ND-fan

It would be nice to get more people out to the games especially with the effort girls have been putting forth. The difference this year i believe is they had normal off year, they have Borowicz and Lane healthy, Leet is having good year, and the additions of Daninger, Davis, and Hoskins have all contributed to the team. The final thing is they are playing as team and at both ends of the court now there playing defense and their offense has improved. I also see it in coaching of these girls and look how even the assistants are involved in the games now something we didn't see as much last year. We have three really difficult games still coming with KC and next weeks rematches with South Dakota schools. This is still fun because we have come long way since last year and were still improving as team.

The move to FBS level and also moving all your sports to next level i have hard time seeing where the benefit is for NDSU especially how most G5 conferences are half way across the nation for possible fits for NDSU. There is probably enough revenue to fund the football program and first few years there would be enough fan interest of playing at this different level. I still see problem in generating additional revenue to fund all other sports NDSU has now because the costs will go up for these sports as well when you jump a level and additional travel costs. Other costs is when jumping a level will be coaching costs, costs of bringing in teams for home games, and also additional overhead costs to administer these additional staffs and fund raising to keep athletic department funded. (Look what Craig Bohl is getting for salary at Wyoming as head coach is 1 million more than you are paying now.) I just think the fan support you have had from region will drop because reason for this growth in fan interest has been your playing for national championship. The casual fan can Identify with this and also the playoff system where you have had couple of home games that local television coverage across the whole state. Then add in championship game in Texas right after first of year it has become mini vacation to get away from the cold weather and the holidays were over. Now we get to small g5 conference and if you win it have record that is good enough to be invited to bowl game that will be played week before Christmas or couple of days after Christmas which could be played on Thursday, Friday, Monday, or Tuesday the number of fans going to the game is going to be diminished especially around Christmas. Also number people able to watch the game will be less because people will be working and season is busy with other activities. I guess as North Dakotan and specially non Bison fan i am not going to go out my way for bowl game where before i have watched because they represented state and region when they were playing in Frisco. I may be wrong but some where in my gut if this doesn't work out as tax payer of North Dakota i may have to come in cover the short fall or at least finance them until they can restructure athletic department. The bottom line I have number other reason but this getting too long already. I just think for the state, region, and all the colleges when we have all major universities in same conference in Dakota's and surrounding universities brings most fan interest for college sports. I have long ago realized we are not populated enough and will never have resources to compete in P5 conference and only way it will work if most universities want to play up level to g5 we will need to form our own conference to do so.

Why would you say that? I have to believe she has to like the position she is on this team as leader and style of play they are playing suits her game. Then add in there beginning to win. I know there was something happen in her not starting but i would find that hard to believe she would want to transfer only that. I may be wrong on this but going else where i would believe be bad move on her part and i think she has opportunity to play in big dance before her career is over here at North Dakota.

I too was skeptical of Bernhard in that i thought she had the ability but i didn't think she had enough head coaching experience but she has proven me wrong which i very happy that i was. The program is headed in right direction and if recruits that she has recruited live up to expectations UND could become a factor in next year so of the conference. South Dakota team with 3 five year players returning this year and their history of being good team i believe will be nearly impossible to upset this year. South Dakota state is also very good team year but i do feel given right night we could be able to beat them. Their team has very deep line up but difference this year is Selland is playing hurt and is not the player she was last year. The rest teams now in Summit conference i believe if we play our game we can defeat. This is quite turn around from last year where we struggled to just win a game or two in the Summit.

I stated it before only logical fit for FBS conference would be if Montana, Montana State, North Dakota State, Und, SDSU, USD, Northern Iowa, Idaho state, Eastern Washington, Idaho, and utah and Northern Colorado formed a conference. Even with the names listed above i don't know how many would want to move up but this would have foot print that would make sense it would limit distant travel and if enough would join you could have east/west spliit in the conference to also limit travel and costs . If it was marketed right getting right media company that wanted to provide sports tv to the states in this conference there could be some television money. Also most national markets wouldn't want to regionalize a market to small market states that this conference would be in so if was done right conference and tv provider would need to be almost partners in developing and marketing this conference to this region of the country. The big time p5 schools are basically doing this now national level and i don't see their numbers increasing because adding more schools just dilutes amount of money being shared when adding more schools. If anything we could see a drop in p5 schools because they don't improve the revenue shared to pot because of tv viewership and other media revenue they can generate for other p5 schools. This sounds like were getting away from basic of college sports but this has been happening in last 20 years and unless their is political change i just see this continuing down this path. We have done this on national scale and next step is for local media company working with smaller college conferences selling this on regional basis as subscription to watch their favorite teams. But until this happens i don't see where NDSU or most of FCS schools and small mid major schools will be moving even to G5 conference because most of these conferences are near what they want for membership. These changes could happen quite quickly or may never happen depending how much change smaller division I schools are willing to accept and if there are smaller local media companies willing to grow and put media business company together sell conference on regional basis. I think this may happen but until somebody does it and makes it successful it won't become the thing to do.

