Mattress Mack's money talks at North Texas

In a strange turn of events, the University of North Texas announced it will rename its new athletic practice facility after the football coach the school just fired. Why? Because Mattress Mack said to.

The backstory is this: After nine years as head coach of the UNT Mean Green, Dickey was fired last week because officials weren't happy with the team's recent performance (2-9 last year and 3-7 so far in 2006); coincidentally, he learned the news less than a month after suffering a heart attack. And that was what ticked Houston furniture magnate Jim "Mattress Mack" McIngvale, who donated $1 million to the UNT athletics department a couple of years ago, off. "I don't think firing a guy three weeks after he had a heart attack was the right thing to do ... Even Wall Street is not that callous," McIngvale told the AP. He blamed the Mean Green's faltering record not on Dickey's coaching — the team won four straight Sun Belt titles between 2001 and 2004 and won 26 consecutive conference games from 2001 to 2005 — but on a lack of funding from the university. "If they want a big-time football program, then step up and spend big money," McIngvale said. "Wishing and hoping don't get you any toys on Christmas."

If the university didn't rename the McIngvale Practice Facility after Dickey, Mattress Mack said he would take his million and give it to the UNT music school. The ultimatum was largely a matter of principle, he said, since the donation was made two years ago and the money has already been spent, but the UNT athletics department isn't really in a position to lose $1 million — even symbolically. "You have to keep the boosters' best wishes in mind," Athletics Director Rick Villarreal said. "But I would never put myself in a position as an A.D. to allow boosters to tell me who needs to be hired [or] who needs to be fired."