bincitysioux

So will WWU and CWU have to increase schollies to 30 to meet the NCC minimum, or will they not be held to those standards because they are "affilliate" members?

I'm shocked that Winona only has 9 football schollies. That is a credit to their players and to their coaching staff. It also illustrates the quality of the NSIC. I guess I always just assumed that they were at the max of 24. I would think that they would have no interest in joining the NCC if they can dominate their current conference with only nine scholarships. Does anybody know how many scholarships UMD offered before joining our conference. The future of the NCC looks pretty bleak to me.

I just wanted to offer up another scenario regarding the DI vs. DII debate, regarding recruiting. We've talked alot about the caliber of ND athletes and whether or not there are enough quality players in the pool to support two DI programs in the state, or even one for that matter. I went to a very small Class B high school (about 100 students), we didn't have football but were very good in basketball, especially girls' basketball. Our girls went to state five times during my 7th thru 12th grade years, winning once, and finishing runnerup once. We had pretty competetive boys teams as well. During my time there were 8 student-athletes that went on to play college basketball. 3 played JUCO, 3 played NAIA, 1 played DII, and one played DI. The DII player was a Mr. Basketball finalist who played in JUCO (UND-Lake Region), NAIA (Jamestown College), and DII (NDSU). The DI player was a 1995 Miss Basketball winner who went on to play at Weber St. Perhaps if UND were DI, or if NDSU had been at the time, my schools Miss Basketball winner would have stayed in the state. My worry is that 10-15 years down the road, if UND stays DII, that NDSU will have a far superior advantage in recruiting the best ND athletes. 15 years from now, if UND is not playing games against NDSU, the animosity between the two will likely wear off. An incoming freshman will likely want to play for the school that competes at the highest level, if he or she has the opportunity to. I realize right now that while NDSU is early on its transition that it may not be a very big factor, as the playing field is still fairly close, and the sense of being rivals is still there, I'm sure alot of kids growing up have preconceived notions about being a UND fan or NDSU fan. But my fear is that 10, 15, 20 years down the road, that UND will be forced to or only have the opportunity to sign student-athletes that today would only be considered NAIA caliber players. I worry that of the next 8 student-athletes to come out of my school 4 will play in the NAIA and 4 will play in DII, not nessecarily because of their talent, but because the highest quality athletes may now get offers from the two existing DI schools in our region (NDSU or SDSU).

ecbrevik, You make excellent points, and I respect your opinion as you obviously put alot of thought into your argument. I guess we will just have to agree to disagree. Personally, as someone who lives in this area and attends alot of UND events, I simply am not happy with the state of the NCC, DII as a whole, and the level of competition that we have been/will be competing against (especially in basketball). I just think that our fine university has recently outgrown the league in which it fit so comfortably in for so many years.

Credit card loans? Honestly, I'm no expert in where money for university athletics come from, so I cannot speculate. Many other members of this board have much better ideas than I on how to raise money. I assume the bulk of it would have to come from alumni. I have to believe that raising our level of competition would inspire alot of alumni to give more, and more casual sports fans in GF to buy more single game tickets. I give to UND now, I would give more in a heartbeat if it meant I could go to a game IN Grand Forks against Montana, Butler, or Green Bay. Mayville and VCSU don't make my wallet jump out of my pants.

Correct, and the reason that I included those schools is because I wanted to see roughly what the immediate impact would be while in transition, how much of an increase would be needed from the very early goings.

This is not true anymore. 4 teams have left within the last 5 or 6 years. 3 of them were usually one of the top four teams in the NCC year in and year out. 2 of them were usually one of the top teams in entire DII year in an year out. The NCC was extremely lucky to add UMD, but will not be so lucky again anytime soon. The gap between the NCC and the NSIC is as narrow as it has ever been, and I don't see that gap widening any time soon. I guess it is nice for us though, we can play the role of playground bully, beating up on the little kids. Sure, the Big Sky, Great West, Horizon, or Mid-Con aren't the biggest, best, or most glamorous conferences in DI. But I don't see an "NCC Round Up" on CSTV either.