We only loose Leet for next year and Lane returns next year. I hope that Vanderwal can replace Leet next year but we won't know until then with them trying to redshirt her this year. They have been playing 8 girls lately with varying degree of times depending on teams they are playing and foul trouble they have been in. Today they played percentages by slowing down the possessions in the fourth quarter but it also got them out their rhythm offensively and depleted their lead. It worked but i have seen where this can lead to disaster and it takes very good teams to execute this style of play. If they can get sweep next weekend UND going through first half of conference season would have secured the third place in conference standings.

The numbers spent by each of schools above may not be totally accurate but i do find it interesting the schools that were at the top of list were playing for national championship. The UND Fan above statements were very interesting and enlightening about fund raising and level of support for the schools. I do have one question and that is NDSU does go to FBS what changes will it mean for the structure of their other sports because of title 9. When they go to FBS the number of scholarships i believe will go up but how will they account for this to be in compliance with Title 9. I know not very much of fund raising but in past UND had national scope of past graduates and has that well dried up or have they lost much of that to name controversies over the last 10 to 15 years. I experienced the focus that large universities put on fund raising when one my children graduated from Iowa State from doctor programs and at graduation they had speaker durning ceremonies talk on giving to the university. Which I would say was little too pushy in my estimation but i may be behind the times. But getting back NDSU they may have money to move up and may be popular in Fargo but how does that play out to rest of the state for funding their institution and being part of the upper great plains. I am old school so i may be way out of touch but i think these are important things and higher education system needs to remember its just not city your in but whole state and region these institutions are part of.

With the injuries this team like the paper said just has to grind we don't have much in personnel to change our look much. Suecker is help but still playing hurt and you can tell it in his play. The good part is Bruns, Norman, T, and Mathews are developing much faster because of the playing time. It would be nice if they could come up with win but they nearly need to play perfect game they have so little margin to get a win with. You can see the frustration in Sather when he is coaching but i got to feel he got to be pleased with effort these players are putting forth. I hope we can make it through rest of the season without any further injuries but with effort these players are putting forth i could see injury happening.

I see Daninger is senior but she has year of eligibility left according to Midco half time show so i thought she was here for another year. That is where i was wondering how many openings they have for next year. I guess Orth could have year left of eligibility left with last years giving additional year of eligibility.

I have lost track here but how many commits do we have for next year and how many openings. I thought we have signed several people point guard from michigan, the four star recruit from Michigan, and one girl from Minnesota. But i may be wrong on these and i thought we would have only 3 to 4 openings in scholarships. Maybe there others that may not be returning next year i am not aware of. I would appreciate somebody putting this all together where we stand on signings and scholarships available.

I would like for someone to explain to me how that improves them Nationally or even locally for fan following or in the world of the media. Most people understand if they go to FBS it will be to one smaller FBS conferences and if you win the conference it will be for some lesser December bowl game played in afternoon on maybe weekday with limited tv exposurer. Second if they have to move all their sports to this new conference they will find they will have tremendous costs of travel and these sports will loose their traditional rivaleries again eroding the fan bases. Then you add in the recruiting where number of players if they are traveling farther it makes it more difficult for parents and family to watch these athletes. These are some of difficulties i see with move to FBS but i can see it happening because there is lot ego with NDSU and Fargo but until the reality of this move happens all they can see is the glory of playing FBS football. The only way this would make since would be if South Dakota schools, UND, and Montana Schools couple other FCS school would all move up and form new conference at the FBS level.

I think they did replace Tyree with Bruns just slightly different players both guards and both have been effective as Freshman. What they didn't replace was Rebraca and I don't think you could have but I think they should have looked for one more experienced big man instead of settling on Howard who didn't fit and finally left the team. Also we haven't seen what Levias will bring to the team I have feeling he would have brought some things that Tyree brought to the team. To also be fair not many teams can absorb loss of three top seven players and then have scholarship player quit team that represents 30% of the roster and in this case has been the top of the roster. The only team that could weather that now in this conference is South Dakota State and they would be still hurt by this kind of loss.

