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Posted: **Thu Sep 15, 2005 12:29 pm**

Pretty good article from the Memphis paper today about the Ponies. Hope we will earn some more respect this weekend.

Upset win earns Mustangs some respect
After TCU hightailed it out of C-USA, SMU got bit of payback

By Gary Parrish
Contact
September 15, 2005

Phil Bennett knows respect.

How to give it.

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How to get it.

When it is nowhere to be found.

So when TCU opted to leave Conference USA just after SMU announced it was joining Conference USA, Bennett, the SMU football coach, understood the score.

TCU wasn't necessarily yearning to be in the Mountain West.

It wasn't that the jump was a natural.

It wasn't for financial reasons.

Best Bennett could tell ...

"They didn't want to be in a conference with us, and that's their right," he said. "But let's face it, and I'm one of the few that will say it, (TCU) has stuck their nose up to us for a long time."

Which is what made last weekend at Gerald J. Ford Stadium so special for so many Mustang fans.

SMU took that stuck-up nose and rammed it right into the ground on its way to a 22-10 victory over the 22nd-ranked Horned Frogs.

For a night, the Dallas-Fort Worth area again belonged to Eric Dickerson's alma mater, which had not beaten a ranked opponent since before the NCAA used the "death penalty" to take SMU football away for the 1987 and 1988 seasons.

Think Memphis beating Ole Miss.

Think Vanderbilt beating Tennessee.

That's the equivalent of SMU beating TCU, with an Iron Skillet trophy to boot.

"We'd been compared to TCU in everything," Bennett said. "A local columnist wrote that SMU is light years away from TCU, and he was right.

"I'll be the first to tell you that (because) in this game, and in this life, you don't get respect until you earn it."

Last weekend, SMU earned it.

Back from the death penalty, Iron Skillet in hand.

Posted: **Thu Sep 15, 2005 12:44 pm**

Great to see some attention coming from outside of Dallas!

Best and worst sentence in the story:

D wrote: .... SMU took that stuck-up nose and rammed it right into the ground on its way to a 22-10 victory over the 22nd-ranked Horned Frogs. ....

Vivid imagery there with the nose-ramming comment. Might be a little over the top, but that's a matter of personal perception.

But I was at the game, and if I remember correctly, it was 21-10, not 22-10.

Whatever -- good pub!

Posted: **Thu Sep 15, 2005 12:47 pm**

And no, us beating TCU is not like Vanderbilt beating Tennessee. TCU is a good team, but let's not get carried away.

Posted: **Thu Sep 15, 2005 12:49 pm**

it is not just us but all of C-USA was thrilled to see TCU get it's come uppance.

It was a great introduction for SMU to the C-USA crowd as well as the gestures made to Tulane.

Posted: **Thu Sep 15, 2005 3:55 pm**

......I was both shocked and thrilled to open my "Comical Appeal" this a.m. and see the story. Old Phil sounded a little "feisty" with some of his quotes...I REALLY like that! I am feeling a bit like Ben Crenshaw the night before the last Ryder Cup.."I've got a GOOD feeling about Saturday...!" The tcu win was big, no doubt, much needed....but a fat, juicy W over the Ags would send this place in orbit......GO MUSTANGS!! BEAT THE AGS!! Long Live Jerry Ball.