fans,

I created an account so I could correct some misinformation about our team. North Texas is actually returning our QB Mason Fine, who threw for 4052 yards and 31 touchdowns in his true sophomore season. Fine was named 1st team All CUSA and won the CUSA Offensive Player of the Year award.

Mason is one of only two returning players to throw for 4000 yards last year. He was named to the Maxwell, O'Brian, Camp, and Manning award watch-lists before the start of this year.

In our opening game against rival SMU, Mason Fine completed 80% of his passes (40 for 50) for 444 yards, 3 touchdowns, and no interceptions before getting pulled early in the fourth. Now SMU lost their top two receivers and their best defensive lineman but returned most of their starters from last years 7 win team. Hard to tell how good they are going to be this year, they may be down, or they may just have some early season growing pains under a new head coach.

In other words I'm not sure how good of a team we are yet. I expect to have a great offense, our defense was subpar all last year. Out defense was outstanding against SMU. Our 1st team held them to 2 first downs and 40 total yards of offense at the end of the third, after that we brought in everyone off the bench, being up 36-0. However, we don't know how good SMU will be this year. They can recruit, they usually out recruit us, and have the #1 G5 class this year.

Before we play Liberty we'll have a game in which we should easy out athlete the opponent, Incarnate Word, and a game in which we are going to be easily "out athleted", Arkansas. So I'm not 100% sure how much either of those two games are going to tell us about our season.

If you hav any questions about North Texas, I'll be happy to answer them.


PS: A quick fun fact about Mason Fine. He is of Cherokee heritage and his long term post football goal is to become a Tribal Chief.
Thanks for the clarification as well on the QB situation as well. Looking forward to what could be a good old fashioned shootout between gunslinger quarterbacks in Lynchburg
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By TH Spangler
Registration Days Posts
#557576
If we can get past Army and take care of business with Norfolk State I could see the perfect storm brewing for North Texas. They will be coming off a huge game against Arkansas. Maybe a little emotional let down by them and we could pull off another miracle ?
By JK37
Registration Days Posts
#557819
Liberty is one of only a few universities whose female sport nickname still officially contains “Lady”.
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By Liberty22
Registration Days Posts
#557823
well yea but that's supposed to be showing just our nickname, which is Flames. That page is not for women's sports it's for the school overall.
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By Cider Jim
Registration Days Posts
#559785
McCracken has stats about how LU is comparing to other first-year FBS programs of the past.
This is from Wikipedia, so it may not be entirely correct. Still, it offers a good look at how Liberty compares to previous schools' first football seasons at the FBS (as known as Division 1-A) level. Liberty could still top Marshall by winning all of our games this season. Tying with Nevada and App State looks like a more realistic possibility, though.

Marshall (1997): 10-3
Georgia Southern (2014): 9-3
USF (2001): 8-3
UNLV (1978): 7-4
Nevada (1992): 7-5
App State (2014): 7-5
Louisiana Tech (1989): 5-4-1
Old Dominion (2014): 6-6
UCF (1996): 5-6
UAB (1999): 5-6
FAU (2006): 5-7
Akron (1987): 4-7
Troy (2002): 4-8
Texas State (2012): 4-8
ULM (1994): 3-8
Middle Tennessee (1999): 3-8
UConn (2000): 3-8
Coastal (2017): 3-9
***Liberty (2018): 2-2***
Arkansas State (1992): 2-9
North Texas (1995): 2-9
Boise State (1996): 2-10
Charlotte (2015): 2-10
South Alabama (2012): 2-11
UMass (2012): 1-11
Buffalo (1999): 0-11
FIU (2006): 0-12
Western Kentucky (2009): 0-12
Georgia State (2013): 0-12
By tyndal23
Posts
#559796
Are these year 2 of transition year or 1st official FBS year stats. I think our Inaugural campaign is confusing in year 2 transition.
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By Cider Jim
Registration Days Posts
#559827
Just before the half, Troy is beating Georgia State 23-0. And Troy will be in Lynchburg on Oct. 13. If you want to scout them, the game is on ESPNU.
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By Class of 20Something
Posts
#559842
Cider Jim wrote:Just before the half, Troy is beating Georgia State 23-0. And Troy will be in Lynchburg on Oct. 13. If you want to scout them, the game is on ESPNU.
I heard Troy lacked a ton of discipline in the game and there was a lot of laundry. That should favor Liberty
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By BJWilliams
Registration Days Posts
#559850
I would disagree to a point. Bend but don't break can work against the run, but Troy has a very mobile QB who can make plays both running and passing
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By Cider Jim
Registration Days Posts
#559875
Ballcoach, did you watch any of the game, or were you driving the whole time? Troy looked impressive, esp. with their mobile QB. First place in the Sun Belt, Troy has a record of 5-1, including 3-0 in conference games, and has wins over Nebraska (24-19) and Coastal (45-21).

