Losing is contagious

[newshound]

Well, our soccer program is officially the worst it's ever been ... looking like no NCAA's for men or women ... can't blame this on ol' Copeland.

Volleyball is very mediocre and always has been. Might be well past time for a change there at the top. No NCAA's in program history should get you a "hall pass."

So, "Top 25 in everything we do" has a long way to go, since we are Top 25 in just about nothing we do right now (including football game presentation, which is bottom 25, for sure).

Only thing that's Top 25? The Boulevard. Please, have mercy, don't mess with that.

[jkflamebo]

just saw the guys lost 3-0. what a disastrous season for smu soccer. orsini dropped the ball letting mclements take over the program when schellas left. mclements needs to get canned

[pjpony]

just saw the guys lost 3-0. what a disastrous season for smu soccer. orsini dropped the ball letting mclements take over the program when schellas left. mclements needs to get canned

Home crowd, 1st round 3-0 demoralizing spectacle. How humiliating to lose to a #103 ranked team in that fashion. You're right, McClements never should have been hired in the first place. Surely, this is a men's program first to lose to 3 teams ranked below 100 in a single season. We've now lost to teams currently ranked 160, 182 and now 103 during the McClements experiment. So he is to be congratulated, I suppose, for getting himself into the Mustangs record books. We'll put you into our hall of shame and now you must go. You've done enough damage. Orsini, please, please, please can the man.

[Hoofprint]

Well, our soccer program is officially the worst it's ever been ... looking like no NCAA's for men or women ... can't blame this on ol' Copeland.

Volleyball is very mediocre and always has been. Might be well past time for a change there at the top. No NCAA's in program history should get you a "hall pass."

So, "Top 25 in everything we do" has a long way to go, since we are Top 25 in just about nothing we do right now (including football game presentation, which is bottom 25, for sure).

Only thing that's Top 25? The Boulevard. Please, have mercy, don't mess with that.

I notice a glaring lack of solutions to go along with your complaints about everything. Any constructive ideas, or just whining?

No way Coach McClements should be replaced. Give him Guarda and Geppert and Oliva and this season is entirely different. Add a healthy da Silva and healthy Mariel and healthy Osorio and everything is different. Every coach deserves a chance to prove himself, and Coach McClements is no different. I'm already looking forward to the spring, when he'll know who he has back and who he doesn't, and he can build around them. We're back in the top 25 next year.

[redpony]

Every coach deserves a chance to prove himself, and Coach McClements is no different.

He had his chance and he destroyed a great program. He is a proven inept loser. Just look at his D1 record before SMU. SH said that this was his best ever class. TM found a way to turn them into losers. I hope all of us can look forward to a spring where we have a new coach that is a winner. SO needs to realize his mistake and cut his losses. WE NEED A PROVEN WINNING COACH.

GO PONIES!!!

[jkflamebo]

WE NEED PROVEN WINNING COACH.

couldnt agree with you more. this program is not the caliber of a program where an experimental hire like mclements is acceptable. we need someone who knows how to get it done and who can deal with adversity (injuries)

[HorsePower]

Absolutely amazing. Coach McClements hasn't turned anyone into a loser. He spent the spring expecting to have one team, and when he was hired, he adapted to another. His team endured a rash of injuries. We saw at the beginning of the year what this team - even without Guarda, Oliva and Geppert - was capable of when healthy.

Comments like "He is a proven inept loser..." and "...TM found a way to turn them into losers..." are both inaccurate and cowardly, and simply underscore the thought many here have had that you're either one of the candidates who didn't get the job or a friend of one of the other candidates.

I'm glad there wasn't a CowboysFans.com in existence when Tom Landry and Jimmy Johnson were first hired, or fans would have tried to run them off, too.

[stangs07]

Seems like the men's team should be a super power since they are the only D-1 team in Texas.

[jkflamebo]

Seems like the men's team should be a super power since they are the only D-1 team in Texas.

they have been except for this past year

[Whoresini]

I'm glad there wasn't a CowboysFans.com in existence when Tom Landry and Jimmy Johnson were first hired, or fans would have tried to run them off, too.

The guys above didn't inherit teams that had been ranked #1 in the country during the previous season.

[pjpony]

Comments like "He is a proven inept loser..." and "...TM found a way to turn them into losers..." are both inaccurate and cowardly, and simply underscore the thought many here have had that you're either one of the candidates who didn't get the job or a friend of one of the other candidates.

