UND Fan
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Posts posted by UND Fan
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2 hours ago, NDRA said:
I think a big part of it was when the decision to go Div 1. was made. Made more out of desperation in order to keep up with the neighbors. Meanwhile not much thought was put into increased expenses. Coaching salaries, facilities, etc.
You are 100% correct!
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2 minutes ago, nodak651 said:
Probably has something to do with Kris Engelstad trying to get Kennedy fired, for his efforts to negotiate a usage agreement that benefits UND Athletics as a whole.
Someday you will learn all that Kris does for UND athletics and UND athletes!
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Funds are being raised to establish a Women's BB scholarship in Katie's name. Any contribution will help! Here is the link....
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6 hours ago, Ndamukong_sioux said:
Former UND DBack Chavon Mackey tragically passed away last Sunday morning in Jacksonville, FL in an auto accident. I know he wasn’t a fan favorite in this forum during the Mussman/Transition years but regardless he loved Sioux Football and he left it all on the field when he played and will be missed by his former teammates and friends. Please join me in praying for his 3 young children and family while they go through this tragic time.
Thanks for posting - I live in Jacksonville and was not aware of this!
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5 minutes ago, Teeder11 said:
Missing an Orth like firebug tonight.
I had hoped Aumer might step into that role but, not tonight, at least.
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1 minute ago, Dustin said:
Score and time update?
We are down by 2 with 5 minutes left in the 3rd.
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Kacie is unreal - she does need some help. I think she will get help when some of other girls settle down/settle in!
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1 hour ago, ND1 said:
Kraft won the 3 point contest and Mara won the slam dunk competition at fan fest tonight
Any other observations?
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I have purposefully not read any posts on a football thread since the start of the Boise game. I know I would have been frustrated by many of the comments about our play, the play of Schuster, our coaching, etc. I would guess that many of the observations were "right on" while others, as usual, got carried away with petty, naive and just plain stupid comments.
I will make a few observations before concluding with the point I think we must all (those of us on ss.com, the UND athletic department and the football staff) understand and address:
- I was very disappointed in our play. We certainly didn't look like one of the better FCS programs in the country.
- Tommy did not have a good game. It sure appeared he lost his confidence/composure in the second half. That said, our offensive line (one of our strongest positions) did him no favors - he had very little time to do much of anything. His lack of mobility was very apparent against a team like Boise.
- I sure hoped we would give Boise a good game but any expectations to win this game may not have been well-founded. Despite their 0-2 record, they have a lot of talent and seldom lose at home. If you go position by position, you could count on one hand (maybe a finger or two) the number of superior football players we had compared to Boise. They were bigger, faster and more confident than our players.
- Before UND-FB-FAN gets on my case for not implying we should not expect UND to win some of these games and, if not, play a good game and gain everyone's respect for how well, how hard and how disciplined we play. I fully agree that this is what we want to our program to be and we need to get there as soon as possible.
Now my primary point.... for UND to compete at the level we all want, we need to recruit better athletes. I have been following UND recruiting very closely for many years. We continue to sign very few highly recruited prospects. For us to be successful, we need to land kids that many DI schools want. I do think that a lot of our not-highly-recruited players turn into pretty good contributors but we are not going to be a championship level team until we get more studs to decide to play ball at UND. It is too bad that Wiki is not still available. Over the last 10 years, you would see 1) most of our recruits had few, if any, other DI offers and 2) that we seldom landed kids that had offers from NDSU or SDSU.
While that is a criticism of our recruiting, we must realize that it is difficult to recruit kids to Grand Forks do its rather remote location compared to other schools we compete against. Fargo is only 75 miles from GF but, with their years of success, recruits and their families do not mind the distance. We can't do much about UND's location but another problem has been our facilities. It isn't that long ago that we had a locker room that should have been condemned 10 years earlier. The Pollard Center has been a great improvement but with a locker room across the street, a so-so weight room, etc. has not impressed kids that we need. With Phase II finally becoming a reality, it should help a great deal. No more excuses! We also need to do a better job of bringing in talented transfers - much of the above applies to transfers as well. Do we have the coaching staff to recruit better players, I guess we will find out!
Regarding Phase II, you will be hearing about a LHB&F (Let's Help Bubba & Fritz) campaign quite soon.
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57 minutes ago, St Patrick said:Arrived this morning, hauling the goodies for the team and staff.
We were about to launch a Let’s Help Bubba to purchase the equipment (storage, shelving, etc.) needed for the inside of this trailer (and maybe the paint job) when someone offered to pay for it. This is a good step forward - much better than trying to load everything onto an airplane. I don’t know what the airline charged for loading, transporting and unloading the plane but it must have been substantial. Additional football equipment can now be efficiently transported to away games - whether the game is in Brookings or Boise!
There will be more info on a Let’s Help Bubba soon.
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This doesn't belong here but didn't want to start a new thread....
A good article on Amani Hooker. He is Q's brother. It would have been great to have landed him - we tried! He went to Iowa after receiving no interest from UM.
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2 hours ago, Hambone said:
Can't wait to hear who it is
Check your PM
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5 minutes ago, GoodGood said:
Please tell us more!! Height? Weight? Position? Name? We need to know more!!!
It will be announced soon.
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1 hour ago, Siouxperman8 said:
Way back in the day it was $1.00 pitchers at the Spud. $0.35 (35 centers) on Thursday nights.
same sentiment about going back in time to relive that.
Some of us old farts remember when Frenchy increased his regular price of a pitcher from $.75 to $1.00. Some of us were so distraught, we didn't go to class for days!!
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1 hour ago, HoopsFan03 said:
Good for them! Glad to know you believe they are doing what they are paid to do. Also, you do know that this website is literally created so that fans can post their thoughts and opinions right??
But to answer your question, did we get a knock down shooter? Someone like Norman? No. Did we get a legit PG to run the offense and lead the team? Possibly but looking like he will be ineligible. Did we get a 5 man to protect the paint? Something that we were absolutely brutal at last year. Probably not. Amar had 17 blocks in 32 games at the Juco level.
Like I said in my last post that you must not have read, these can be addressed by players getting better, adapting to new positions, and many other ways. Just would have been nice to address them right away via the portal, in my opinion!
I don't disagree with your last paragraph at all. My only point is that anyone is naive to believe that the staff didn't try to address these needs! If it is your opinion that we could have picked up someone in the portal that could have truly helped the team and we elected not to do so, I guess I need to respect your opinion!
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2 hours ago, HoopsFan03 said:
In all seriousness though, not saying Eli King can't play PG but it definitely doesn't give me great confidence heading into the year if he will be our starting PG. If you watched the games last year you could see Treysen struggled when he was in playing point. The whole team and flow of the offense struggled when he was at that position. Like @GoodGood said, he is a much better secondary playmaker.
This is supposed to be our year to compete at the top of the conference and we got solid transfers, but didn't address some of the biggest concerns. 1. No knockdown shooter (like Norman) 2. No legit PG that can play (like Trent) 3. No legit 5 man that can protect the paint
Some of these concerns can be solved with players stepping up, players adapting to new positions, and eligibility decisions. But it would have been nice to solve some of these with the transfer portal. Can't wait for the season to get started though!
You continue to say things like the highlighted comment above. How in the hell do you know they didn't "address" those issues? Any decent coaching staff knows what they need and will attempt to address those needs. Being successful in bringing in talent whenever/wherever it is needed can be a whole different story!!! Any college basketball coach in the country would agree!
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11 hours ago, UND-FB-FAN said:
That’s the point of my statement (difficult to connect with anyone at UND...). Thanks for clarifying though.
I agree that this thread should get back to recruiting but…. let me know who you want to talk to at UND and I will set it up for you!!
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8 hours ago, UND-FB-FAN said:The whole point of a forum is “talk”. You can’t “do something” on a forum, but you can set forth the foundation and discuss ideas.
Nice try, though.
How about the $60K+ that ss.com (LHB) has raised for the FB program??
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I posted the below message a couple of months ago. Since then, I have heard from quite a few of you, some wondering if health problems might be prompting me to pull back on my ss.com, Wiki updates, Let's Help Bubba, etc. activity. I appreciate the concern and am pleased to say that health is not the issue. As stated, I am tired of the constant arguments and smart-ass posts on ss.com. But a bigger reason is my concern about UND's athletic fundraising, especially the Champion's Club. The upcoming facility improvements will help recruiting and player retention but, until we have the money to truly compete with our competition, we will not be able to consistently challenge for championships in non-hockey sports.
I am going to contact Armacast, Zink, Chaves, etc. with examples of my concerns. Other ss.com members have indicated that they weren't contacted to continue CC membership and others have indicated that they had expressed interest in CC or other athletic fundraising efforts but did not hear back from UND. If any of you can provide me (either on this thread or by PM) with specific examples, it would be appreciated. Please don't exaggerate your example. I will not use any names in my discussions with the UND brass.
I live far from ND and have one generic question about CC membership efforts. There are obviously many businesses (inside and outside of GF) who are CC members, many at higher levels. That is great but are we actively encouraging the owners and upper management of these businesses to be CC members? I get the impression that many of these individuals feel that their companies' involvement means that they do not need to individually become CC members. These folks are likely quite well-off and/or are well-paid. I am not implying that these folks don't care about UND's athletics needs. I just don't think they understand how much the need is and, if enlightened, many would become CC members, some at higher levels.
Heck, I guess another question is: do we know if anyone from UND is actively knocking on doors soliciting CC memberships.
The bottom line is that CC does not come close to providing enough $ to cover all UND's scholarship costs on an annual basis. And UND seems satisfied/proud to raise about the same amount of $ every year even though tuition increases every year let alone helping with the ever-increasing costs of running a DI program.
One other item - I have been asked about future Let's Help Bubba campaigns. My involvement in LHB efforts (and other personal contributions) will be dependent on the result of my discussions with UND management.
On 3/31/2023 at 4:22 PM, UND Fan said:I was one of the first ss.com members – joining almost 21 years ago. I won’t be on the site much going forward but will give some thoughts regarding UND football on a few topics first. I will try not to make this too long and I have no interest in debating my thoughts with anyone.
Recruiting
I have followed our recruiting efforts for many years and was the guy doing the Wiki updates for the last 10 years or so until turning the job over to Hardcore Hawk (who is doing a good job) last year. During that time frame, I followed thousands of potential recruits during the recruiting process. This included kids who attended our camps, prospects we offered or were offered by other conference schools, prospects listed in recruiting websites (247 Sports, etc.), kids whose dads played for us, etc. I have followed these prospects during the recruiting process via their social media as well as other teams’ fan websites.
Our recruiting classes of the last 15 years or so have not been great. If you look at the limited number of: signees we get that other top teams wanted, players contributing as true freshmen, players making all-conference teams, UND players in the NFL (or even getting good looks), etc. We are getting lots of kids without any, or very few, FCS offers. These are good, hard-working kids with some talent but turn out to be average-to-very good FCS players. This needs to change - we need more high-end FSC level recruits before we can expect to be truly competitive year in and year out.
There has been a lot of talk about UND’s location (geography and weather) with many saying that it doesn’t have any negative effect on recruiting. Those who think that location isn’t an issue are very much mistaken! Most kids want to play somewhere that their parents, grandparents and/or girlfriends can attend most games. Although it is improving, the number of talented prospects from ND and NW Minnesota is limited. When you are recruiting kids from Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Illinois, etc., there are so many other FCS schools much closer than we are – including all the Dakota teams. The two SUs are getting most of the kids they really want. It’s not just NDSU we have to worry about now, SDSU has been winning just as many battles as NDSU (geography is helping them with some kids). I would like to see us recruit the Winnipeg market (heck, all of Canada) harder.
Facilities are improving but are not there yet. If you had ever seen the offices and locker room under Memorial, they were worse than you can imagine. It was surprising any talented kids chose UND back then. In a couple of years, we should have facilities equal to (maybe better) than the other Dakota schools. That will help a great deal but there is still the distance issue.
I will talk about NDSU a little later but, as the Fargo/West Fargo metro area continues to prosper and grow, the number of talented FB players in this market will continue to grow. We need to get a decent share of those kids. If SU lands the lion’s share, it will be easier for their dominance over UND to continue.
Bubba
Bubba and I are pretty good friends but I truly don’t have a great handle on his ability to lead us to the point where we consistently challenge for conference and national championships. I certainly have disagreed with some of his decisions at critical times in important games over the last 2-3 years. However, based on our inability to land many top-notch prospects, Bubba might be doing a hell of a job!