I thought this was possible game for us to win especially at home. I only got to see most of last half of basketball. I find no fault with effort with this team but lack of athleticism compared to our other opponents is easily seen watching the game. If this team shoots basketball at 42% for the game and makes its free throws this game should have been 10 point victory. Instead we loose by 7 points and looking at rest of league i don't see one team where i feel were better them and would be favored to win the game with personnel we have on the court right now. This does not mean we can't come up with couple of victories in conference season but loosing tonight was one of the victories i thought we might have playing at home. Sueker is not even close to 100% you could see it with him coming off court in second have we was limping walking to the bench. When will Nero return haven't heard any time line on him yet and are they just going to redshirt Levias for rest of the season since were 2/3 through the season. I see McGrath must be sick or hurt not on the bench. This all adds up to pretty thin and young lineup for the rest of the season. The positive to this season is Bruns, Mathews, Tsartsidze, and Grant are getting playing time which should help them in future years getting experience playing quality minutes. I think this season is now all about getting ourselves ready for next season and hope with new additions next year help us make a step forward to competing in this conference. I know this very negative assessment but i just don't see us having much of chance of anything with remainder of the season. Were going to be at best 7 seed and lucky to be 8 seed which we more than likely to meet South Dakota State team that is so talent and deep we would have hard time winning against their second 5 let alone their first 5. This is not going to be quick rebuild now this is going to take couple of years developing the players and adding young talent a lot of people here on this board are really going to be squawking about this but no matter what direction we go its going to take time especially if going to go with young players. We are already committed to this when looking at roster number of young players on the roster and who are recruited for next year. Its very rare to win conferences with young players it takes experienced leadership to win and only time will take care of this.

I guess i look at from different view with most of the losses were lost by touchdown or less and most of these losses could have been a win on one or two key plays going our way so we very close to having very special year. Also all these losses were against playoff teams and FBS school that had very successful season. The difference is team never got confidence or ability to make key plays to start winning these games against quality opponent. The my main reason for this is skilled position players on the team were young and this only comes with more experience and learning from these losses. yes i heard all other reasons on this board but still comes down to players making plays on the field in crunch time and this year it sure didn't happen.

This past weekend the two South Dakota Schools have been making a statement to rest of the Summit league in women's basketball which most observers already knew is they are different level than other teams in the Summit. This past year with granting of extra eligibility for last year just about guaranteed these two schools another year of dominance in the Summit conference. South Dakota got return of their three stars of Sjerven, Lamb and Korngable for fifth year and with backed up talent they were set to have another good year and it sure showed against our girls this week. Then we come to South Dakota State they only have one returning 5 year player Irwin very good player giving them depth while their major star recovered from season ending injury last year. The thing with South Dakota State is they have number seniors or i should say seniors that gave them extra year of eligibility coming next year or the year after. Also adding that South Dakota State has recruited number of very good young talent that are fighting for playing time wonderful position to be in with small mid major program. This was the position that UND and North Dakota State used to be in schools that had tradition of winning and where top athletes wanted to come and play on winning teams. Both programs are in process of rebuilding and are different phases of that process but something is missing we don't seem to have interest of fans or community to get back there and seems we are not promoted even by schools themselves like back then. In the past athletic departments and community would have put urgency to getting the program tops in the conferences they were in but now i don't see that now were one sport schools and that is where media is trained on and also the schools. I have question for all to ponder we have example of similar situation in Nebraska what happens if these sports fall on tough times like it has in Nebraska their recognition and following falls on hard times. What effect does this have on schools and communities. I can hear all sorts of that is not going to happen but in past when we had Tom Clifford leading the university, he wanted us to be winners in anything we did and he work hard to make that happen. I have nothing against new president in fact i think he has gotten off to good start but i do have questions about AD what his focus is on for UND athletics. I started about dominance of South Dakota schools but i leaked into my frustration about wanting UND to be best and i thought we were getting there back there in 2016 and 2017 when we started to have you conference champions in basketball for women's and men's, volleyball, and even with the football and hockey program was also at the top. Then we got into cutting sports and look where we are now with most of these programs not desirable position to be in and i have to believe most people want this for UND.

