bincitysioux

A redshirt freshman is sombody who did not play in the first season aftery they signed with the school. Mollberg is a "true freshman" this season whether he sees the field or not. Jameer Jackson, for instance, is "redshirt freshman". This will be his first year of game action, but was on the team and in the system last season.

I'm thinking it was probably because that is the only open date for the whole season, other than the final weekend, and it is right in between Montana and Montana St.

Do I see DaveK in this picture?........................................

North Dakota was quite solid last year. Offensively, we were one player away from being very special. It is possible that problem has been remedied by an FBS transfer. Defensively there was a major defect in defending the pass that IMO was a much more glaring problem. If there is any sort of improvement in that area, than I think we will be quite competetive. I think worst case scenario, we finish 6th in league play. Best case scenario, I think we finish 3rd and make the playoffs. I'm quite confident that this year's squad will end the year in the top half of the the conference standings. Where exactly, is anybody's guess......................

I've been contemplating Denver. Most of us North Dakota fans are intrigued by them due to hockey. But, really that is all they bring to the table. They never have had much success in basketball, which is most important to a non-football school or conference. Outside of hockey, they don't have alot of fan support. They are a private school. Basically, in the big picture of all this conference shuffling, all they have going for them is location. And by location, I mean ease of air travel. Competetively, their location is not ideal considering they have to compete with Colorado, Colorado St., Air Force, and even Northern Colorado, in addition to four professional teams for entertainment dollars. I think Denver's options are just as limited as Idaho's. Despite how much I love the hockey rivalry with the Pioneers, I can't say I'd be in favor of them being in the Big Sky, especially now that Idaho is in the fold. Personally, I think Denver probably has two realistic options left, but probably not for at least 3 years. One is that I think Idaho will end up playing football in the Big Sky. The Mountain West will add New Mexico St. and Texas-El Paso. That will give the MWC 12 football schools, allowing for divisional play and a championship game, but leaving them with 11 all-sports schools. I could see the MWC then adding Denver to round out the all-sports school alignment and not alterting the geography of the league at all. The second is, that eventually Oakland University will leave the Summit. When that happens, the Summit would be obliged to consider Denver. Although the Summit has been condensing its footprint in recent years, they still remain the most volatile of all DI conferences, and need to protect against future defections. I believe Denver would actually be closer to all of the I-29 schools in the Summit Leauge than Oakland is.

Slightly off topic, but still related to broadcasting, I wonder who will fill the void left by Sean Johnson's departure? UND Athletics announces administrative promotions Sean Johnson basically called over the radio any women's basketball games that Ralston was not able to over the past two years. Since that artilce mentions that Ralston will specifically do men's basketball, I assume they have somebody else lined up to do most if not all women's basketball games.

The Alerus wasn't even sold out for what everybody in the state knew would be the final game for the Nickel Trophy for many many years back in 2003, so I am not surprised that a game against Montana that won't take place for two months is not sold out after one day of selling tickets. What he said. My guess is that the bump in season ticket sales right now is more a function of being 8-3 last season and being a Top 25 team much of last year rather than the opponents on this season's schedule.

So, the Idaho A.D. says he doesn't expect to be an independent for more than two years. That means in 2015 he expects Idaho to have a conference for football. Remind me, when do Nevada, Fresno St., and Hawaii have to stop making their installment payments for the exit fees?

This is great news for the Big Sky. Surely Vandal football will join the party within 3 years. What a great school to be affiliated with......... It is truly amazing how much the Big Sky has raised its academic profile in the last couple years in adding UC Davis, Idaho, North Dakota, and Cal Poly.........................

I'm in the same boat as you are. I can't even get cable at my place, satellite is the only option. It is quite obvious to me that the coverage provided by the new TV deal is at best half as good as what has been availablet the past two seasons...........

Yes, I see the point you are making. But as far as I'm concernced, you could put a picture of a naked lady on the 50 yard line and I'd still rather watch the football game being played on top of her............... To me, it is kind of like everyone's enfatuation with black jerseys and helmets that are a slightly different shade of green. I really don't care as long as I'm watching good football.............

