The Sicatoka

What Dartmouth's "Big Green" experience shows: They still have folks referencing "Indians" (retired for 30 years!) in regard to the school and its teams. If a name change were to ever occur that just can not be allowed to happen. What that means is that if you change names you can not leave the even the remote possibility of the old moniker being taken seriously from that point forward. You must change to something decisively different, so much so that the old moniker is completely refuted, and thus not worth even being mentioned. That's the only way to avoid the Dartmouth experience. Thus, .... Go Cavalry.

And South Dakota State lost to a DIII and ended up second in the Great West. Whups.

We all have opinions on schedules and who would have done what with someone else's schedule. I went to a source that has no dog in this fight (to try to take my opinion out of it): Massey Ratings, Strength of Schedule. NDSU 138 UND 149 If you want to talk Massey Ratings, here are the first five non-DI-As listed: NDSU Montana UMass North Dakota <-- #1 in DII, ahead of all but 3 of DI-AA Youngstown St.

How 'bout, Imagine going to NCAA events, with no Indian related images, where only Pontiac logos are allowed, but having that logo in. If not that: Cavalry. ..... (sound the charge)

UND's record through 12 games in the Dave Hakstol era: 2006-07: 6-5-1. 2005-06: 7-4-1. 2004-05: 5-5-2. Don't get me wrong. There's a ton of work this team needs to do. But good teams come together through adversity (like injuries to key players). All is not lost. Some of you need to get away from the rail of the ship.

Random Observations after reading through this: Fargo is sure of what it can achieve, to a fault. Grand Forks is sure of what it can't achieve, to a fault. Grand Forks could take a lesson in confidence from Fargo. (Those tech jobs didn't appear in Fargo by accident. They believed and maybe even overreached. GF needs to start believing in what it can do. The flood should have taught that lesson, but it still hasn't sunk in in some quarters.) Massey's strength of schedule has NDSU (137) just 11 slots ahead of UND (148), of over 700 teams listed, so please don't tell me about "most difficult NDSU schedule ever". A watered down NCC (no UNC, no xDSUs), with DI-AA UNI and Winona State as non-conference, was nearly as good. As far as "best Bison team ever", that's disrespecting the abilities of that (yes, I'll say it) Bison dynasty in the 1980s and what they could do. Those teams were powerful. Are the Bison very good this year. Yes. Are they believing a little of their own self-generated hype. Probably. Why'd only 5000-ish come to The Al Saturday? Simple. 49-2. I almost didn't go for that reason. I saw WSU v. Wayne State on FSN-North on Friday night and knew that their run defense wasn't going to stand up to UND's offensive line and that their pass blocking schemes hadn't improved. (Ask that QB's wrist.) Finally, never make the mistake of believing that today is the way it's always going to be. Using today as the reference point to how the future must turn out is an excuse to not do anything. Plus assuming that assumes that you won't slide down either. Set a stretch goal. Dream big, or go home.

Welcome to the second biggest reason for low attendance.

The biggest factor in "low turnout"? I'd go with this.

NDSU's and SDSU's reports are on-line. Dig a little.

Uh, not quite. From the 2006-07 DI Manual (for what that's worth):

Great notion! Syracuse could cut a deal with "Minute Maid", 'cause we know of all the citrus crops grown around Syracuse, NY. Then again, I said just cut a deal with this car manufacturer and keep the green (their racing color*) thus putting Myles Brand's lame-a$$ Pontiac to shame. * be sure to click "Emerald"

Bruneteau? How would you pronounce that? Something like "brunette-oh"?

"undsportsfan": You're of a different point of view on this issue than the majority (of both American Indians and the general population). That's OK. Open, rational discourse is what makes this country great. Like it says in one of the briefs to the court, even

Biggio and Bagwell? Bergman and Biggio? We're definitely in need of a non-blonde--oh, ... are we in need.

Apparently except for Phillippe Lamoureux.

I'm gonna have to press the "no sale" key on that one. Orangemen.

Don't you love how the story is the one of the five and not the four of the five? Go Cavalry.

Would we start up the "Big Ten Hockey Conference" then?

Should Bison fans who said UND would never move up with Kupchella at the helm be critiquing others' predictions? Now, somebody go find the numerous posts where I predicted UND would cause the dominos to fall something like, oh, I don't know, maybe this:

Isn't that hostile and abusive to Scandenavians, you know white peo.... Never mind.

I'm surprised they didn't go Stanford/Harvard/Dartmouth/Cornell and "be" a color (cardinal/crimson/green/red). Go Fuchsia!

Bracket for proof: http://www.ncaasports.com/soccer/womens/br...t64_dyn/2006/DI Will we get the "flaming spear show" by FSU in pre-game?

Oh, they could, if they started today, in roughly the year 2020. Again: Not. Gonna. Happen. Goodness, did UND and NDSU fans just agree on something?

Not. Gonna. Happen. If Augie is staying DII and looking at the NSIC, and given that SCSU, MSU-Mankato, and UMD are staying DII, I see the NSIC getting bigger and maybe splitting into two divisions very soon. Or, maybe Winona State, Bemidji State, C-SP, one other NSIC join the core NCC of SCSU, MSU-M, UMD, and Augie. You'll see one of those two scenarios long before the one you posed.