How exactly are redpony's comments "cowardly". Please humor me. I'm so tired of hearing about redpony being this secret candidate or a friend of a coaching candidate. Stop beating a dead horse already. The same could be said about you being McClements or a friend of his because your comments are all emotional and not fact driven.

From what I understand the top three candidates in the mix after SH left were club coach Dave Hudgel who I heard the AD said no to, Kevin Grimes (former assistant under SH, SMU All American, captain, played on national team and in the pros and current University of California, Berkeley head coach and who in the media said he wanted the SMU job and then there was McClements who was just sitting there on a platter playing politics with the search committee until Grimes got so frustrated that he pulled his name out. I heard this was all orchestrated by McClements behind the scenes. I was told that his plan of action was to delay, delay, delay. A coach like Grimes isn't going to put up with those type of games when he's highly sought after everywhere. So, in the end McClements prevailed and we're in this mess that you want to continue eventhough much of what you say defies logic.

Instead of all your silliness, please answer some real questions, like how many years do we have to lose before you believe McClements should be fired? How low must our program go before enough is enough? What does it take? Because he will lose. He always has and he always will.

Just look at McClements past record as a D1 HC and it says more than everything else. In a D1 world the record and not crying about injuries accounts for everything. All programs have injuries but the top coaches don't whine about it. If McClements was half as clever as a coach as he is behind the scenes hoodwinking everyone then the ponies would be in the NCAA playoffs and we wouldn't all be posting on a board titled "Losing is Contagious". Out of curiousity, who of these three coaching candidates do you think redpony is? Dave Hudgel who the AD already passed on, McClements or Kevin Grimes who is currently preparing for the NCAA playoffs since his team is highly ranked and he will be coaching in them?

[redpony]

Since some on this board think I was a coaching candidate or have kids involved at SMU I will clarify a few things. I am retired and have been for over 10 years. I have never had an interest in any job at SMU or any other U.S. college or university and my kids are all adults and out of college (and none of them are employed by or associated with any college or university). Some of my grandkids are athletic. One currently plays volleyball in college (the school does not compete with SMU), one is a junior in HS and will most likely go to aTm on a soccer scholarship and another grandkid is 14 yrs old. She is a VB player and is being heavily recruited by many large schools. The ND coach has talked to her a lot at the Jr. Olympics camps. She will most likely go to Stanford and has no interest in attending SMU.

My sole interest and concern is that SMU athletics regain the stature and national prominence they once had.
Until this year our soccer programs were one of our few consistently successful sports programs. In the past swimming, track, tennis, and basketball were all successful to some degree but over the years have fallen well below acceptable standards. Currently many of those programs are in a rebuilding phase. I simply find it unacceptable to bring in second-rate coaches for programs with a winning history.

I had no preconceived opinions regarding the ‘new’ soccer coach other than I felt it had to be a person who was highly successful at the national championship level and had a proven winning record. SO’s selection did not fit that criteria. We can all see the results. This will probably be the first year in the last 10 or so that we will most likely not be in the College Cup. This year the records of both the men’s and women’s soccer teams speak for themselves. They are not winning records and changes need to be made.
As I have stated several times on pf.com I have no horse in this race. I just want a historically successful program to continue being so. Most of us have suffered enough with our football fiasco we don’t need more losing programs.

[817pony]

How many National Championships did this team have under SH? Also, is it just me or did this team lose to FIU in the conference tournament last year?

[newmustangfan]

My sole interest and concern is that SMU athletics regain the stature and national prominence they once had.I simply find it unacceptable to bring in second-rate coaches for programs with a winning history.

So, redpony, exactly how do your posts help SMU to regain stature and national prominence? If you think recruits don't look at ponyfans.com, you're crazy.

[EastStang]

I thought Grimes took his name out of contention and that he was the frontrunner. Part of the problem was the timing of all this. SH left only a few weeks before the summer workouts. Name coaches (except unemployed fired coaches) were busy gettting ready for this season and would have been loathe to dump their teams right before the season. McClemments had a tough job. Would SH have found a way to win these past few weeks? No one knows. I suspect, when he saw the Bruno Guarda was going pro, he knew that the season would be a lot tougher and his marketability could sink. McClemments was not signed to a long term contract. He knows he needs to produce or he won't stay. Using the Tubbs criteria, he will get next year to get us back on a winning track. If we continue to lose to sub-100 teams, he'll be gone (IF SO has his eyes on someone better).