star2city

Bismarck Tribune (Actually, it did have a 2% over run due to accounting code errors.)

The challenge is to sign a home and home with Montana State for 2011 and 2012.

Now, for the SBoHE, need a thirty-year statement of support, too.

Shreveport Times: Southland Update

Having lived among Crimson Tide fans and now among Volunteers (with a lot of Hokies around too), have to say the Volunteer fans are so much better and way less obnoxious. Auburn, Tennessee, and Ole Miss fans are the best SEC fans to hang around. On the other hand: LSU, Miss St, and Alabama.

Northwestern State seems to have been going through all kinds of adjustments and turmoil: a number of FBS transfers attempting to work themselves into the system, their QB lost a relative the day before, and several of their players had swine flu last week. They likely won't be the same team next week. Better to face them now, rather than later in the season.

Small private DI schools like Jacksonville, Mercer, Detroit, and Presbyterian all added lacrosse because it would add students (and tuition) to their bottom lines. Some of them didn't even add any scholarships, so DI lacrosse for them is like non-scholarship IAA football. For UND, scholarships wouldn't be that great of expense (11.7 / yr ), while travel and coaching would be. Since UND tuition is so much less than most of the private schools that offer lax (like Denver), it would make DI much more accessible for many prospective DI lax players in the west. Likely 30 or more athletes without scholarships could enroll just to have an opportunity to make the team. That said, before lax could ever be offered, UND has to be in an auto-bid all sports conference, a year-round training facility has to be available, and a longer-term conference home for football must be realized.

The irony is that "Red Raider" originally referenced Apache raids.

Agree the break is a very good thing, especially with no home game. However, can we really expect Landry to have a no turnover game again? The lack of skilled offensive players is also a concern.

Schwenzfeier - Three interceptions, Seven solo tackles against TTU

One player wasn't able to return with the team plane, according to one Texas Tech blog. Was that Konrath?

The Kibbie Dome is undergoing some renovations: lowering the field to add 3600 seats (to 20,000 capacity) and replacing the plywood ends with translucent fiberglass. K-Dome On a neutral field, Sagarin ratings prefer UND for the win. 160 North Dakota AA = 51.89 0 0 0.00( 0) 0 0 | 0 0 | 51.89 160 | 51.89 160 164 Idaho A = 50.77 0 0 0.00( 0) 0 0 | 0 0 | 50.77 164 | 50.77 164

In some ways how much the Fighting Sioux Club donates is more significant than season ticket sales (although the two go somewhat hand-in-hand). Fighting Sioux Club Record Year For comparison sakes, thought I read that SDSU has around 1500 football season ticket holders and their Jackrabbit club has under 1000 members and gave less than $1 M. Perhaps someone can update that. NDSU Teammakers numbers around 2000 and they give around $2 M. Guess their season ticket base is now above 9000, although five years ago is was like 4000. For men's basketball, NDSU sold around 1500 season tickets last year. It will be interesting how future likely-sellout games with Montana and potentially NDSU will affect a season ticket base. Sell-out games and assurance of obtaining decent single-game seats drive season tickets sales.

Wish I knew. Suspect until the nickname issue is "over", there won't be much progress.

Digger Anderson on UNO's Staff

The Unlikely Maverick: Bobby Stroup It was a more than youthful stupidity.

The schools that get talked about the most for MVC expansion don't have football: St. Louis, Butler, Oral Roberts, and even Memphis (if it's football became a Big East affiliate). Unless Creighton leaves the MoValley, UNO will not get in. USD and WIU have essentially no shot at a full MVC membership, as their home campus locations are too small and neither have a decent large basketball venue. SDSU may have a chance if it played a number of games at a new Sioux Falls arena. NDSU has no chance without a basketball venue. UND actually would have a chance if the REA was used, but that would be a long ways away. The interesting point is that the Summit Conference and the majority of its schools (with the exception of NDSU, SDSU, and WIU) would want it's member schools playing football under it's banner. When and if UND joins, that would make six football schools. The football question is another reason why UND's membership may be purposely delayed until SUU is closer to leaving.

Omaha World Herald: Trev's Big Vision for UNO

And there's also a lot of talk about the CAA football splitting again: which means a 12 team FCS conference isn't stable, which refutes your arguments.

NDSU barely obtained membership in the MVFC, while SDSU had little opposition. Same issues apply to UND vs USD. Many of the MVFC schools don't necessarily want the strongest programs or potential than they offer: they want a win. This isn't like getting in an BCS conference. Bascially, Vermillion is an easy bus ride to almost every school and USD's budget and facilities aren't a threat to other schools. This MVFC situation is very different from the Summit. When the Summit added USD, that move basically prevented UND from having any option to go to the Big Sky (no travel partner available). USD much preferred the Summit anyway to the BSC (travel in the BSC would have killed USD's already tight budget). By taking USD first, the Summit, which wanted both USD and UND and needed more schools anyway, could bascially call the shots in how it would accept UND. Right now, the MVFC has no need from more schools unless Mo St or Ill St go FBS. The MVFC also wants to preserve a slot in case Wichita State ever restarts football. Not saying UND to the MVFC won't ever happen, but the MVFC isn't even knocking on UND's door right now. The Summit is.

