Musings from La Tech BBB

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If we took everything we were offered, we be in the Sunbelt

Heartbroken beyond words for our players

Bruce needs to be fired, take responsibility and accept being the fall-guy. I almost think we should fire Sonny too -- if he had anything to do with this (especially with all the interviews)

But this just exposes the ridiculousness of the system -- for the governing body of college athletics to allow a team with little-to-no resources who scrape together a great season to fall through the cracks is unacceptable. We all know this has nothing to do with student-athletes - it's about dollars - and our student-athletes were just smacked in the face by that reality. Of course the AD should have protected them, but if we accepted everything we were offered, we would be in the Sunbelt. We stood our ground for something we believed was possible - a bigger, better reward than playing NLU in Shreveport. Everyone on this board would have taken that same stand!!

And to all the people yapping their mouths about boycotting, not renewing season tickets or giving money to LTAC, blabbing that this will affect recruits and boosters - SHUT YOUR TRAPS! Stand with your team 100% - think whatever you want, but the only thing you should be saying is that you support your team 100%! That's it. You're arm-chair quarterbacks making Monday morning decisions.

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Contrary to the nonsense I've forced myself to read on this Board, we have NOT been embarrassed, we have NOT hurt recruiting (Dykes is doing that), and our reputation (what little we have) will NOT suffer. The haters will try to spin an untrue perspective, but in a few months none of this will make any difference.

The ONLY thing that matters is playing, and beating, quality opponents. If we do that next year, the world will be right back beating a path to our door. We didn't do that this year.

What we have just done however, is demonstrated the degree to which we have moved away from all other UL System schools and renewed our commitment to a bigger vision than those schools.

Just ANY bowl game against ANY school is no longer the goal or a necessity. Our rebuilding is still new and fragile, but we have matured enough as a program to recognize that not all bowls, or bowl opponents, are helpful in advancing the program goals. Just as our 9-3 record had credibility only through its close losses rather than its wins, trumpeting a win over a tied-for-third place Belch school would at best have done nothing for our reputation, and at worst would have increased the perception that it is to that level of play that we should be assigned.

What we should demand is for Dykes to immediately end his smoke and mirrors charade and produce some quality wins. And he should start by replacing the DC and giving the DC the authority to recommend additional staff changes if deemed necessary. Oh yeah, and end the job search Sonny; we're stuck with each other until you can produce a team that can play on both sides of the ball and produce those quality wins. Get used to it; I'm trying to.

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We didn't make a really big mistake. We made the best decision possible based on the FACTS at the time. To accept the first offer from the lowest of the 3 options in play, basically taking ourselves out of the running for the 2 better bowls, would have been dumb. The odds of neither of the other two bowls panning out was EXTREMELY low, until the B(c)$ busted yesterday. Also, we knew we'd have to take care of business coming into this season, with only 1 conference tie-in. We finished 3rd in the conference, and that is the biggest reason we are not going to a bowl. The rest is just the screwed up nature of the business side of things. I really think when all is said and done, the I-Bowl is going to be the one with egg on its face. I guarantee their passing us over is going to be part of the story leading into that game.

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Dykes is the one that screwed this up. We win the last 2 games and we're in the Orange Bowl. He had his mind on getting another job and didn't have our team prepred for the last 2 games. Even winning one of the last 2 would have put Tech in a good bowl. Dykes blew it. He should be fired. It will be a long time before we get another opportunity like this. Going to Shreveport to a bowl game has no effect on our football program at all.

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so you boycotters want to go to a third rate bowl in a third rate town in a fifth rate stadium and play the warthogs? we don't owe anything to anyone involved...you want to blame someone/something, try the bcs bs and the idiotic bowl/conference tie ins that guarantees lousy teams in formerly respectable bowl games. I'd rather stay home than meet nlsc in state fair stadium in a game sponsored by a pyramid scheme.

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Blame is with Independence Bowl

They showed that we don't really have a working relationship. We would have obviously accepted if we were given more time. Other teams that have local bowls would never do this to them, they even have tie ins with those bowls. This just shows that there is no relationship. They have no loyalty to us, investment in us, or care about our advancement. I have heard of their uncooperativeness but this is my first experience with it. As their local team, who plays games there fairly often, we should have a cooperative working relationship. As fans, instead of putting pressure on and bad mouthing our school, we should put pressure on the Independence Bowl to be more cooperative with us. Using media, newspaper articles and opinion pieces, Tv, and online social networking, we should justly criticize the Independence Bowl and their decision to choose an OHIO instead of waiting 24 hours for it's local team who contributes to the bowl, and city annually.

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1. No. I don't care for playing ULM but a bowl's a bowl's a bowl. In any case, we would not have played ULM regardless...ESPN would never have allowed that matchup. 2. Kind of unrelated, but I think it depends on whether it's a bowl game or regular season. I don't care to, no.

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