Practice wraps up Wednesday morning, and Shane Meyer, director of operations for the University of Houston football program, reminds the team about curfew.
They all cheer.
Meet the No. 17 team in the College Football Playoff rankings.
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It’s a bring-your-lunch-pail, put-on-your-hard-hat group that has adopted the personality of its 66-year-old head coach.
Nothing flashy.
Old school.
No drama.
The most excitement comes when the ice cream truck shows up every Tuesday after a victory.
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Just call them The Most Boring Team in America.
And that’s a compliment.
Entering the final month of the season, the Cougars (6-2, 3-2 Big 12) are on pace for consecutive 10-win seasons for the first time in the program’s 80-year history. There’s still a path to the Big 12 championship game, although they’ll need to win their remaining four games and get some help.
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Yet there the Cougars were Tuesday night, sitting at their highest CFP ranking in school history, just a few spots behind name brands such as Notre Dame, Ohio State, Tennessee and LSU.
For all the talk about the Cougars being overlooked, the results are hard to ignore. UH has won 16 games over the past two seasons, tied with Texas for the second-most among the state’s Power Four programs. Texas Tech leads with 19.
While UH goes about its business, there’s been no shortage of distractions around the state.
Texas can’t figure out whether it’s back, or whether Arch Manning should sit or play.
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Texas A&M fans are ready to write a check to send Mike Elko packing.
Texas Tech was a soap opera this summer. Then there’s billionaire board of regents chairman Cody Campbell, who can’t stop talking – or posting on social media.
Does anybody even talk about SMU?
Baylor finally fired coach Dave Aranda.
A similar fate appears on the horizon for Sonny Dykes at TCU.
Then there’s Houston.
They’ve done more with less, operating with fewer revenue-share resources than some of the nation’s deep-pocketed programs.
No quarterback controversy. No ridiculous comments from former coach Dana Holgorsen that the “ship has sailed” on recruiting or complaining about an “impossible buyout.”
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No weekly referendum on the direction of the program.
No craving for the spotlight.
No coach with one eye on his next job.
No viral moments.
Willie Fritz likes it that way.
“I don’t have any hobbies,” Fritz once said.
He’s just an old-school football coach who believes in discipline, accountability and doing the little things right. If you forget, they’re written on the walls inside the Memorial Hermann Football Operations Center.
Ask around the locker room, and you’ll hear the same message. Do your job. Keep your head down. Focus on the next opponent.
The Cougars took a few days off during last week’s open date in the schedule.
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“We were kind of bored just sitting there on the weekend, so we’re ready to go this week,” quarterback Conner Weigman said about a return to practice for Saturday’s game against Cincinnati.
Want headlines? Good luck.
Fritz doesn’t seek attention, and he’s not one to overreact. He’s modest but not shy about what the Cougars are building.
The strongest statement you’re likely to hear from Fritz came this summer, when he explained why he took the Houston job: “I wanted to have an opportunity to win a national championship.”
For a program that has spent much of the last decade searching for an identity (and trying to keep coaches), that’s a bold statement.
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But not if you’re winning.
“We have a very complementary team,” defensive coordinator Austin Armstrong said. “I think teams that have a chance like the position we are in now… you’ve got to win different ways. I think Coach Fritz has built our roster to be able to do that.”
If there is one knock on the Cougars, it’s their inability to win the big game. They came up an inch short of forcing overtime in a two-point loss at then-No. 13 Texas Tech. They couldn’t hold a lead in a 21-13 loss at Utah, which is No. 3 in the CFP rankings.
No shame in a pair of ranked losses by a combined 10 points.
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But if the Cougars really want to get people talking, those are the games they must win.
To be legitimate contenders.
To be exciting.
And not so boring.
Until then, there’s always Tuesday. And the ice cream truck.
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This article originally published at The Most Boring Team in America? Houston Cougars are No. 17 and doing quite fine without the drama.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: Sports.yahoo.com