Our offense looks terrible to many people standing and then we have no outside game. South Dakota State looks like current type of modern offense being played with go inside and then kick back outside for the three and were playing old school basketball just pound it inside and look at the numbers it should have been close game. The difference is they shot 9 more threes and and made seven more three throws so we loose by 18 with us giving up one more bucket on turnover. We shot today 1 for 11 today for three's and this modern day basketball you have to have people hit the three Manson shot the most today shooting 0-6 and only one hitting three point shot was Daninger and Borowicz never attempted 3 point shot. Also we are showing short bench where our front line people are playing tired and it showed on the court today and South Dakota State went at least nine deep today. I think when we fall behind 20 points in games like today we need to start playing some our freshman it may even we loose by 40 points but there is no way were going to build this team without them getting more playing time. We can't expect to compete with short bench so we might as well start looking at building this team for next year. Also Borowicz must be in real dog house with her not starting both games this weekend for both halves. I would like to hear some reply from Bernhard on the status of the team and i see that Davis did dress for the game but were still missing several players.

South Dakota state coach made adjustments at half and we did nothing to improve our offense. we got out scored 22 to 11 in the third quarter. We need somebody to hit outside shot and looks like they have just put a restriction on Borowicz from shooting outside shot.

I do believe we are recruiting better talent but one year's recruits won't suddenly turn us into contender in the summit. We have to have improvement of the players that are on the team now with additional talent to become a factor in the conference. We can't keep having years where we our loosing players to injury and expect to put quality team on the floor. Last night we are missing Anderson, Davis, Vanderwal, Wallace, and Gordon off the roster and i believe these are all scholarship players. That is 1/3 of our team and then we had Borowicz sitting for both of the opening haves we expect to compete with one top teams in mid major program. The next thing is probably won't have the services of Lane now for several weeks after injuring her ankle. Then we have Leet who picked up her third foul in third quarter trying to protect her we sit her but at time were down 20 points what do we have to loose if not try to let her play with the fouls but instead we protect her and then were down 30+ points by time she gets back in but then were trying to press where she not fast enough to play so she ends sitting for most of 4 quarter on the bench especially when were shorthanded for the game. The game management of this game stunk from the very beginning and i hope they look at this film of this game and not only from what players did but how they coached the game because there are alot of things they could learn about themselves. The other thing last night was we missed i don't know how many layups and not by younger players by leadership like Orth. Finally, one last thing i will say is we are terribly undersized in height and also physical strength to like of South Dakota. I look at their girl's size and lower body strength we look like children out there to bunch of adults. I will say with the above complaints were improved over last year but i think we need to address these areas plus number of other areas if were going to improve this team. I still believe Bernhard is learning and i think she can get the job done but she needs to be more open to public getting fans informed on what they are doing right and wrong. I look at her counter part at South Dakota you can go see her news conferences after the games plus her coaches show and she tells more in her one public appearance than Bernhard puts forth in whole season. Then look how the fan base follows this team and invested in them something to learn from.

also missing Anderson and Davis our 7 and 8 players off the bench. Also is Vanderwal out for the season or will she return before season end we could us another tall girl to just help for few minutes. I thought this would be much closer game but missing these players has hurt in our rotations. Second is Orth has missed at least 6 bunny layups tonight which hasn't helped. South Dakota has showed why they are rated but i don't think this has been great effort on our part. I don't think we well prepared for this game at least we sure didn't have game plan to beat them from the game we played. This is not good way to start the conference season and my guess is South Dakota State is going to light us up come Saturday. I feel we can't match up with them size or quickness at all. I think we gave up in second half and i don't understand saving Leet because of her foul situation and then she ends up sitting on the bench with 3 fouls. I guess i am confused what the game plan was and use of the players available. I think Bernhard will need to explain what happened.

They played alot better than i expected and if they could have finished like they played in the middle of second half they could have pulled upset. T played like the press he received coming into this year and Bruns is playing much better than anybody could have guessed for true freshman. Being down to 8 players may have helped instead of playing 10 -11 we had players that had to perform and new they were not going to be pulled as soon as they made mistake taking the additional pressure not making mistake away but just going out there and playing hard. I see where we getting core of young players that could be built around in the future.

I was impressed with women play tonight with exception of the turnovers you can't have minus 10 differential on turnovers and also not scoring in the paint but we had the shots there in the game but couldn't get them to go down. I wish we had another big girl to just to play a few minutes to give Lane just a little more rest. I think that is why we struggled offensively some in second half she was tired and it effected her shot and also her positioning for getting the basketball. Hoskins and Anderson will need to fill that roll as the season rolls along. This is such different team than last year overall play is up we should be one of teams in the middle of the conference by year end and that's if we stay healthy. This is team that could be contending in the Summit if they progress and add some more talent in next few years.

