David Miller, the billionaire oil tycoon and former SMU basketball player who has played a significant role in the Ponies’ return to prominence as a major donor and the school’s board of trustees chair, couldn’t bring himself to watch the wildly popular “Pony Excess” 30 for 30 documentary when it was originally released.

It was probably seven or eight years after its 2010 premiere that Miller watched the film, which dove deep into the “death penalty” the program received for flouting recruiting rules by repeatedly compensating players at a time when it wasn’t allowed by NCAA rules.

“It made me nauseated,” Miller said.

But now there’s a new story to tell on the Hilltop, one that Miller had a significant hand in. “Thunder On: Resurgence of the SMU Mustangs” is a sequel that tells the story of the university’s and football program’s rise from the ashes, including the school’s move to the ACC and berth in the 2024 College Football Playoff. The hour-long documentary, produced by Texas Crew Productions in conjunction with Peyton Manning’s Omaha Productions, premieres at 3 p.m. (ET) on Sept. 21 on ESPN.

“Thunder On,” directed by Chip Rives of Texas Crew, touches on SMU’s rich athletic history and the devastating impact of the death penalty, but focuses on how SMU climbed back to college sports relevance, all while the NCAA landscape rapidly changed to allow schools to compensate players and recruits in a manner that got the football program punished nearly 40 years ago.

“We wanted it to be a forward-facing look at this school and this program in the aftermath of the death penalty,” Rives said. “And we looked at the irony of what killed this program in the 1980s is not only helping to make it relevant again, but making it elite again.”

Several familiar faces are featured in the film, including former “Pony Express” running backs Eric Dickerson and Craig James, as well as several other former SMU players and coaches, prominent donors and alumni like Miller. Current head coach Rhett Lashlee and quarterback Kevin Jennings are also included.

Rives, a Peabody Award, NAACP Award and eight-time Emmy Award winner who directed “Phi Slama Jama” 30 for 30 and also worked on “Brian and the Boz,” said the fast-paced production began in March and took six months to complete.

There are multiple inflection points in SMU’s winding journey since the death penalty. The school, along with Houston, Rice and TCU, was not included in the formation of the original Big 12 after the Southwest Conference dissolved in the mid-1990s. SMU traversed through the WAC, Conference USA and the American Athletic Conference before nabbing its ACC invitation.

The program snapped a 25-year bowl drought in 2009 and won 10 games in 2019 under Sonny Dykes. Lashlee took over in 2022 and last season captured the school’s first conference championship since 1984.

Miller said SMU has invested over $250 million in athletic facilities in the last 10 years. The school also upgraded coaching salaries and recruiting budgets, and has been competitive in name, image and likeness compensation for players, which has helped Lashlee build competitive rosters. Miller also spearheaded the fundraising efforts that helped secure SMU’s deal with the ACC, as the school agreed to forego nine years' worth of Tier 1 media rights distributions from the conference.

“We raised $100 million in a week,” Miller said. “There were six or seven people who made $10-plus million pledges to that.”

Rives said the film is “a story of sports and business” and is different from the original 30 for 30. “If you want to see the scandals and everything else, go watch Pony Excess — it’s great,” he said. “If you want to see the current state of SMU, watch our film.”

Miller is proud of how far SMU has come, but knows the Ponies simply getting back to a power conference is just the beginning.

“We want the world to understand that we are absolutely committed to success at the highest level in intercollegiate athletics,” he said. “I’m not predicting (more conference realignment), but it’s a possibility. And when that time comes, we want to make sure that we stay in this club.”

Read full article here:

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6613779/2025/09/10/smu-football-thunder-on-pony-express/