Horns247 Board

posted on Orangebloods

first a few cliffs from coaches meeting today:

Mack told the staff he's coming Back and there will be no changes. Said he's excited about improving on 2011 and is excited to see this staff grow with the team. Said he wants this Bowl practice to be the most intense since he's been here. Said after that going into the spring all positions are open. Said Texas is starting over and wants to see young players improve and get their chance to show something.

Having said that, there serious pressure coming from the top guys to get rid of Diaz. I was told Texas is willing to make a run at the best of the best and will pay for it. If they get rid of Diaz it's very telling about Mack's future with this program because he's is Diaz's corner.

Although the top 3-4 Boosters are with Mack, the vocal minority of former players and Boosters is getting bigger and louder. So much so that Mack is starting to ostracize anyone that he knows of that has said something negative about the program, players or coaching staff.

Mack and ESPN are having quite the feud right now. So much so that it is even becoming a source of dissonance between Mack and deloss. There was an incident last week where Mack got fed up with a few members of the ESPN media crew and denied their request for a segment.

You want some sunshine with that?

Texas isn't as bad off as some of us think. There's some reason to have a tempered excitement going into 2013. Here are some notes from someone within the program:

Texas is expecting several defensive Juco commits over the next month. Really excited about that because they feel these are guys that will be able to help them right away. Feels Texas needs to get much better at LBer and Safety in order to get to the next level. Says Texas needs to get bigger and stronger at outside LBer.

Speaking of, two players they are really excited about going into spring is Peter Jinkens and Tevin Jackson. If those two players can take the next step along with Kendal Thompson then this Lber crew gets a LOT better with Hicks coming back. One interesting thing I heard is that Hicks could be playing at MLBer again if they can't get someone else to take the next step. Texas feels a lot better about OLBer than they do MLBer right now. This position group should be very competitive this spring and will be one that probably will shape the face of the 2013 season. If Texas can become much better at Lber than this team can take a big step forward.

Did I mention that Peter Jinkens? He took a step forward last night?

Last night was a game that we saw the pressure finally get to Harsin in terms of his willingness to use Daje Johnson. There was some smoke that daje might be looking at his options after the season and not wanting to be another DJ Monroe. Yea, he only got 6 touches but he accounted for 100 yards of offense and it was clear Harsin wanted him to be involved. I believe he was targeted 10 times last night. Suddenly Daje has about 500 yards of offense on less than 50 touches for the year. Not too bad for the freshman.

How about Malcolm Brown? All he did was come back from injury and prove he's still going to be a factor for this program. I said it before and I will always say it, he's the most talented RB Texas and yet we're all so quickly to pass the torch to Gray. Yes, Brown's obviously injury prone and I'm not sure he can be a "full-load" running back but in this new college football era you don't need your top back to do that. If he can come in next year and stay healthy and share the load with Gray, this team is going to have one of the top 3 running back groups in college football. And Brown has never had a good OL to run behind.

Speaking of OL, Texas is looking at yet another Juco OL to bring in for banquet weekend.

I should have a few more notes later this week.