I hate to agree with you but i don't see us having very good time against NDSU especially with Nero and Sueker down. I don't think this will even be close we can't match up with them and i have feeling this will be similar result like SDSU had against KC. This looks like to me going to be pretty much 3 team race in Summit and were not one of them.

This is going to be long season especially if we miss Sueker and Nero are hurt. We can't loose our top two players to injury on thin bench already and if Howard did quit even makes bench that much thinner. Howard was not going to be big factor at UND because he had limited ability in that he wasn't big enough to play inside and not quick enough to play on outside especially when it came to playing defense. He had a roll where he could provide some offense but that would be limited playing time. This team just doesn't have the size to compete inside and players they have playing on front line are just not experienced enough to get the job done. I looked again we were out scored in the paint by more than 20 points and if this continues into the conference season were going to get lit up by upper teams in the conference. Looking ahead at NDSU were going to be eaten live in the paint they have experienced front line and bigger than we are, Our only hope for us is if we can shoot from perimeter near 50% we may be in this game but even then we would have hard time beating them. Sather knows right now the team they put together after last year's major turnover is not going to fair well in conference play. I hate to say it, but the pressure is going to be on him to turn this program around and i got to believe they will have to see significant improvement after next season. I have been thinking on this yes he was handed team that lack roster depth when he took over but again all weak players that were part of that first year either he inherited or he brought in have left. The problem is that we still have roster problems by players transferring out or we have just missed on their ability to play at this level. The current freshman class looks like we have turned the corner but we will need to retain them and build from there. The problem i see where fans are going to be upset is were going to have several teams in our conference like ST. Thomas that will have already passed us and they were just division III, Western Illinois who look like there coach has rebuilt them in less than two years, and even South Dakota who lost through transfer and injury looks to be farther along than we are. I still believe Sather can become very good coach but his learning curve and his assistant learning curves on recruiting and retaining division I players may have cost us year or two. Also I have to believe covid hasn't helped either and may be big factor in our recruiting and retaining players at the university. All i know is this going to be very difficult season and our record will show it at the end of the season.

I went to box score of Mayville state and Bemidji state the game was fairly close in first half and Bemidji blew game open in the fourth quarter. Voegeli only played about 15 minutes of that game and it was early season and Mayville played pretty much there whole bench in that game. It's always hard to compare by teams match up against other teams match ups. Bernhard said they didn't play very well but also said Mayville had several players of D I ability so my take is Mayville is probably going to be very good team in NAIA and North Star conference and watching last night i didn't see where Mayville was that out matched with the players they had on the floor. Also they had very good size for small college basketball team. This where i think UND has problem matching up with alot of top Summit conference opponents in that they are not very deep on front line with size. This team is playing better than last year but i think talent wise were behind top half of the Summit conference. I see next years class addresses alot of these issues and number of freshman this year should be better after year of playing or developing practicing. Bernhard is rebuilding threw recruiting and that takes time after how far the program had fallen.

Zac i guess i still disagree with you on our guard play because i think why we have regression at guard play is that we don't have player like Rebraca in the middle and yes the players haven't progressed but i never thought they were high quality guards but they filled roll last year when they had Rebraca. But when you had player like Rebraca in the middle that could score and create his own shot it just opened up outside for guards like Panoam and Igbanugo who are left open can hit that outside shot. Thats the difference this year that little extra time has effect on our shooting percentage. Also last year we had Nero and Ihenaco both guards that can create opening for themselves scoring and played better defense so they could just rotate those other two in situations where they could be real factor. Now this year we don't have inside presence and teams are exploiting this weakness. If you go back to Montana game we shot the ball well and Howard had career game both shooting from outside and inside and Tsartsidze had effective game inside and one of few games we were close to other team in points in the paint. The last three games we have been out scored in paint and also shot ball poorly especially when the game counted and after they had the game in hand they played deeper in their benches so some statistics get skewed then in overall game. I guess i think Sather was taking a big gamble on four year players progressing to next level because usually what you have in player is pretty much set after playing four years of college ball. But getting back to front court we basically have Tsartsidze sophomore and the two freshman because Sueker has size but he is more outside forward/guard than inside player. That leaves little experience at frontline position and none of them had played division i basketball. I think Sather may find something before years over that might work because he is as good as any I have seen getting best out of players. That's my hope he may pull upset or two in conference tourney. Also that other freshman guard i have to believe he had to be in there plans of replacing Ihenaco. I just think this rebuild now will take several years because it takes times for players learn to win and develop as team.