https://sunbeltsports.org/standings.aspx?path=football

https://sunbeltsports.org/schedule.aspx?schedule=745
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By R i
Registration Days Posts
#561319
thepostman wrote:9/1 vs Old Dominion 5-7, none--We win. We do great in these kind of games under Turner Gill. We will be prepared and the stadium will be full
9/8 @ Army 8-3, Armed Forces Bowl (one game to go)--We will lose.
9/15 vs Norfolk State 4-7, FCS - none--Win
9/22 vs North Texas 9-4, New Orleans Bowl -- Loss by quite a bit
9/29 @ New Mexico 3-9, none -- Loss. A long road trip will be made longer with this loss
10/6 @ New Mexico State 6-6, Arizona Bowl -- Loss
10/13 vs Troy 10-2, New Orleans Bowl --Loss
10/20 vs Idaho State 4-7, FCS - none -- Win
11/3 @ UMass 4-8, none -- Win
11/10 @ UVA 6-6, Military Bowl -- Loss
11/17 @ Auburn 10-3, Peach Bowl -- Not even close
11/24 vs New Mexico State 6-6, Arizona Bowl -- Win

We end the season 5-7. I don't expect Army to be as good this year as they were this year and so that loss will sting as will the loss @New Mexico State. I wouldn't be surprised if we find a way to lose another game.

The one positive is there are so many players returning and one would hope they will continue to improve. But that is far from a certainty.
Serving up some crow this morning for breakfast, especially to those who cant seem to find a way to give this team credit for over achieving so far this season.

Army is receiving top 25 votes, and we are 4-3.
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By R i
Registration Days Posts
#561320
Jonathan Carone wrote:L - 9/1 vs Old Dominion
L - 9/8 @ Army
W - 9/15 vs Norfolk State
L - 9/22 vs North Texas
L - 9/29 @ New Mexico
L - 10/6 @ New Mexico State
L - 10/13 vs Troy
W - 10/20 vs Idaho State
L - 11/3 @ UMass 4-8
L - 11/10 @ UVA 6-6
L - 11/17 @ Auburn 10-3
W - 11/24 vs New Mexico State

I could see us potentially splitting that New Mexico swing in the early part of the season, especially if we stay out there the entire week between games.

At most we get 5 wins.
At the least 2 wins.
Most likely is 3 wins.

4 wins already and 3 more games we will likely be the favorite remaining. We are over achieving and out performing most everyones expectations. Strange considering how we have underperformed and had high expectations most every year I can ever remember. Give this team and coaching staff come credit.
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By R i
Registration Days Posts
#561321
BigRed1 wrote:
The one negative is we have Gill returning and I have no hope he’ll improve in his coaching skills. Unless things drastically change, I think 3 wins is shooting for the moon next year.

To add to your crow breakfast BigRed you have made the decision to stay at home and not attend a game until Gill is fired. You are missing some good ball games man. Suck it up give the team some credit for shooting the moon and enjoy the ride.
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By R i
Registration Days Posts
#561322
Old Red wrote:2-10

On the bright side, we should some exposure on ESPN.com each week with Ryan McGee's "Bottom 10". :|

On the super bright side our top 30 Troy win is still on ESPN3 for your viewing pleasure.
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By R i
Registration Days Posts
#561324
Chippy wrote:2-10 with current defense
4-8 if we get better players and better scheme
4 Wins 5 games to play. 3 games we should win.
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By R i
Registration Days Posts
#561325
LUGrad2000 wrote:3 wins total
2 FBS wins
1 FCS win

We are a transitional team. We will struggle next year. It has to be tough to prepare for the level of talent, depth, and experience that we will be seeing every week.
Nailed it! In the first 6 hames. Now what is your opinion of the second half the season ?
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By R i
Registration Days Posts
#561326
TDDance234 wrote:With the current setup, I'd be happy with 2-3 wins.
4-3 . :D
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