McNeese visitors

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I believe Jacoby was going to the A&M game last weekend but didn't make it.

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He made it, and he told them they're the leaders. From 247:

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Ponchatoula (La.) High five-star safety Jacoby Mathews watched the Texas A&M season-opening win over Kent State this past Saturday night.

“Oh man they played great,” Mathews stated. “They played how I expected, pretty fast on defense. It was good getting to see the freshman quarterback Haynes King. I watched him in the Elite 11. Isaiah Spiller being close with him, we have a good relationship and I liked seeing him run downhill hard and be explosive.

“I liked everything I saw. The team played together and gelled as one team and that’s how they pulled out a good victory.”

It’s clear Texas A&M has the momentum in this recruitment heading into the fall but several other programs remain in the mix.

“They’ve put themselves in the best position possible, especially with the defense they have and the team they have,” Mathews said. “At the same time you want to do all these great things but winning is what it’s about and I feel they have a successful program right now and they’re definitely putting themselves in the top seat for me.

“I want to see how they’re going to do my senior year. Depending on that, I’ve been just trying to focus on my senior year and trying my hardest to get Coach Hank (Tierney) to 300 wins and get a state championship under my belt. I think a decision could come after the season.

“Yes sir I’d say A&M is No. 1. LSU, Georgia, Texas, Florida State, it’s a lot of people really. I’m open to all options and open to everything and I’m free to everyone and I’m trying to see what every program does.”

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Just gotta hold together what we already have. New coach will have his hands full.

I would not be ok with not landing Mathews, he could be a quick problem solver at linebacker or safety, similar to Stevens. You cant lose that kind of recruit in LA right now with how bad things are at LB/S. When Sage Ryan gets healthy he should massively help safety, but we still need all the guys we can get there and losing Matthews to a team we play every year is completely unacceptable. This is a guy who really really wants to be a Tiger. It was not made up he was one of the biggest recruiters of this class. If we lose him to a team who simply has a good defense when we couldnt the last 2 years, complete and utter failure.

Bama can sweep in and take a guy or two we want time to time, and you have to live with that. Having A&M suddenly do that? Unacceptable.

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I mean the situation is what it is. He decommitted and went to the A&M event and has said everything positive about them. LSU is possibly/probably about to have coaching staff turnovers.

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There's a strong difference in being "ok" with losing a top in-state recruit at a position of extreme need, and feeling like it might just be inevitable. Even it might be inevitable (it isnt), you should never be ok with A&M taking a 5-star from our state, again especially if it's at a position we are dying for some players at. I mean if it was yet another WR, I guess who really cares because Craig will just ruin him anyways in Jimbo's offense...but Elko wont be wasting Mathews.

I think firing O will only set our program back further. Instability is how you stay mediocre. Auburn is a great example.

Depends on the coaching hire.

He's giving them their money's worth for the present. Tiger.

I’ve seen too many “ can’t- miss” guys miss to GASF about anybody.

He actually didn’t make it per Brian Peroni…he “watched it on tv instead”

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I think firing O will only set our program back further. Instability is how you stay mediocre.

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You're correct that instability is how you become mediocre in the long run. Where you go wrong is in identifying what path is more likely to lead to more instability. The path that leads to more instability is likely keeping O.

Imagine if we finish 8-4 and decide to keep O. We lose matthews and likely some other high-profile recruits. We don't pull in many big out-of-state studs, and we likely wind up with a recruiting class between #8-10. aka not that great. Then we go into next season. NExt season is a fricking disaster, because O doesn't have a clue what he's doing. The 2023 recruiting class is even worse. We fire O. The 2024 class is terrible because whoever we hire only has half of the usual amount of time to put it together. So thats now 3 straight bad recruiting classes, made worse by the fact that some kids from the 2022 class likely leave due to the firing/hiring. At this point, we are in a situation where we're not in a down-turn; we are in a full-on long-term bad situation, starting damn near from scratch.


Alternatively, we fire O quickly, rip off the band-aid, and start to rebuild the program before we get stuck with back-to-back-to-back bad seasons. If we bring in a legitimately good coach for next year, he will be behind the ball with respect to recruiting the 2023 class, and we will lose some guys from the 2022 class in all likelihood, but at least the 2022 season will be strong on the back of our stacked arse roster. Which will allow us to bounce back quickly in terms of recruiting.


It all comes down to what option you think gives us the best bet to have a good 2022 season. We will have a VERY talented roster. I personally don't think O is capable of coaching a successful team without superstar coordinators. If he doesn't prove me wrong by the end of this season, then i want someone else starting in 2022. That's the best path towards limiting the long-term instability. You have to take a short-term hit to shore things up in the long run. Keeping O after a mediocre year just prolongs the inevitable and makes the eventual hit worse and worse.



(Note - I'd love nothing more than to be proven wrong by O and the current staff, and will gladly get on board with keeping them if they're able to prove me wrong. It just doesn't seem likely to me at the moment.)