Athletic Department Funding
Funding remains a major issue. At this point, we are unable to pay our coaches competitively nor are we able to provide many of the “bells & whistles” for players provided by other programs.
The latter is one of the reasons I organized seven “Let’s Help Bubba” campaigns over the last few years. We raised $60,000+ for first class knee braces, Guardian helmet caps, computer equipment for breaking down film, quality cold-weather jackets for outside games, etc.
I offered to run a LHB8 last fall. I was not pleased when it did not happen. It was not anyone in the FB program who dropped the ball. I will leave it at that!
I won’t get into details but I have some real concerns about our athletic fund-raising efforts especially related to the Champions Club.
It makes common sense that averaging attendance of 10,000+ will create more revenue and a better game day experience – this needs to happen soon. We all agree that winning and a positive fan experience at the Alerus will have a positive effect on attendance.
Lastly, on the topic of money, many have stated that the Engelstads only care about hockey. I have wanted to post this for a few years but understood it was not to be made public. Just recently, it did become public - Kris Engelstad has written a check paying for all FB players' summer school tuition for many years. That is not a small check as most FB players are taking classes during the summer.
NDSU
I attended UND when the rivalry was much more intense than it is today. I dislike the Bison as much as (probably more than) any other ss.com member. That said, it is ludicrous to continuously put down their FB program as well as the rest of their athletic department. Now that their womens BB team as back to being good, SU is very competitive in every sport. That certainly can’t be said for UND. Their expectations are to be successful and nothing else is acceptable. They do what is necessary to remain successful!
Team Makers fundraising efforts pay for 100% of all athletic scholarships at SU every year. The Champions Club funds less than one-half of UND scholarship needs. Just think about what UND Athletics could do with an extra $2+ million every year.
SS.com
The constant bantering back and forth is getting real old and is one of the reasons I won’t be visiting the site much going forward. Too often, neither party knows what they were talking about in these “infantile” discussions. My recommendation – if iramurphy posts a comment (FB or otherwise), you can be confident that it is factual. He has the most knowledge and experience of UND athletics (and athletics in general) of any active ss.com member.
Lastly, if you aren’t supporting UND athletics financially as best as you can through Champions Club membership or one of the other funding programs, don’t bitch about our coaching salaries, our bidding for home playoff games, etc.
Reviewing the above, it probably came across a bit too negative. I think the program continues to make progress. Hopefully, we will soon be able to seriously compete for league championships and first round playoff spots annually. The new facilities should help a great deal!
You will see me posting once in a while but, guys – please grow up and stay away from the juvenile discussions. Some prospective recruits (and often their parents) check out a school’s fan websites. Anyone reading ours would not be impressed. I fully realize that a lot of this is common on fan websites but that doesn't mean we need to follow their lead!
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Just landed a 6’4” All-American MB from Indian Hills CC.
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40 minutes ago, sioux24/7 said:
I think they’re different style player. Johnson was getting more offers it appears. Amar I think filled a bigger need.
It is a little concerning that Amar hasn't received more attention/offers. With that size and his rebounding stats, you would think he would be receiving a lot of attention!
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16 minutes ago, SiouxFanSince1990 said:
Oh boy are you special.
I guess it may have come across that way - it certainly wasn't my intention!
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You may have seen that I wrote a bit of an epistle over on the FB thread. I will not do so here but many of the issues I stated about UND fundraising, the recruiting challenges and dumb banter between members goes for BB as well. I have done the Wiki for M & W BB and VB for the last few years. Hopefully, someone will take over these duties.
I made the comment over there that you can "go to the bank" with what iramurphy has to say. That goes for BB as well. You can also be assured that SD UND knows what he is talking about.
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You may have seen that I wrote a bit of an epistle over on the FB thread. I will not do so here but many of the issues I stated about UND fundraising, the recruiting challenges and dumb banter between members goes for BB as well. I have done the Wiki for M & W BB and VB for the last few years. Hopefully, someone will take over these duties.
I made the comment over there that you can "go to the bank" with what iramurphy has to say. That goes for BB as well. You can also be assured that SD UND knows what he is talking about.
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2024-2025 Season
in Men's Basketball
Posted
I understand that Mara is making progress and a full summer in GF should continue to help his development.
There are four scholarships available.