PN-G bamatex

The Tuskegee Institute estimates that the KKK has been responsible for the deaths of approximately 2,000 people total in its entire 150 year history.   Al Qaeda, from which the much more powerful, dangerous and murderous ISIS is derived, killed 2,996 in 102 minutes during an attack you could see from space.   To call both organizations horrid would be accurate. To call them comparable would be asinine.   Due to the obvious dissimilarity between the natures, ideologies, and destructive capacities of the two organizations, and the immediacy of the threat presented by ISIS as opposed to the defunct state of the KKK, I see no way that the KKK can be considered relevant to the topic of this thread.   Moving on.

  No it is not. Have you ever actually been to Starkville? It makes College Station look like Manhattan.

  The only thing you're going for is the game, because there isn't much there besides the university. Trust me.

Classic LSU freight train syndrome. Train just left the station too late this time.

Sloppy, sloppy game. Way too many turnovers and the secondary, while improved, is still scaring me. We won this game because of depth.

  Maybe not, but they say everything's bigger in Texas for a reason....

Same here. Never met the kids, but never heard a bad word about him.

Alabama typically does short features on the jumbotron before the game to recognize athletes for their academic and athletic accomplishments. Today's was about Hayden Reed, who graduated from LC-M in 2013 and now competes for Alabama in discus. Pretty cool to see a fellow Southeast Texan on the big screen. Thought I'd share and give the LC-M fans something to be proud of.

  This, coming from a Texas fan?

[Hidden Content]   "Mama wanted me to be a preacher. I told her coachin' and preachin' were a lot a like." - Bear Bryant

  No argument here.   And Auburn's luck ran out with 14 seconds left in the national championship.

I thought K-State looked more talented and Auburn looked lucky.

  If they're in Australia, I can guarantee you they're here. And they probably came across the border with Mexico. Want to guess where that most likely puts them?

I'm not. All the people who hated it there moved here.

[Hidden Content]

[Hidden Content]

Man. No wonder we're a blue county.   :D

Or that they aren't intelligent.

Were they looking at just the city or the entire MSA?

  25% is all? How many of those kids actually get much playing time?   The other schools you mentioned aren't commuter schools. Granted, Lamar is doing its best to fight that reputation and is having some success, but the bottom line is, Lamar's student population comes overwhelmingly from the Golden Triangle. I don't think you can say that of the rest of those schools. And even if you could, the fact remains that you won't find, collectively, the number of high school football fans in Huntsville, Nacogdoches, Lafayette or Lake Charles that you will in Southeast Texas. None of those areas have anything resembling a PN-G, and yet we've got three high schools I can think of off the top of my head that can fill up Lamar's stadium better than Lamar can. Use what you have to work with.   As for the coaching, I plead the fifth.

  Basically, all of that.   Earlier in this thread, it was pointed out that Lamar has wins over such vaunted teams as Texas College, Mississippi College and Grambling State.   A win is a win, but not all wins are equal.   If Lamar wants fan support, it has to stop beating up on smaller schools and start beating schools the average, reasonable observer would associate with Lamar. Teams like Sam Houston State, SFA, and longtime rival McNeese. Everyone loves a winner, but a small collection of wins does not a winner make. Until Lamar can effectively compete with the schools it should be on the same playing field with, it will continue to lag behind in fan support, school spirit and regional prominence.   Outside of that, the only thing Lamar can really do to put fans in the stands is to put local players on the field. Southeast Texas is one of the best places in the world when it comes to high school football fanbases. There are a lot of longtime high school fans who would pay the price of a ticket and concessions to see their favorite high school players take the field again. I can't tell you how many PN-G fans would happily go to Lamar games if they thought they'd see Brennan Doty back under center.

That's a recipe for political, social and economic disaster. And an explanation for a lot of California's problems.

[Hidden Content]   Those welfare statistics are pretty striking.

Simple. Win.

  As much as I hate to admit this, I think you're right.   On the upside, our offense seems to finally be getting some kinks worked out, but we can't do it all on the backs of Amari Cooper and TJ Yeldon. Jones isn't playing his normal caliber of football right now, and we aren't making effective use of the rest of our RBs. We have got to start spreading the ball around with some success, or SEC defenses will key in on our two best skills players and we will run into trouble moving the football.   On the downside, our defense is not where it needs to be. Our secondary is starting to scare me. Nobody in the secondary wants to keep their eyes on the football, just the player. They aren't trying to break up the pass, just bring the receivers down after they've caught the ball. We lack intensity and focus, and that's the last thing I ever thought I'd say about a defense coached by Nick Saban and Kirby Smart.   I'm confident we'll beat Florida, Mississippi State and Arkansas. I think we'll beat Ole Miss. LSU is a toss-up and I don't know how we're going to beat Auburn and Texas A&M if we keep playing like this. A&M will hand us a blowout in our own house if we don't make some major changes.   On the topic of the thread, I think A&M stands the best chance of winning the west. Alternates would be Auburn and LSU, but I really think it will be A&M. The east is pretty much a race between Georgia, South Carolina and possibly Florida. Georgia stands a better chance of beating Auburn and Florida both than South Carolina does, so I think the Bulldogs will take it. A&M would win that game, and represent the SEC in the playoffs. In that scenario, there's an outside chance of LSU going as well if their only loss is to A&M.   If it's just A&M, A&M wins it all. If it's A&M and LSU, we get another SEC rematch and it's a toss-up. And no, I don't care about how good Oregon is. Neither will the Aggies or the Tigers.