I agree those are all great features. But how many casual fans care about zooming in on offensive line play? You and I have discussed this topic before. I just think that at this point in time, IPTV is more of a luxury or enhancement to traditional TV. It will probably be a bigger player down the road, but I think is much farther off the horizon than you do. Like I said, I have all the access I need personally. I watch more Sioux sports in person than I do on TV. The reason I want North Dakota athletics easily available to the mass public is simply to grow the brand and improve interest. Right now, I don't think relying on web-based media is the best way to go about it.

Are you implying that there is going to be some sort of activity going on on the field of play on Saturdays that will distract my eyes from the atrocity that will apparently be taking place at the 50 yard line on the floor of the stadium?

Kind of ironic that as far as I can tell, every FCS school that played on Astro-turf in 2011, will now be playing on Field-Turf in 2012: North Dakota, NDSU, USD, and Idaho St................................ SUU also went from natural grass to Field-Turf this summer. Lots of upgrades going on in the Big Sky and MVFC...........................

See, that is what I am saying. Why would I want to watch Sunday Night Football on NBC's website, and deal with any (however minor they may be), buffering or freeze-up problems? I just watch Sunday Night Football on channel 11. Where I live (rural ND) I have 3 options for internet: wireless, dsl, or satellite. I have two of the three right now, and despite paying for the "highest burstable speeds" on both, I am buffering and freezing alot. I don't know if it is better if you live near or in one of the bigger cities, but it isn't the answer out here.......................

I believe that was meant to be a snowflake. See, it could be worse.............................. The DakotaDome in Vermillion also never had a Coyote logo at midfield until the installation of the new turf this summer...................

So you and I are basically in the same boat. We pretty much have all the access we want/need. My point is, that it seems we both go out of our way to make sure that we can see what we want to. Most people probably don't do that. We'll just have to agree to disagree on the value of online television content for now, and that is fine. I'll ask you this though, since you watch most of your sports online, can you tell me a decent site to watch hockey on the internet? Because I have never come across an online hockey broadcast worth watching....................

My guess is because Midco would frown upon the University advertising that the games could be viewed for free rather than through Midco's paid service. Since sprig said that Midco has offered the feed to all the regional cable companies that have carried in the past, that must mean that the games will still go up on satellite (rather than fiber). The question is, will the feed be scrambled now?

I don't care for this "breaking news"....................

They could only for an away non-conference game........

I don't understand why the members of the conference agreed to the CBS deal given the exclusivity clause in it. It makes no sense for all the member schools to agree to televise fewer games than they have in the past.

I think at this point you put too much stock into the value of watching television online. And this is coming from a true techno-nerd that has the internet piped to every TV in my house, along with over-the-air, free-to-air satellite, and DirecTV. My point is that geeks like me are the exception rather than the rule. With UND Insider, Big Sky TV, random satellite feeds shooting through space, and season tickets for football and hockey, I'm all set. But my grandma in Arizona, and my aunts and uncles in Alaska are now out of luck along with tens of thousands of others. I also trust the people who make these decisions. I may have mis-spoke when I said UND voluntarily went away from Fox. The NCHC made that decision for them. The HD that CBS will provide for hockey will be great. But I'd gladly take 20 UND hockey games in standard definition versus 4 or 5 games in high definition. And actually, all of the members of the NCHC would have been on TV more if Denver and UND would have stayed with Fox rather than going with CBS.

I don't know a ton about Portland St., except that they have been improving. They were 5-3 in the Big Sky last year and missed the playoffs because they one of their 7 wins was against a DII school. They are a solid program right now. If the game were in Portland I'd probably give them the edge. In the Alerus, I like North Dakota by 10............... San Diego St. is a middle-of-the-pack Mountain West team. They should be heavy favorites at home against us. They could be a beatable FBS opponent for us, but every bounce will have to go our way.

The games on FCS didn't cost UND money. The prior affiliations were revenue neutral. My issue is the availability of games. It is not so convenient for older alumni to figure out how to hook their computer (if they have one) to their plasma TV (if they have one) so they can watch poor video of a hockey game. For the last two years, all they had to do was flip on their TV, and the game was there if they wanted to watch it.

I was going off of the schedule that FCS posts on their website. Last season, you could find any UND games scheduled there about 6 weeks in advance. That would be great, but I don't think it will be so. CBS-SN, like NBC-SN is a national channel. FSN, like the rest of the Fox sports channels are regional. The Big Ten Network is really the only "national" channel that has "regional" alternates................