RD17

I already posted this on another message board, but these are my thoughts: After talking to a couple of NCC athletic directors last week and getting a chance to digest everything since UND's announcement, this is what I now think is going to happen: USD will do their D-I study and I think they will make every attempt to convince themselves that D-I is doable. Ultimately, USD will go ahead and make the move. That leaves the other five NCC schools and I believe that all of them would prefer to stay D-II and in the NCC (even UNO). So I think what will happen is that those five schools will present themselves as a unified front and get very aggressive with expansion, probably officially inviting four or five schools at once (all from the NSIC with the possible exception of Kearney). If the NCC is successful in expanding, then the NSIC will simply fill itself back up with schools like Minot State, U of Sioux Falls, Jamestown College, Black Hills State, etc. and life will go on with the same two conferences. If the NCC's attempts to expand fail, then I think UNO will go to the MIAA and St. Cloud and Mankato will go D-I. UMD and Augie will probably also look at D-I, but ultimately I think both would have to attempt to join the NSIC, making for one northern plains D-II superconference.

OK... give me an example of something Kupchella could possibly know that would necessitate a one year delay in the process.

If Kupchella is going to come out today and say "we're going Division I", then it makes no sense to delay because apparently the university is moving regardless of what is discovered in the "exploratory exploratory" year! And if you're going to try to tell me that the UND leadership is working with some super secret information that led to this decision to wait a year, I'm not buying it. Like IowaBison said, all this is doing is extending the transition phase by an extra year.

Absolutely, 100% right on the money. It is complete and utter lunacy at this point to officially announce a move to D-I and then not really do it for another year. I guess it's par for the course with the leadership that is at this university right now.

As The Sicatoka pointed out, people have been studying this issue internally at UND ever since the other schools left the NCC. If they don't have a firm grasp by now on what the associated D-I costs might be and how to proceed from here, then they shouldn't have their jobs anymore. Plus, an exploratory year was specifically designed for the purposes of financial planning, etc. Point two: Even though the by-laws were changed to an 18 month withdrawal from the NCC, there is no penalty for not complying. Like I mentioned earlier, two NCC AD's have told me recently that UND would be crazy to wait any longer so I don't think anyone is going to harbor any ill will if UND withdraws this summer. It still gives the rest of the league plenty of time to get the 07-08 schedules set. Point three: UND needs to do what is best for UND at this point. Plus, what's best for the NCC is to not have UND hanging around in limbo for another year. The other schools in the conference want a firm decision one way or the other and they want it ASAP. Point four: Every school in the NCC is going to need to study its own situation and I highly doubt that everyone will be ready to make a decision by next June 1 (if UND were to hold off a year). And I think everyone realizes that a D-I NCC is not a viable long-term conference solution anyway. Point five: It should be pretty apparent with what NDSU and SDSU have gone through, finding a conference will be almost impossible as long as an official commitment has not been made. Waiting another year does no good from a conference standpoint. Point six: Nothing hurts recruiting more than indecision. Going through another year of waffling all but insures that if UND goes D-I, it will do so with less talent on the rosters and probably struggle more than necessary in some sports. It is time for Kupchella to make a firm decision one way or the other. To me, the hand wringing on this subject has gone past the point of being annoying and has entered the realm of being harmful to the athletic program. Kupchella has shown that he has it in him to step up and be a forceful leader with the nickname issue and now he needs to do it with the athletic department.

If true, this is insanely stupid... that is precisely what the "official" exploratory year is for. I have talked to two NCC athletic directors in the last week and both of them have told me that the biggest mistake UND could make is to say "we're going D-I, but not for another year or two" because another year of waffling around a) hurts recruiting and b) makes finding a conference nearly impossible. Also, if this was the plan all along, why worry about getting the deadline pushed back to July 1st? Makes no sense to me.

A D-I NCC is not feasible over the long-term because an entirely new conference must wait 13 years before being eligible for an auto-bid to the basketball tourney. I could see a D-I NCC working in the short term (during everyone's transition) for scheduling convenience but it would eventually be doomed to failure as the schools got close to being postseason eligible. Everyone would be looking to leave the NCC at that point to get into a league that offers an auto-bid.

One of the schools was Winona State but I'm not sure who the other school was (I'm guessing someone in the NSIC). I have also been told that if UND for some reason decides against D-I and commits long term to the NCC, Winona will still be joining the conference. Of course all of this will be a moot point sometime in the next 10 days when UND announces that it is going D-I.

The economics of D-I below the level of the BCS schools are not good. Pick any mid-major school out of that link that The Sicatoka provided and look at their financials. The amount of student fees and institutional support going to athletics at most of those places is staggering. The NCAA also released a study about a year ago showing the negative financial impact of reclassifying to D-I. But, apparently the ancillary benefits of being D-I far outweigh the increased costs for most of these schools (including UND). Short of D-I placing another moratorium on membership, I don't think the exodus from D-II to D-I is going to stop anytime soon.

Northern Michigan and Michigan Tech have already turned the NCC down, the reason being that the schools didn't want to cut ties with lower Michigan. I also understand that the NCC has contacted schools as far away as the Milwaukee area (Wisconsin-Parkside) about membership. If the NCC does ultimately fall apart, the timing of UND's classification study will have played a major role. I believe the NCC was very close to getting a couple of schools to join late last fall, but they quickly backed off when UND announced the study. If UND had waited a few months it's quite likely that a couple of new schools would have joined the NCC making UND's departure far less damaging.

There are some good thoughts thrown out there in this thread and I just have two things to add: 1. I think people are overestimating the affect divisional affiliation has on enrollment... as long as the academic programs at UND continue to be outstanding people are going to come to school here regardless of Division I or II. I also don't see this as a zero sum game between UND and NDSU for students... there are a lot of reasons (declining enrollment in the local high schools, weather, etc) why both schools should be struggling to maintain their numbers but both are clearly growing and prospering. As I understand it, UND was expecting a pullback of 500 to 700 in total enrollment due to the new academic standards this year and yet the headcount remained steady... this certainly bodes well for the future. 2. The entrance standards for athletes are more stringent in Division I than Division II and UND's requirements are much more in line with D-I. If UND stays D-II many of the other schools they are competing against are recruiting from an entirely different pool of athletes... in fact this is even happening to some extent now within the NCC. I think if this point were being raised with the faculty, they may be much more receptive about switching divisions.

Yes, McFeely's email address is listed at the end of his column but it didn't occur to me before to contact him directly. I think I will send him an email asking him to explain his contradictory statements and see if I get a response.

Contrarian is an excellent word to describe McFeely. But I can think of an even more descriptive term in this instance: hypocrite. From McFeely's 1/18/2002 column Division I is NDSU's green light: So, in 2002 McFeely was obviously convinced that Division II and the NCC were the places to be for NDSU. But now in hindsight he's criticizing UND for not tagging along? Whatever. I think next time the "particularly prescient sports columnist" needs to dig a little farther into his own archives unless he enjoys looking like a fool.

I'm not exactly sure what they do at the Metrodome either but I did find an article about that system being in place at Toronto's Skydome: Sounds like a lot more work than just basically rolling up the old stuff, but I think it certainly would be worth the investment, especially if UND is playing more than just football in there in the future (lacrosse ).

After reading some of the posts in this thread and noticing the TV coverage and attendance of the NCAA lacrosse championships last week, I am now also convinced that it would be a wise choice to add the sport at UND. I think the most important thing with any emerging sport is to get in on the ground floor regionally. UND's experience with being a few years late on adding women's hockey and the struggles since should be evidence that if we're going to add lacrosse, let's do it sooner rather than later.

You still have no clue. The report was never designed to be a Division I study. Here are a couple of exerpts from an email conversation I had with UND's faculty athletic rep. (and former interim AD) in March. This should help clear up what the report was all about and also show that people in the administration have an idea of what is going on: As far as the deficit goes, who knows? It could be that the school decided to cut back on institutional support for athletics this year, thus creating a larger deficit. (It was in the report that UND doesn't use nearly as much money from the general fund to subsidize athletics as other DII/IAA schools). That is something that would likely have to change in a move to D-I (thus mitigating any deficit problem). It could also be that the debt service on the Betty is figured into the overall athletic budget and that issue would likely be resolved with some facilities fund raising (which is going to happen regardless of division). Without being able to see the specifics, I don't think any of us are in a position to say exactly what is going on. I'm not one of those people that believe everyone at UND is infallible, in fact I have some major reservations about how the new AD has handled some issues that have come up so far (like the hiring of the new basketball coach). But I do know this: I would much rather take my chances on Buning leading my school through the transition than a guy that is tipping the bottle every night and then taking it out on his wife.

I would agree... there is no way Buning comes out and says the things he did yesterday without the approval of Kupchella. I believe Buning's comments are a "greasing of the skids" so that when the time comes Kupchella can just make a quick formal announcement and wash his hands of a situation he really has no desire to be a part of.

As usual, you have no clue what you're talking about. The $1 million figure in the report is merely the difference between UND's current budget and an average I-AA budget. The charge of the study group was not to come up with a detailed financial plan but to make some comparisons to help weigh the pros and cons. Tom Buning has told several people off the record that it will take a budget increase of $2.5 to $3 million per year to maintain a competitive D-I athletics program so I think the people running the show at UND have a better grasp on things than you would like to believe. And please, go back and reread Woden's post... maybe you will finally get how the whole situation with the REA complicates (and indirectly increases) UND's overall athletic budget.

Most schools don't even have search committees when looking for coaches... it's all on the AD to review the applications, do the interviews, and make the hire. The bottom line is that it is ultimately the AD's responsibility for the success or failure of the individual athletic teams so he'd better have more say in the hiring process than just picking from a list of three finalists.

I also agree with tony. It's funny how Steve Hallstrom's blog about Fullerton saying that the BSC is interested in three schools in the Dakotas is blown off but Fullerton's latest talk is taken as Gospel truth. Whatever fits your agenda I guess. Oh and the latest D2 school to be accepted into a D1 conference (just on Monday)... the University of South Carolina- Upstate. So they now join Kennesaw State, Central Arkansas, Florida Gulf Coast, North Florida, and Presbyterian as D2 schools that have recently found a conference before entering the provisional process.

Regardless of what you think of the job Buning is doing, he most certainly should be involved in the search for a new basketball coach-- hiring coaches is right at the top of the list of an AD's responsibilities.

From ESPN.com on Illinois: Illinois trustees to work with NCAA on mascot

Not to belabor the point but this just doesn't make sense... on October 22 last year SDSU drew 14,500 on a 41 degree day to see a crappy D2 team (Missouri-Rolla). On October 29 SDSU drew 4,100 fans on a 62 degree day to see the most storied program in I-AA history (Georgia Southern). I realize the Rolla game was Hobo Days but that is a ridiculous discrepancy, especially considering the weather conditions. Now back to the original topic of the thread.