kiyoat

I absolutely wasn’t trying to troll. Sorry if it came off as such. I don’t follow UND WBB that closely yet, since you haven’t been in the conference, so I was just wanting to get a more informed read on where you guys think the program is at. I knew you had won the Big Sky a couple of years ago. I also know that WBB is actually followed in North Dakota, as opposed to many other places in the Summit. Likely due to major successes in the past, like all the D-II championships. I don’t know why NDSU has been so bad recently, but if all 4 Dakota schools could get competitive at the same time, the Summit could become a regular multiple bid league in this sport. That’s my agenda, or ulterior motive, in posting here, not trolling.

What are you guys' opinions of Brewster and Walseth? Brewster has had a few successful years in the Big Sky, but what do you guys think about his coaching/ recruiting/ future at UND? Walseth has not done well at all, and this year looks even worse than most. If they retain her after this year, could it be said that they have basically given up on WBB? The thing that puzzles me about that is the fact that both UND and NDSU have been dominant programs in the past, and I assume there are some fans that still have some high expectations for your women's teams. No offense meant by any of this, I just wonder where you guys think those two coaches are sitting, with regard to the hot seat. Also, The Summit needs more strong teams, and I think your two programs are certainly capable of filling that void.

Denver. I think a number sports in the conference are set up that way. I'd love to have Vermillion host the Tourney. I think you would see quite a bit more attendance overall with proximity to the three largest-attendance VB schools (UND, NDSU, UNO). Hopefully this championship will help increase the fan base in Vermillion as well.

http://thesummitleague.org/sports/wbkb/2018-19/releases/20181003i01unf The Summit preseason poll and preseason teams announced. Klabo is first team all-Summit and UND was picked 6th. Personally, I have no idea where to put the UND team. They are kind-of a wildcard to me because of lack of experience playing them. Just like in volleyball.

I agree with you , but I am saying that both ORU and NDSU have had very challenging non-conference slates, as well as front-loaded league schedules. As such their overall W/L record will not tell you the whole story. USD went' 5 sets with NDSU in front of 1,500+ fans. Statistically NDSU had an atypical block-a-palooza, but in the end the better team did win, which proves your point about the sport. Although the Yotes won in four sets in Tulsa, ORU scored 20+ points in each set. Both ORU and NDSU have taken sets from Denver as well, which is impressive. To me, the only "bottom feeder" teams right now are SDSU and WIU. The rest have a pulse, and a chance at an upset. I'll make a bet with you, and say that either ORU or NDSU will at some point in the season win a match against one of the following teams: Denver, USD, PFW, or Omaha. A win like that should be considered an upset. No money, just a "bold prediction." with crow-eating potential. What's your prediction?

Nice job so far in conference play. I don’t know how the Hawks will finish the season, but I wouldn’t be too concerned that you didn’t dominate NDSU or ORU. Both of those teams are better than their records would suggest, especially in their home gyms. I don’t think either of those two will win the conference, but I’ll bet they pull an upset or three, and ruin someone’s season.

I guess then we are back to motivation. The Montanas are the founding core of the Big Sky. It’s named after their state. I doubt they would be interested in leaving it. Kind of like the Big 10 trying to add North Carolina from the ACC.

The Dakota 4's sponsored sports would align very well with the Big Sky. Football removes the need for Men's soccer (which none of us have) AND Baseball (XDSU's could then drop). focusing resources on the two more-profitable men's team sports just makes sense.

I don't mind the idea of merging with the Big Sky, but I'm not sure what their motivation would be to do that. I suppose you could say that they have extended offers to all of the Dakota 4 in the past, but would they want the rest of the Summit? Maybe not. We would have to join them and leave the Summit. Denver and ORU have one foot out the door anyway. Fort Wayne would be better served in the Horizon. Omaha wishes they were in the MVC. That leaves WIU. Financials may force their hand into the OVC. I guess I could see that happening, other than having to lose the SLT in Sioux Falls. Maybe they would do a rotating neutral site between Boise and SF? That would be interesting. Travel partners for a "Northern Plains" division: MT/MT St, UNC/Denver, UND/NDSU, USD/SDSU. Or switch Omaha for Denver. Big Sky would go from 11 full members to 16. perfect for 2 divisions. One big negative would be travel costs would go up, but UND has already experienced that and survived.