I-AA FOOTBALL TOP 25 Avg Enroll: 13,261 Avg Pop: 36,833 Avg Attend: 10,105 UND Enroll: 13,000 GF Pop: 54,000 UND Attend: 9,389 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- UND Athletic Budget: $7,350,852 Avg. Budget of DI-AA schools with DI hockey: $13,348,209 Avg. Budget of "regional" DI-AA schools: $6,930,870 *the "regional" schools I looked at are NDSU, SDSU, UNC, Montana, Montana St., Idaho St., and Southern Utah. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I-AA SCHOOLS WITH HOCKEY Total enrollment: 11,833 City Population: 94,693 (If you throw out Northeastern in Boston it is 51,120) Avg Football Attendance: 8,061 Avg Hockey Attendance: 3,036 UND Enrollment: 13,000 GF Population: 54,000 Avg UND FB Attendance: 9,389 Avg UND Hky Attendence: 10,870... ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- UND drew 9,389 per football game in '04, seventh best in DII. Two schools ranked ahead of them (NDSU and SDSU) are in transition so actually you could say UND was 5th. The average for DII football attendance is only 3,685. The average for DI-AA is 7,666. North Dakota already draws better than most I-AA schools. For men's basketball, in '04 UND drew 2550 per game, 11th in the nation in DII. Throw out SDSU (#1 DII Attendance), and that again puts us in the top 10. Average DII basketball attendance was 864. Average DI was 5,154. I know UND is closer to the 864, but c'mon, that sounds pretty meager to me. In '04, UND hockey was 2nd in the nation in attendance, 10,870. Last point, average enrollment of DII schools is about 4,300, while enrollment of schools with I-AA football is a little over 10,000. I believe UND's enrollment is right around 13,000. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The demographics of UND are much more similar to Mid/Lower level DI institutions than they are to DII. Geography is by no means an asset, but NDSU, SDSU, and UNC would provide immediate historical rivals along with the possibility of the Montana schools and UWGB and UW-Milwaukee. Funding will certainly be much tougher. Although UND's budget is significantly less than I-AA schools with hockey, it is already similar to our "regional" I-AA schools. Alot of money would need to be raised, of course, but I think/hope it could be done.

Exactly! 3 of the top 4 NCC teams are now gone. Other than Winona St., I don't see any real exciting possible additions, and they probably wouldn't leave the NSIC anyways because they rule it. That would be awesome to go to the Ralph and see UM or UW. Sure, it might only happen every 10 years, or not at all, but it would be nice if it were at least a possiblity. It was pretty cool when Kansas was here! It is realistic though that Montana, Montana St., UW-GB, UW-Milwaukee, could be coming to GF on a regular basis. Everyone of those teams is far more excitable than UND's current entire non-conference schedule.

I would much rather prefer playing second-tier DI schools like NDSU/SDSU than the NAIA schools that litter our basketball schedules now. The "best available regional DII competition" is pretty poor outside of the NCC. The best available competition is now DI. I would rather be playing NDSU and SDSU than Northern St. and U of Mary. Support of UND goes beyond the student body. I live about 100 miles from both GF and Fargo. If I were a casual North Dakota sports fan, with no ties to either UND or NDSU, wanting to go to the city for a weekend and the choices on a given saturday were basketball games between UND vs. Bemidji St. or NDSU vs. Weber St, I have to believe that NDSU/Weber is gonna win out almost every time.

Nobody here has eluded that a move to DI would bring Florida St., Duke, North Carolina, Illinois, Notre Dame, or other "big name DI schools" to Grand Forks. But, it could possibly bring schools like Idaho, Idaho State, Maine, Denver, and Eastern Michigan (ecbrevik examples), along with Wisconsin-GB, Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Montana, Montana St., Illinois-Chicago, etc., etc. On top of those possibilities, it assuredly will bring NDSU and SDSU back to Grand Forks. I will still maintain that having one of the most successful DI hockey programs in the country will be an asset for scheduling in all other sports. I don't think it is too far fetched that UND could play UMASS in basketball! How's that for a big name? New Hampshire, Harvard, Canisius.....All these prospective opponents, as far as I am concerned, are better than Valley City St., Mayville St, Southwest Minnesota St., Colorado Christan, Mesa St.......It all boils down to the type of competition that you think your school should be competing against. Is UND a VCSU/Mayville St. type institution, or is it a University of Maine/University of New Hampshire type institution? You all know my opinion.

