82SiouxGuy

But isn't it more troubling that they have a $1.8 million budget shortfall, plus $1.5 million overage on the house, plus the other assorted things that the Foundation paid for? The Foundation shouldn't have to pay for budget shortfalls, it should be providing for scholarships and other extras for the students.

There is no guarantee that the Great West would get an auto bid in 2020 or ever. The NCAA doesn't have to give a conference an auto bid. But more important are the regulations requiring the number of schools that stay together and how long they stay together. Basically, pretty much all of the schools would have to stay together for the next 10 years before the league is eligible for the NCAA to even consider giving an auto bid. Of course not getting into an auto bid conference for another 10 years would probably kill the athletic department anyway, so UND would have been better off going back to Division II rather than staying in Division I without being in an auto bid conference. The Great West is not a long term solution, and it never was meant to be a long term solution. It is a glorified scheduling alliance that gives a bunch of schools that were independent something to play for.

These tickets are still available. How about $30 for the pair and a chance to see some of the best young American hockey players play the UND Fighting Sioux.

It seems like it is some time during the 2nd half of the 2nd season that the big defensemen of the last several years learned to control those emotions. Let's hope that #24 follows that pattern.

What an earth-shattering statement. I'm glad they were able to straighten out the controversy and keep the masses informed of their impending potential research on the possibility of expansion.

I think your point is valid. This year has almost as many freshmen, the class isn't ranked as high and the team has injury problems. Yet the record is actually better than that 05-06 class at this point. It shows that people should have expected some struggles early in the season, and that the team has plenty of possibilities to improve. This year's class may not be as gifted as that one, but there are plenty of good hockey players on this team. They need to get healthy and take that next step in the learning process. Then they should be able to compete with anyone in the country and do it consistently (it's the consistency part that is missing right now).

I have also seen Missouri mentioned before related to the Big Ten, but had forgotten about them. The short list seems to be Notre Dame, Missouri, Pittsburgh, Rutgers and Syracuse. Notre Dame is the only one of those schools that currently has hockey, but I believe that Syracuse has a strong club program and has discussed adding the sport.

Most officials in college sports of all kinds do it as a part time job and a way to stay in touch with the sport they love at a high level. They often start by officiating at the high school level and then move up to the college level. And most of them stay at the college level for as long as they continue as officials. I am not sure about th career track for NHL officials, but would suspect that it is similar to baseball. In baseball umpires start at the lowest level of minor league baseball and work their way up by performance. Only the best officials move up to the Major Leagues, and only a few spots open up each year because officials often last for many years (sometimes too long). In basketball and football they often go from the college ranks to the pros. But even in those sports, most officials reach the college level and stay there. So my guess is that #2 is closest to the answer for most officials, but there are probably individuals that would fit into either #1 or 3.

That was probably a school suspension. When the Commish was on with Tim I'm sure he said that he had never given out more than 1 game.

Actually he said he had never given out more than a 1 game suspension so he didn't know what it would take to give more than that.

When Hak was on the radio with Tim H right after the game he said that they had talked to the league office about the previous bad calls, but didn't know what he was going to do about this one. After all, nothing had happened with the first 3 really bad calls.

The belief is that the Big Ten has a rule that if 6 schools have the sport, they will have a Big Ten Conference in that sport. There have been other 6 team conferences, some that have done quite well. The Big Ten is very stable, so the chances of losing a school are pretty small. Plus several other Big Ten schools currently have club hockey and have had some level of discussion about moving up. The Big Ten could go ahead with a 6 team conference if they wanted and play a bunch of out of conference games, they could have a bigger conference made up of regular members if other schools moved forward with hockey as a regular sport, or they could have some affiliate members. If they decide to have affiliate members there is no guarantee that UND would even be considered. The Big Ten, just like several other conferences, are very concerned about being in the company of the "proper" partners or league members. They want the members of their league to meet certain standards of academics and reputation, and seem to want to be affiliated with schools that are on "their level". It is all about image and being associated with peer institutions. So the feeling is that if they want affiliate members they would choose schools that are Division I FBS rather than FCS or Division II. Schools like Bowling Green would probably have a better chance than UND. So the chances of UND being part of a Big Ten Hockey Conference are probably pretty small.

Sorry you had to deal with him just because you visited this site. You have pretty much pegged our occasional visitor and constant hater. He may cause more problems for his favorite school than anyone that actually works or goes to school there, at least with fans from other schools. When they play a new team in football or basketball he often goes to the fan site for that school just to start trouble. His lack of class, lack of tact, questionable hold on reality and possible lack of intelligence reflect very poorly on our neighbors to the south. Luckily, not all fans of that school are nearly as bad as he is. He does have a few friends that occasionally join in his tirades. Many people learn to just laugh at them as they play the fool.