I didn't realize that the MVC was down to just three men's tennis teams. That worked out well for us, since the Jacks cut that sport as well. Now I understand about the team sport requirement (I looked it up). A "Division 1 Multi-sport conference" must sponsor a minimum 6 men's and 6 women's sports. three of the men's and three of the women's must be "team sports" and must include basketball. So right now we are fine on the 6-and-6, but our men's "team sport" requirement is just barely being met, with 9 BB teams, 6 Baseball and 6 Soccer. We lose Fort Wayne and we would have both a Baseball problem AND a men's soccer problem. Eastern Illinois is an affiliate men's soccer school that we can't afford to lose, either. Sponsoring football would count the same as 2 team sports, so we could fall below 6 in either baseball or soccer. That would give us more flexibility to meet the auto-bid requirements. Let's do it. Northern Colorado brings both football and baseball. 10 teams. Done. Here's the current NCAA rule on conference requirements: http://image.cdnllnwnl.xosnetwork.com/attachments1/files/11600/628372.pdf?DB_OEM_ID=11600 (Section 20.02.5) "Multisport Conference"

According to Wikipedia..... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Summit_League Looks like the Summit League made some moves last year to shore up another sport, and get some hooks into the MVC. In 2017 we added Valpo, Drake and Illinois State as affiliate Men's Tennis members, bringing our # men's teams up to 8 in that sport. Fort Wayne doesn't have Men's Tennis. I'm not sure why it wasn't more publicized last year, but I think that is a great move. Much better than adding affiliates that aren't legitimate targets. Maybe there is a reason they didn't make a big deal out of it. Targeting Horizon League and MVC teams as affiliates possibly shows intent to poach/merge with those conferences, and (very slightly) destabilizes them as well. We also have had Eastern Illinois (OVC) as an affiliate member in multiple sports, and Valpo in Swimming. We would be smart to try and get UNC to switch their Baseball and Women's Swimming/Diving to us from the WAC as well. Maybe I have been too hard on Douple. Evil genius.

Sorry for the long string of posts, but my conclusion is this: Both UND and NDSU have had some recent success in VB, and if either team were to host the tournament soon, I think the attendance #s would set records, and possibly set up a permanent hosting site, like the SLT is for Basketball. Money talks. I'd prefer USD host first, and the Jacks fans would attend, even if their team sucks, and a similar result might happen. The main issue with Vermillion hosting, though is air access and lodging for multiple teams. Most would likely stay in SF. Summit VB in SF would be massive, but I'm sure would be met with much angst from other teams. Fargo or Grand Forks as a permanent site would draw a lot of fans, I bet.

If you go to the last page of the PDF in the previous link, you will see Attendance records for the VB tournament and championship game. Total tournament attendance: 2,953 Fargo 2009 1,879 Fargo 2010 1,773 Indianapolis 2014 1,660 Tulsa 2006 1,316 Tulsa 2004 Championship Match: 1,615 NDSU vs Fort Wayne 2009 951 NDSU vs Fort Wayne 2010 802 Valpo vs ORU 2006 (in Tulsa) 673 Valpo vs ORU 2004 (in Tulsa) 587 ORU vs Valpo 2003 (in Tulsa) - what you may notice here is that the championship games constitute almost half of the tourney attendance, and the championship game attendance isn't that much higher than a regular season home game. The Indianapolis Tourney was boosted (IMO) by Fort Wayne fans adding to the IUIPUI fans due to distance. SDSU has never hosted, despite having a regular season title back in 2007. If any Dakota team hosted you would have lots of fans from at least two teams show up, and blow the records up.

http://www.thesummitleague.org/RecordBook/2018-19_Summit_League_Record_Books/15_Volleyball.pdf Yeah. It looks like that has been the practice since 2008. Before that it seems a little random. maybe a rotation, or bids? It's strange to me that Denver Volleyball has not grown its fan base along with the run of titles. They still don't draw much. I think that any of the Dakota-4 would increase a fan-base with that kind of sustained success. If the Yotes can ever win a regular season title (we were close the last two years) I think our fans would show up for hosting the SL tourney. We have a decent VB venue with the new 6K seat SCSC. I'm sure UND would support it as well.

I would concur with your opinion that youth is playing a factor with your team, as well as a challenging non-conference schedule. 15 matches is 2 or 3 more than the rest of the Summit teams. I would guess that is an advantage in terms of more live games = more reps. Don't sleep on Fort Wayne, they have done very well in the non-con, and their schedule wasn't overly weak, either. I haven't scouted them, so I don't know why they have done so well. As to Western Illinois, they have only won one game so far. Not sweeping them would raise some red flags IMO. The Yotes have stumbled a little after a promising 5-1 start. I'll guess that youth is a factor there, too, but who knows? Denver has over-performed an average-weak non-con, and look fairly dominant at home. That is significant, since the league tournament has been there for a few years. Good luck.