Montana/Montana St. spends alot more on football because that is there #1 sport, like hockey is to us. I used the Big Sky schools I mentioned because they are the closest I-AA schools to us, along with some Great West schools. In terms of total athletic budget, we are in the ballpark. The best I-AA comparisons for UND are Maine ($2 million football budget), New Hampshire ($1.4 million), to a lesser extent UMASS ($745,000). I think you have to look at schools that support DI hockey and have successful hockey programs. I'm sure NDSU's football budget is bigger now since their move up, but in 2003-2004, UND's football budget was slightly higher ($1.316MM vs. $1.309MM), and football is the number one sport at NDSU. Every school is unique. NDSU approached their move with the idea that they are more on par with Montana/Montana St. rather than MSUM and Northern St. UND needs to approach it like we are more on par with Maine and New Hampshire rather than Crookston and Bemidji St.

I don't think that these are very good comparisons to UND or NDSU. I was comparing to I-AA schools like Montana, Montana St., New Hampshire, Maine etc. I'd say these states are more comparable to North Dakota population-wise and school enrollment-wise. No one here is suggesting UND move to I-A and start funding athletics like Minnesota, Nebraska, Florida, or UCLA. NDSU and its supporters are quick to point out that schools like Montana, Montana St. are their peers. I would agree with this, and say that UND's peer institutions are schools like NDSU, Maine, New Hampshire, etc. Not University of Mary or Bemidji St. I think a move to DI-AA IS in UND's best interests.

2003-2004 figures: UND Athletic Budget: $7,350,852 Avg. Budget of DI-AA schools with DI hockey: $13,348,209 Avg. Budget of "regional" DI-AA schools: $6,930,870 *the "regional" schools I looked at are NDSU, SDSU, UNC, Montana, Montana St., Idaho St., and Southern Utah. UND doesn't seem like it would be very far off from the other schools in our region if we were to move up. The budgets of the hockey schools is nearly double what UND's is, that's kinda scary. On thing about it is they're all located in the Northeast, maybe they have to spend more to compete with one another (recruiting, media exposure, fan support, etc).

Can't remember the name of the kid, but the Gophers lost a highly touted recruit today. He's from Bloomington, going to be a senior in HS this year, but elected to play pro in a junior Canadian league after high school, foregoing his college eligiblility. I heard it on the PA and Dubay show this morning. Sorry I can't remember the name, I'm sure somebody on here does. Jeff Dubay also talked about how the incoming class from Minnesota, which includes Kessel, is supposedly the best class from any region since the class of the the late 80's from Massachusettes that included Roenick, Tchachuk, and others. Just wondered if anybody else heard this and what they thought.

I'm going to go ahead and predict a drop off in Basketball attendance.

I was referring to that Babich team that was of national championship caliber. Last year's team had a winning record. I guess that's a success.

Lennon is an extremely competetive person. He has already conquered DII. He is a UND guy, and North Dakota guy, and very loyal to the University. But if UND stays DII, paying him DII money (I don't know what he makes), and a DI or I-AA program comes along and is able to offer him a higher paying job at a higher level of competetion, I would sure hope he would take it. He's earned it. But if UND moves up, and still only pays him at the low end of the average I-AA salaries, I think the chances of him staying are much better. It would be a new challenge to him, and I'd think he'd love to give it a try at the next level with UND if he could. Right now he can't. That's all I meant.

Are we in transition ? This looks alot like NDSU's schedule from last year. I thought about getting season tickets this year when I heard they were going to play all games in the Sioux Center, but I now have no interest. I ain't driving 90 miles to see Mayville St. and VCSU.

I'm surprised that GVSU is ranked ahead of UND. Also didn't Pitt St. lose both of their quarterbacks, or just one? Philpot is gone, right? I'm a little surprised USD isn't on the list either. They were a surprise last year, but could be again this year. They still have Logan coming back, don't they?

Too bad the administration doesn't share my view. I'm excited for the next six months to play out with Buning and Bollinger at the helm. The Dec. 1 DI exploratory deadline is right around the corner. I know it won't happen this year, but I can dream can't I?

Wow, two non-conference and two conference games against Top 25 teams. Luckily three of them are in the Al. Should be fun!

All the same, I'd just as soon move to DI and keep Dale.