If UND was offered full membership to the WAC, that would obviously trump any other option. But full membership isn't going to happen to UND (or NDSU) anytime soon, if ever. Pretty simple short explanation: if Boise, Fresno (and La Tech and possibly NMSU) are gone, the WAC would need entry-level FBS schools with no questions asked, but could be much more geographically selective about all-sports members (without football). Longer explanation: If the WAC loses Boise and Fresno, the WAC would basically drop to a very low-level FBS league: lower than the current Sunbelt. Keeping the WAC viable would take a different plan than normal. The WAC would likely have to offer affiliate membership to Cal Poly and UC-Davis in football (Big West fits better for them for all-sports would be lower risk). Idaho is struggling now: the loss of it's Boise St rivalry would leave it as a northern outpost in a conference with no true rival. The WAC schools have to keep Idaho and Utah State healthy as FBS schools. What the WAC would really need is regional grouping of football schools to assure that attendance (and interest) stay high. If BOise State's gone, I think Montana's interest in the WAC would increase as Montana would be more than competitive with the remainder of the WAC (Montana has not desire to be the little dogs in a conference to Boise and Fresno: too much risk). Having division groupings like Nevada-San Jose-Davis-Sacramento-Poly plus another grouping like Idaho-Montana-Montana St-Utah St-UND would allow a number of rivalries and high visitor attendance for division games. An Idaho-UC-Davis football game would not do much for either fan base, but an Idaho-Montana or UC-Davis-Nevada game would be sell outs. The Sun Belt FBS league was basically an amalgamation of FBS schools that needed each other: N Mex St, La-Monroe, Troy, FIU, FAU were all affiliate members first before any of them became full members (NMSU later left for the WAC and could go back to the Sunbelt if the WAC loses prestige). Non-FBS core members like W Kentucky, New Orleans, South Alabama, and UA-LR kept the Sun Belt together as an all-sports until football became strong enough to be the main driver. If the WAC loses Boise St and Fresno St, it's football side could have to evolve similar to how lthe Sunbelt did. The WAC is more likely to need an FBS football program (UND football) than UND all-sports.

What's interesting about the Montana - UND series is that Montana has now scheduled home-home series with three Great West teams (UC-Davis, Cal Poly, UND) that should give Montana more of a game than most of their Big Sky opponents. Montana could have continued scheduling Western State or Dixie State and still sold out their stadiums. Instead Montana seems to want to chose to be somewhat benevolent to and strengthen western schools that may have FBS potential if Montana ever leaves the Big Sky. If the WAC ends up losing Boise State (likely) and Fresno State (possible) to the MWC, the WAC will almost need to reinvent itself as a FBS conference (adding non-football core members and affiliate football members). UND to the Big Sky is no longer possible, but affiliate membership in a WAC football league (Summit in other sports) might be: A WAC Pacific (football only) division of Nevada - full member UC Davis (stays in Big West ) Sac St - full member Cal Poly (Stays in Big West) Hawaii - full member San Jose St - full member A WAC Mountain (football only) division of Idaho - full member Utah St - full member N Mex S - full member Montana - full member Montana St - full member (someone else - few other options - UND, as affiliate?) I have serious doubts about UND getting into the MVFC (USD likely has a much better shot, which would make 10 members). FBS membership might have to be considered at some point in order to firm up a football affiliation.

UND officially on Lamar's 2010 schedule

The WAC commissioner has been stating that they won't expand: but if adding Boise St gets the MWC closer to a BCS bid, it will happen. Some sports columnists say next summer an announce will be made, and Boise St gone will begin a two year transition to the MWC. Fresno St and Houston are also considered targets if the MWC goes to 12. The WAC officially denies anything like that will happen, but their likely just projecting a confident public mode when their actually almost panis-strickened: WAC has no interest in a 10th team. It's possible the WAC could lose three teams (Boise, Fresno, LaTech). Keep in mind that an FBS league must have eight members, but those members can be football-only members. FAU, FIU, Utah State, Idaho, and La-Monroe were all football-only members of the Sunbelt for a time. Rutgers, WVU, Virginia Tech were once football-only members of the Big East. CUSA had Army. The WAC can add football-only and all-sports members (like a Denver) separately. Cal Poly and UCDavis would likely never accept a Big Sky offer: their sports offerings are too different. The WAC has always been their goal: and their attendance would likely increase substantially if they played more local schools and were at the FBS level. FAU and FIU didn't have 15,000 seat stadiums when they moved up: Poly and Davis would have time too.

Give $100 Mill to KU and have a Med School named in your honor Interesting: