star2city

Finally, one men's addition to the DI lacrosse scene: University of Detroit The Detroit Mercy men's team will likely join the Great Western Lacrosse league, giving the conference these teams: Ohio State Notre Dame Bellarmine Detroit Denver Air Force Quinnipiac The schools adding lacrosse at the DII and DIII levels are becoming increasingly geographically diverse, including a number of schools from the west, deep south, and midwest: Arizona (Grand Canyon) Arkansas (Hendrix) California (Notre Dame da Namur, Dominican) Florida (Rollins) Indiana (Tri-State) Michigan (Adrian) Tennessee (Sewanee, Tn Wesleyan) The number of DII and DIII schools in the South, Midwest, and Far West adding lacrosse is expected to further accelerate, with a larger number of schools expected to announce within the next few years. Supposedly, St. John's in Minnesota has made tentative plans to add men's lacrosse and is waiting on another MIAC school commitment before announcing.

Floyd R. Turbo thoughtfully recalled Jimmy Carter being ferociously attacked by a killer rabbit. Secret backstabbing culprit? : NDSU president unaware 'rabbit control' involved shooting

With only 17 schools offering Petroleum Engineering (more offer Petroleum Eng options), and with the potential of the Bakken Formation, this is a needed upgrade at UND.

NY TImes: Indians Revive Tradition in Youth Lacrosse

UTPB may actually be the most prestigious school listed above. Originally intended to be UT-Odessa, the politicans at Odessa's upper crust twin rival oil-city Midland squawked and threatened to withdraw needed support. Permian Basin is a major oil basin that contributed to much of Texas' wealth and oil-base that both cities are in, so UTPB was an agreeable name. For several decades, UTPB only offered junior and senior level classes (Odessa JC and Midland College students often transferred there) and had no athletic program, so its name isn't widely known. With Odessa's and Midland's emphasis on HS sports, MoJo, and Friday Night Lights, UTPB athletics has a mountain to climb.

The Big Sky doesn't have baseball, and UND really would have a difficult time as a baseball DI independent. For Softball, Idaho State & UNC are indies, E Wash and Weber have club teams that may go varsity, while Portland State and Sac St are in the WCC, but would have to switch if six Big Sky schools offer softball. Softball may in a sense be a small asset to gaining BSC affiliation (and forcing Portland State and Sac St into the BSC for that sport). The Summit has both baseball and softball, but doubt Oral Roberts is especially thrilled with the idea of adding another northern baseball school. UND's chance of acceptance may actually increase without the sports.

LM Glasfiber Announces Blade Plant at Little Rock With this announcement, looks like GF's LM Glasfiber manufacturing employment has probably hit a peak. It would be great if LM Glasfiber started a technical center in GF.

Help: EERC director Groenewold may seek UND presidency Groenewold as UND president, from my understanding, would be an unmitigated disaster for athletics and the Sioux name.

Off the top of my head, here's a list of schools that are often mentioned as having IA football aspirations or publicly expressed those desires: UC-Davis Sac St Portland St Montana Texas-San Antonio (doesn't even have football yet) Kennesaw St (ditto) Appalachian St Ga Southern Texas St Massachusetts Delaware James Madison Old Dominion Illinois St Youngstown St To that list, add Jacksonville St (AL), who haven't really done much since they left DII: Bham News: Jacksonville State studies move to big time With Fullerton talking about the Big Sky moving to IA, and with some chatter that the Colonial (formerly A10) conference may go IA in the future, how much longer will IAA (FCS) be viable?

Lindsay Whalen?

Fayetteville (NW Arkansas) is much more culturally attune to Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri than it is to any SEC school, and it has an old rivalry with Texas that beats anything they have in the SEC. Arkansas really doesn't have a rivalry game in the SEC (LSU, Ole Miss, and Miss St at least don't consider them as such.) Texas already has attempted to get in the Pac-10 (and Big 10) and were declined, which what prompted the formation of the Big 12.

Depends on the circumstances: Summit- NDSU, Big Sky - UNC or Weber St The Big Sky had formerly paired Sac St with NAU, which is a much more signficant ordeal than getting to Grand Forks from Denver or Salt Lake. Now with the lone wolf travel plan, some teams will be going to single cities on Thursdays and then home for a Saturday game (or vice versa). Adding a tenth school would alleviate their scheduling issues and their travel costs would go down. The Summit League actually has UMKC and Souther Utah as travel partners, which demands three separate days of plane travel. The Summit League also has Oral Roberts and Centenary as travel partners, a 350 mile trip. Centenary wasn't added to be ORU's travel partner (ORU and UMKC are a more ideal pairing). Multi-city travel itineraries, if done well in advance and if they include a Saturday night stay, are often not that much more expensive than round trip, and are almost always cheaper than two round trips. You've been claiming all along that UND and USD are both destined for the Summit. But at the same time, you've been saying UND/USD are travel partners. Those two statements are contradictory.

