Conference realignment is bad for college athletics. There is, though, a very thin silver lining for those of us who generate #content. It can be tough to write game previews when you're dealing with the same schools with the same coaches every year. If nothing else, new schools mean variety! Yay, variety.

That brings us to the University of North Texas, the first of the AAC newcomers to make their way to Annapolis as league members. The Mean Green are part of the American's push into Texas, joining three other Lone Star State schools in the conference. Indeed, the school's Denton campus is only a 45-minute drive up I-35 from the American's headquarters in Irving (on a good day, anyway). I talked a little bit before the season about why Texas' demographics made the state a priority for the AAC's revamp following the Big 12's poaching. From 2000-2022, Texas gained more than 9 million residents, the most of any state and a 43% increase for what was already the nation's second-most populous. It's a tremendous boom in a place where football is deeply ingrained into the culture; as a result, the state only stands to become even more bountiful for recruiting.

Think of it this way: let's say that Texas and Texas A&M are the first-tier destinations for Texas recruits. The second tier would be the near-Texas blue-blood-type schools like Oklahoma, LSU, and Alabama. In those cases, the Texas players they get might be every bit as good, but there just aren't as many of them. The next tier after that would be the other Texas Big 12 schools like TCU, Baylor, and Texas Tech, plus the rest of the SEC West to varying degrees. This isn't a perfect list, of course; there's bound to be overlap and bouncing between the tiers. But you get the idea.

Now, consider that with the right coaching, a team from that third tier of Texas recruiting went to the Playoff last year. That's how good the football is in Texas. It stands to reason, then, that the next tier below that-- say, the state's AAC schools-- should be capable of competing for conference championships with the right investment in their programs. Those schools also tend to be preferred landing spots for Texas recruits who initially committed out of state but end up in the transfer portal. That's what the American is banking on, and North Texas is smack dab in the middle of it all.

Then again, potential isn't the only thing the Mean Green brings to the American. They've also had a respectable amount of football success already. They've been to six bowl games in the last seven years, including two nine-win seasons and two C-USA championship game appearances (including last season). Yet they could never get over the hump. While North Texas played in the C-USA title game last season, they still finished the regular season at 7-6. Looking for the ever-elusive next level, the school fired head coach Seth Littrell. Now, it's 37-year-old Eric Morris tasked with taking the next step in a new conference.

Sometimes "pedigree" is overrated when discussing coaches, but if it's your thing, then Eric Morris is your guy. He has been associated with just about every hot name in football today. Morris was a wide receiver at Texas Tech under Mike Leach from 2004-2008. He had three different position coaches during that time: Lincoln Riley, Dana Holgorsen, and Sonny Dykes. In 2012, he was the receivers coach for Leach at Washington State. The following season, he was brought back to Lubbock to be Kliff Kingsbury's offensive coordinator, where his quarterback was current insurance pitchman Patrick Mahomes. Morris' resume is basically a network of the College of Air Raid Cardinals.

At the rate he's going, it might not be long before Morris becomes their pope. After the 2017 season, Morris got his first head coaching job at the ripe old age of 32, taking over at Incarnate Word. UIW started as a Division II program in 2009 and moved to FCS in 2013. It had been a bumpy ride, and the team Morris inherited had just finished 1-10. In his first season, he led the Cardinals to a 6-5 record, a share of the Southland conference title, and their first-ever berth in the FCS playoffs. UIW's offense improved from a meager 293.2 yards per game to 483.2 yards per game. In 2021, UIW went 10-3, won the Southland outright, and advanced to the second round of the playoff. That season, Morris' team was second in the nation in total offense (500.5 ypg), passing offense (404.5 ypg), and scoring offense (38.5 ppg). He returned to Washington State for a year to be the Cougars' offensive coordinator before North Texas made him their head coach.

After four games, it's clear that Morris is making an impact in Denton, too. The Mean Green are already at the top of the AAC in total offense and a close second in scoring offense. They've won two in a row heading into their conference opener in Annapolis. With a win on the road at Navy, followed up with one at home over a struggling Temple squad, the Mean Green would have a lot of momentum going into a matchup with league favorite Tulane. The Mids will have their hands full trying to keep that from happening.

We've talked about the Air Raid around here before. It's less of a strict offense and more of a philosophy. The basic idea behind the Air Raid is to have five receivers on every play. They are spread across the field, and there will always be at least one receiver apiece in short, medium, and long patterns. In theory, a zone defense would be stretched thin enough to always leave an open receiver. Against a man defense, the offense counts on their fifth receiver being better than the defense's fifth defensive back. If the defense tries to bring extra pass rushers, the offense will throw a tunnel screen. Or they'll fake the screen and run a screen & go for big yardage. That's a somewhat ridiculous oversimplification, but it gives you an idea of the general mindset.

In a way, the Air Raid is like an option offense in that the quarterback has specific keys, and what those keys do after the snap determines what the quarterback does with the ball. One way that Morris' offense differs from the "pure" Air Raid offenses is that he uses those same keys to help in the run game. Morris' offenses have incorporated the RPO very effectively, isolating interior defenders to force them into a choice between stepping up to stop the run or dropping into coverage. The quarterback will read some poor linebacker who is wrong no matter what he does. Drop into coverage, and the running back takes the ball through an uncovered gap. Play the run, and a receiver gets the ball in space on a swing pass, sort of like an option pitch.

But with North Texas, it isn't just about the RPO. The Mean Green are a legitimately good running team, third in the conference at over 186 yards per game. I'm not sure if this is what Morris always wants to do on offense or if he's just doing what he can with the team he inherited; over the last three years, UNT averaged 43.7 carries and 220 yards per game on the ground. They have three running backs with over 1,300 career rushing yards and a fourth with almost 800. Running is what they're built for.

Most Air Raid teams treat the run game as a novelty, but against North Texas, defenses have to make it a priority. That makes the passing game more of a big-play generator. Quarterback Chandler Rogers doesn't throw the ball 60 times per game like you sometimes see from Air Raid QBs. Instead, the passing game is more about quality than quantity. Rogers is third in the conference in yards per passing attempt (8.5), while the Mean Green are in the top 25 nationally in passes of 20+ yards per game (4.5). Ja'Mori Maclin, a transfer from Missouri, averages 26.8 yards per catch (third in the country) and has five touchdowns in four games. The Mean Green has the consistency on the ground to keep the chains moving and the explosiveness through the air to make the chains irrelevant.

Rogers, a transfer from ULM, and fellow junior Stone Earle were competing for the starting quarterback job in fall camp, and that competition continued through the Mean Green's first two games. Rogers separated himself with an 11-15, 201-yard, 2 TD performance against FIU and was subsequently named the starter for the Louisiana Tech game. North Texas is 2-0 since then. Watching Rogers play, I'm sort of amazed that he didn't earn the job right away. He has thrown for 634 yards and five TDs as a starter with no interceptions. While he isn't asked to run very often, it isn't due to a lack of ability. He has a bullwhip for an arm, can move, and operates behind an offensive line that only gives up 1.5 sacks per game.

North Texas seems like a perfect storm of offense, but I'm not quite as pessimistic about this matchup as I was with USF, primarily because of Navy's run defense. It's not that the Mids are generally stout against the run, but why they are. Navy's defense uses unusual run fits that confuse offensive lines. The player lined up over a particular gap is often not the player assigned to defend that gap, causing linemen to block the wrong man. That can also make it difficult for the quarterback to read a run-pass option. If the man he's reading isn't the player assigned to the gap the running back is aiming for, it can lead to a missed read or, with a bit of luck, a turnover.

Of course, it's not that simple. Navy does similar things to disguise their pass coverage, bringing players from seemingly unlikely spots to cover their assigned zones. Sometimes, that means an interior defender running to cover an outside zone, and against a team like North Texas, that can lead to players being caught out of position if they don't get there in time. It can also lead to mismatches as linebackers (and sometimes even linemen) drop into coverage. Navy has tinkered with a three-safety look in the past, and I wonder if they might also consider using something like that tomorrow.

Still, even if the Navy defense does everything right, UNT will score points. There's just too much firepower there. This will likely be another shootout, requiring a performance out of the Navy offense that we have yet to see. It helps, then, that North Texas has statistically the worst rushing defense in the country, and by a wide margin. The Mean Green give up a staggering 241 yards per game on the ground. To be fair, they've improved every week; they allowed Cal to run for 357 in game one but gave up 170 to Abilene Christian a week ago. However, even in that game, the Wildcats still averaged over five yards per carry. This should be a game for the Navy offense to recalibrate itself on paper.

However, we're all too familiar with things not working out as they should on paper. We've talked many times here about how there's a difference between defending the "run" and defending the "option." More than once, we've seen teams with bad run defenses come out with a good option game plan. UNT is the second 3-3-5 team that the Mids have faced this season, with the first being Wagner. In that game, though, Navy didn't run their real offense, so there's still an element of newness to this matchup. Most 3-3-5 teams line up in a 5-3 against the option, and I'm sure that's what the Navy offense is practiced for this week. But if North Texas throws a curveball and lines up differently, the Mids' fundamentals will be tested. So far this season that has yielded mixed results.

You hate to call the season's fifth game a "must-win," but there is a big difference between 2-3 and 1-4. Coach Newberry says his team is close to a breakthrough, but they can't afford to stay close forever. If the Mids want to hang with an offense as prolific as UNT's, that breakthrough has to happen now.