Sonny Dykes Saved SMU Football. Will He Stay to Sustain It?

[tristatecoog]

The non-conference schedule was weakest under Chad Morris. His last season we played the softest schedule since the DP. That was one of the reasons he left when he did as he knew he wouldn't have another opportunity to look as good as he did in the immediate future.

This year's OOS schedule was about the same as 2017 but Chad went 3-1 while Sonny went 4-0.
2017 featured SFA, (ultimately 9-5) UNT and (7-5) Ark State at home and (11-3) TCU on the road.
2021 featured ACU, (5-6) UNT at home and (3-8) LaTech and (5-6) TCU on the road.

Sonny won at TCU twice and lost at home to them in 2018 in only his second game. Yeah, in 2018, the Ponies also had to play at Michigan. Those TCU wins probably got him the job.

Chad brought the program from the ashes. Sonny sustained and further enhanced. Chad acted like he couldn't recruit against TCU and Baylor but Sonny adeptly used the portal which didn't exist in Chad's days and recruited Preston Stone. Would Sonny have taken that 2014 SMU team to a bowl in 2017 without the portal?

[Charleston Pony]

Bottom line is that Sonny did pretty much what both JJ and Chad did i.e., produced a winning record with a lot of smoke and mirrors. This year's team has exactly one win against teams with winning records but can't beat ranked teams. Hopefully our guys have enough character to beat Tulsa (another 5-6 team) and actually win a bowl game but who knows who might be coaching them at that poit, so prepare for another humiliating bowl game loss.

Should be plenty of possibilities for SMU to build/rebuild the reputation of the next guy and I don't really care if it's Deion or Chad or Tom Herman or someone else because with SMU having been rejected by the Big XII (where we should be playing), I don't expect significant progress and we are likely to be disappointed when we continue losing to Memphis and now even to UTSA under Traylor.