So a western team's travel would be: Fly from Denver to Sioux Falls, bus to Vermillion, (60 miles) bus back to SF, bus to GF, (370 miles) either (a) fly to MSP, then Denver, or (b) bus down to Fargo (70 miles), fly to Denver or Fly from Denver to Sioux Falls bus to Vermillion bus to Sioux Falls fly to MSP, fly to GFK fly from GFK, to MSP to DEN and then final connection So you either log 500 miles on a bus in what could possibly be wintertime conditions, or add one extra connection, or add two extra connections. And you want to market this as a "perfect" package? Travel is never easy but the logistics here are not a strong point, even if GFK gets a DEN connection.

Denver Post: Divided, Big 12 bound to fall Sporting News Inside Dish: Big 12 power struggle? Dallas Morning News: Revenue sharing ongoing issue for Big 12 The money at stake is probably way more than the Big 12 North would walk away from, but the concept of a reborn Southwest Conference is theoretically possible. Arkansas has often been rumored to want in a conference with OU and Texas. Although highly unlikely, here's what a new SWC could look like: Texas Texas A&M Texas Tech Baylor Oklahoma Oklahoma St Arkansas Memphis TCU The Big 12 North could regroup with the following: Kansas K State Missouri Iowa St Nebraska Colorado Colo St Utah BYU N Mexico The domino effect of such a split would be massive.

Fresno Bee: WAC hits pinnacle after long journey

Seattle U. is full-speed ahead toward a revival of Division I status Seattle U's Challenges:

Another baseball team could be in jeopardy if they don't find a conference: UNC UNC Bears Baseball searches for home, have high hopes Greeley Tribune: UNC Baseball to Take Flight? Strong past can lead way for UNC in future on diamond

There's much less logic in "packaging" UND and USD together than there was with NDSU/SDSU because of different circumstances. If the Summit is interested in either or both, UND and USD would not be travel partners in that conference. The NDSU/SDSU travel arrangement would be broken to include UND and/or USD. If the Big Sky is interested in only one, obviously we wouldn't be travel partners. Adding one seems more likely than adding two, as the BSC would be best served with an even number of schools. Even if the BSC loses a member, a UND/USD combo doesn't help much because the BSC would then need a core DI member (SUU or Denver as examples). Even if we were a "package", GF and Vermillion are more than 350 miles apart, which isn't an easy sell.

After the repeat national championship success of Oregon State in baseball, Oregon Duck boosters apparently had enough. Oregon U adds baseball, and for Title IX purposes, adds competitive cheer, and drops wrestling. Oregon was the only PAC10 school without baseball. By Oregon dropping wrestling, the PAC10 will be down to three wrestling schools (Ariz St, Stanford, OSU), and by conference rules will no longer sponsor wrestling. Wrestling would now probably be sponsored by Mountain Pacific Sports Federation with these schools:

OCU didn't submit their application by the deadline. Next year may be possible. But because OCU will be moving up from NAIA, their transition if they decide to move ahead will be 7 years rather than 5 years.

GF Herald: UND Softball / Baseball Future

From a public relations standpoint, there are better ways to handle this that are win-win. It was a chance for Fargo to show hospitality to the teacher - that would have been truly mature. Instead, the Forum makes a big deal about it and gets in a shouting match with a third-rate teacher that no one concerns themselves with. Communities often have their own personalities, and as someone else stated to me Fargo's tends to be "cock-sure and agressive to a fault". Grand Forks' personality is more "self-doubting and conservative" by resisting change. Those personalities are consistent with how each community handled bad national press directed at them. I believe that some of Fargo's civic attitude also describes NDSU's personality, and GF's personality is reflected at UND. I merely used Bisonville's smack board as evidence of this behavior. I hardly think it was smacky in itself, but an observation. Obviously, you disagree this observation, and that is fine.

This editorial is a disgrace to North Dakota and especially Fargo. Could any newspaper be thinner skinned and insecure about it's community's standing than respond to some third-rate teacher? Forum Editorial: Fargo doing quite well, thank you

Back on topic: Bismarck Tribune: In summer it's coach Bollinger A camp like this can only help UND gain prospects. Nice work by both Bollingers.