I'm sorry you feel that way. Getting into the Summit League will help cut travel expenses for all of those sports, which is a huge expense. It would also help draw fans when playing familiar schools like the XDSUs and USD. It will help in recruiting athletes for those sports because the teams would have a real league to compete in. The team sports would be able to compete for an auto bid to National tournaments, which means winning the league gets you into the tournament instead of having to depend on an at-large bid, which is pretty rare for independent teams. A lot of other issues become much easier and less time consuming for UND staff, like scheduling. All of these would be true of getting into any of the current auto bid leagues. But the Summit is the only one that looks even possible in the next 3 to 5 years. And if UND isn't in an auto bid conference within 3 to 5 years it is going to make the transition to Division I almost impossible. Look, I'm a huge fan of the nickname and logo. But there is a time crunch approaching. Unless the Summit gives on their deadline, or the Standing Rock Tribal Council makes some kind of move, the SBoHE is going to have to make a very difficult choice. And if there isn't movement from one of the two entities listed above, the nickname will probably be changed. If you hadn't noticed, UND did pretty well in volleyball this year. They won the Great West, such as it is. But they also beat several other Division I schools, including teams from the Summit, and ended up with only 6 losses on the season.

I have a pair of tickets available for the UND versus Team USA Under 20 squad on Saturday, December 19th. Top of Section 306. Tickets are in Grand Forks and can be delivered or will meet you at the game. Asking $20 each, $40 for the pair. PM if you are interested.

Maybe the fact that as of Monday they only had 17 skaters available because of injury, so several guys playing this weekend were playing hurt. Or the fact that they team only has 3 seniors, and they are all injured. Two of them are among your best players and the third is one of your energy guys. And maybe you had young guys trying to do too much to make up for the older guys who aren't able to play up to usual standards. The team has injury problems and has a lot of maturing to do to eliminate stupid mistakes. The first isn't a coaching problem and the second is because of the large number of youth on the team which goes back several years when we ended up with unbalanced classes. 40% of the team is currently a freshman. The WCHA is an upper classman league. Young teams usually struggle, especially in the first half of the season. UND is having those struggles right now.

I don't remember for sure, but it seems like it was at least 2 or 3 months from application to announcement.

They aren't waiting on purpose. They are a young team, need to mature and learn how to win in this league, and need to get healthy.

Hak mentioned it when he was talking with Tim H after the game. They were talking about the phantom CFB on Hextall, Hak doesn't know what to do because they have had 4 really bad calls this season that were obviously wrong. Said it wasn't the reason that they lost, but that they may have had a shot to score in the last couple of seconds because the play developed the way they drew it up. Then talked about being short players the next few games because Zajac was having surgery and Kristo is probably going to be on the World Jrs. team so other guys need to step up. No specifics on the Zajac injury or when it happened.

They also need to get some other guys healthy. Hakstol said that Zajac was going to be out for about a month. He has needed surgery most of the season and they have it scheduled for Tuesday. He didn't say what the surgery was going to fix. Vande Velde missed last Saturday and still isn't 100%. That means all 3 captains and all 3 seniors are injured. And it sounds like several other guys are nicked up. The team needs to get healthy and do a lot of maturing over the next few weeks. The talent is there to compete with the best teams in the country. They need to step up and make it happen.

The Summit League doesn't care about the nickname at all. They care about the nickname issue. They don't want to associate with a school that gets negative PR because of an issue, and a school that is fighting with the NCAA. If the NCAA said the nickname is good and all is forgotten, the Summit would take the application the next day. If the nickname gets changed and the NCAA says all is good, the Summit accepts the application. They don't want their league associated in any way with the problem that UND and the SBoHE are dealing with, not from a distance and not even temporarily. That is their choice, it is their ball and we only get to play with them if they say so. It will be interesting to see how the Tribal Attorney development changes things. It could open the way to get a referendum in a fairly short time frame. Or the process could remain in slow motion. In the latter case the SBoHE will make a decision, and unless the Summit agrees to modify their plans it would probably mean the end of the nickname. If UND is forced to change the nickname it is going to hurt no matter when the change is made. But I believe that enough people have accepted the possibility that it won't be as bad as some people predict. Even a lot of the most loyal nickname supporters will eventually accept it if a change is made. Most of us want to support the University no matter what they use for a nickname and logo, although most of us would really like to keep things the way they are if possible.

I think the other school that has been mentioned as a possible recruit for the Big 10 is Rutgers. It is in the New York City market and a decent fit with the conference.

If you have an interest in UND sports beyond football and hockey, you might want to care about the Summit League. It is by far the best option currently available, and one of the few options probably available in the next several years as a home for the majority of athletic teams from UND. The UND athletic department, the UND administration, coaches, players and fans of the basketball, baseball, golf, track, soccer, softball, volleyball and other teams will tell you that they need a real conference home. The Great West is a nice temporary place to play. But it is not a good long term solution. The Summit provides that. It will save the Athletic Department a lot of time, trouble and especially money if they can get become a member of the Summit.

Again, get yourself a copy of "The Idiot's Guide to American Government" and do some reading. This is how our system is set up. We're sorry we don't live in your world where everyone lives by your rules, but this is the United States of America. In the USA the only time a court can rule on a law is when a case is brought to the court involving that law. The courts are not proactive. They don't review laws for validity just to have something to do.

Now you're seeing writing on the wall? Are you taking the proper medication. And I want to see a link showing the exact application deadline and the list of other schools that will be chosen instead of UND if UND doesn't meet the deadline.