Thanks for the mention. Summit League VB should be very competitive this year with the addition of UND to challenge Denver's dominance. Supposedly Omaha could be good this year as well, and I am very encouraged with the Yotes' progress so far, given that we have 3 freshman starters. Both ND schools have more difficult non-con schedules than anyone else, so It's hard to judge strength fairly until we get into conference play. Denver has 9 home games in the non-con. Just a point of clarification: The ISU game was exhibition, and our one loss was to Northwestern, arguably a better opponent from a better conference than Cal. Good luck @ Clemson!

I was curious, so I looked at the last time the Summit had 10 teams.... the 2011-12 season. Most weeks the games were on Thurs & Sat. Last year we had 8 teams, but the schedule was still set up for 9. IUPUI pulled the last-minute move to the Horizon League in the middle of the summer, so teams had to "backfill" schedules with whoever they could find (local D-2 and D-3 teams, mostly) not good for RPI. At least IUPUI had to pay a $1 mil penalty. I have always heard that 10 is ideal for a basketball league, and that seems to make sense.

I would say that it is a bigger advantage for those that travel to the game. Many Sioux Falls alumni of both USD and SDSU have to pick and choose which games they attend. They are much more likely to attend a double header vs travel to both games separately. Maybe you see a similar thing with alumni in Fargo?

We play our final two games at home. We play in Brookings before that. Only 3 of the final 5 games are in Vermillion. Besides, everyone plays everyone home and away. Seems pretty fair to me. You could make an argument that starting the season with more home games is an advantage of some kind. It's subjective IMHO. playing important games on a day that it is harder to get a good crowd (Wed) is a definite disadvantage, though. That sucks.

Definitely. You guys are getting in the league at a good time, when they are finally figuring out how to schedule properly. It has been much much worse in the past. Like rivalry games over the holiday break, having your men's and women's teams playing simultaneously in different cities, only a handful of double-headers, etc. It looks like the entire schedule this year is either double-headers, or Men/Women play on consecutive days in the same place. Big travel cost saving, and better for traveling fans, too. I agree that you guys got screwed a little having your Dakota rivalry games all on weeknights. From what I have read, NDSU SDSU and USD fans are mostly happy with their schedules. I'm guessing it will get better for you going forward, as your admin gives the league office feedback on what games are important to you. They are a little slow on the uptake, but believe me when I say it has been far worse in the past.

Gotcha. THOSE issues. I thought you meant the Texas schools have had an issue with WIU and UPFW. As far as WIU's financial problems, you could say the same about most public schools in the states of Illinois and Missouri, including UMKC. It's concerning, no doubt, but I don't get the feeling WIU wants to go anywhere else. They are a conference founder, and aren't as much of a geographic outlier as Ft Wayne. We need them for football if we are ever going to break away from the MVFC (or just for voting leverage) With Ft Wayne, I honestly wouldn't blame them for wanting into the Horizon. Their travel budget alone makes that move worthwhile.

Interesting. What issues? Texas would extend our footprint even farther, but if some are considering Grand Canyon or New Mexico State, I guess you do what you have to. Definitely sounds involved. I hope Douple is on top of it, but to me he seems a little too reactive rather than proactive on the subject. He needs to squash the perception that the Summit is vulnerable, even if it is only perception. JMO

Good info on Hockey. Also on D-II affiliates. Adding UNC as a baseball affiliate could be a prelude to full membership. The WAC, where they are affiliates now, has 9 teams. The WAC also has 11 men's soccer teams, including Air Force....

Since I am posting on the UND site, I may as well get your opinion on an idea I have kicked around. With UND, Denver and Omaha all in the Summit, what would you guys think about the League trying to sponsor hockey? You need six teams minimum, but they might be able to add three affiliate programs to start. Possibly St Cloud, Mankato, Air Force? (I noticed that AF is a geographic outlier in their hockey conference). It might get some Summit teams to consider adding the sport in the future, and in the meantime it would be one more buffer against losing the auto-bid. I'm sure you guys are very happy in your current hockey conference, and this is a terrible idea that would never happen, but I'm just spit-balling. When Summit Commissioner Douple was asked about expansion in light of losing the auto-bid, he said he wasn't worried about that, because we could just add affiliate members if needed. That got me thinking. I think that adding UND may have been good for keeping Denver and Omaha in the fold because of hockey. And that is a sport that can actually draw fans, despite the high costs.

Fortunately for you, reactionary fans with an inflated view of their school's importance don't make those decisions. As an occupational hazard, Athletic Directors tend to take a more balanced view. Let me know when Justin Sell gets a call from the Missouri Valley. Or better yet, the Big 12. The continued success of the league is not dependent on just two schools. Unless you think you can have the same success as an independent? With UND now in the league you will see a couple more games a year where opposing fans actually travel to Brookings. Same would be true with Augie. Same with Mankato. If you think SDSU is too "big time" to stay in the Summit, what are your other options?