jimdahl

I don't think the NCC will be the best conference this year with the loss of UNC and with UND and NDSU coming off down years. It's hard to call a conference likely to be won by SCSU the "best" (though it wouldn't bother me at all if SCSU proved me wrong and brought home a national championship). I do believe that the NCC is a bit deeper than some of the 1- or 2-contender conferences, despite that those conferences are more likely to bring home a championship than the NCC. In the future, it wouldn't surprise me at all to see Mankato or even SCSU drive deeper into the playoffs once they'll be more likely to qualify (loss of UNC & NDSU and playoff expansion). It's worth remembering that UNC and UND were non-factors on the national scene until NDSU got out of the way in the 90s.

As expected, the Star Tribune decided to drop it's ban on printing team names that it deems racially controversial. The new policy seems to more precisely meet the Strib's goal of disapproving of the names while still reporting the facts of the news. There's also a Fox editorial on the change (BTW Fox -- sloppy research, the town is named Grand Forks, plural).

Recent news stories about Beasley: 6/3 GF Herald Former UND standout Beasley hopes to make a good impression at this week's NBA pre-draft camp 6/8 Fargo Forum [url=http://www.in-forum.com/articles/index.cfm?id=34780]Beasley proves

Thanks for the update. While I wish enough NCC schools (including UND) had moved up to form a new all-sports conference, the transition will be a lot easier for NDSU without having to be a football independent. Reading between the lines, this seems to be a public admission that NDSU expects to be an independent or join a conference that doesn't sponsor football (my MidCo prediction keeps coming back to life). One interesting observation on the timetable-- to begin league play in 2004-05, SDSU would have to resign from the NCC before September, which means they have to secure a conference affiliation in the next few months.

The WCHA released its composite schedule yesterday. UND's mystery exhibition opponent is: Concordia Quebec (the Bison weren't available?) UND's mystery tournament participants are: Findlay, Brown, Wayne St (at least all count as NCAA games) SiouxSports now has the complete 2003 UND schedule and all opponents' schedules (available from the team links in the WCHA standings table on the main hockey page).

Way off topic... I've wondered for a while why Ticketmaster doesn't allow you to pick any open seat from their system (like the airlines' airplane seat maps). I guess their current transaction system works well for multiple simultaneous users (you request X seats of type 'C', it reserves them for 5 mins and returns their location to you). However, a system that let you pick seats could work by reserving the most similar remaining seats if you try to grab seats that have been taken since the screen had been rendered. It would be the standard 5-minute lock, allowing you to choose whether to accept those or try choosing again. The other stumbling block is the need for standard format electronic seating charts for all the venues, but Ticketmaster could demand that the venues supply those.

As an FYI, my understanding is that the "presale" is only for those who have been given a presale password by REA. Tickets go on sale to the general public on Saturday, June 07, 10:00am.

Man, I went to the Holocaust Museum once. Those jerks were REALLY a bunch of Nazis, I mean they had room after room full of Nazi memorabilia. Why were they so fascinated unless they had secret Nazi leanings? (For those with inferior educations, my point is that one can be a Nazi history buff without being a sympathizer, as the FBI concluded about Engelstad in the article linked above). Were Mr. Engelstad's parties a stupid embarrassment to himself? Yes, absolutely. They were also 15 years ago, apologized for, and long since forgotten by everyone who didn't have a personal interest in finding reasons to criticize UND.

Here it is

I don't think I've seen this posted here yet, the Herald finally has a story confirming that Jordan committed to UND. However, it then goes on to say:

Ticketmaster.com indicates that there is a presale from May 27, 10am - May 30, 10pm. It seems pretty odd to me, but that's what it says right now.

The pro-tenure crowd (80% of whom seem to be either tenured or tenure-track professors) actually argues that tenure improves scholastic honesty. Their assertion is that without tenure, proven professors may be cautious in their research for fear of sanctions or reprisal. Personally, I don't find that argument compelling and agree with Bad Eagle. Why shouldn't a university be able to censure a professor for poor performance or even say that a certain professor no longer represents the interests of the school? The free market would provide an incentive for schools to exercise that control judiciously, just as it does for private/public corporations. Just as companies' reputations dictate the quality of employees they can hire, a school that developed a reputation for excessive censorship/control of research would not be able to continue to attract good faculty. Of course, I'm the first to admit that I'm decidely more laissez-faire than most professional academics. The whole tenure issue got a lot of press at the University of Minnesota while I was pursuing a graduate degree there. They tried to tinker with it quite a bit in '97, and then made another attempt at gutting the system in 2000. So far I don't think they've made any substantial changes, but Minnesota is definitely just the kind of institution that would do such a thing and could get away with it.

Eligibility & the draft is talked about in the middle of this thread (I think that link will jump you to the correct post, if not, scroll to the evening of Apr 4).

One of my first posts ever in this forum includes the following prophetic quote: Despite my confusing use of the pronoun "they" twice with different antecedents, I still agree with the entire crowd on this one -- MidCo was and is the only conference I can think of that would be very likely to welcome a new arrival from D-II with open arms. I understand Star's concern about the waiting period and argument that NDSU would be at the top of the list only if full eligibility were closer. However, I'm not sure the conference is that paranoid about the danger of dropping below a core of 6 in the next few years (or is there something I don't know?) Here's a completely random new thought: might there be some concern from MidCo that NDSU is just using them for the transition and would then be interested in "graduating" to a more presitigious football-sponsoring conference? If so, would MidCo be more interested in a less attractive bottom-feeder who is more likely to be a long-term stable member? My guess is that NDSU could sell itself well enough to overcome any such concerns.

I've heard before that they've overall done very well, but the big name is definitely Ryan Suter. You may have noticed his name in the recent discussions of the NHL central scouting service's entry draft list -- he's #7 for N.A. skaters. I don't recognize any other names ahead of him on the list as being incoming NCAA players. The WCHA entries are in about the order I would've placed them, given my limited knowledge. The one that surprises me is Notre Dame. I knew nothing about them.

Talking about the possibility for improvement is interesting, because a player who somewhat underachieved would have a bit of an advantage. The defensive core was awesome last year, though on the shoulders of non-returning players. Therefore, a younger defenseman could improve his individual play quite a bit over next year. Parise seems likely because he did underachieve at the end, giving some room for improvement. However, since he demonstrated his talent early in the year, it's easy to see how he could improve. If UND tries to balance out the scoring across lines, someone like Massen, Lundbohm, or Schneider could be a beneficiary. The risky play, who stand a chance of being most improved, but also a fair chance of not playing much: Brandt.

Glenn, the stats demon, compiled, recalculated, and organized the season stats into a very dense, but interesting page. Some things that jump out at me: UND held its opponents to the fewest shots UND had the most shutouts UND had the worst SV% on opponents' shots UND did freaky-well when tied after 1 (how random) UND was 2nd in shots on goal (to MN) UND's special teams were average, while CC's led the league in both PP scoring and the kill Random non-UND fact: SCSU spent an insane 43% of its playing time tied with its opponent in conference play If someone tells you it was a 3-point game, assume Alaska lost

Alright. I apologize for assuming ill-intent -- I don't know what the actual intent was. I should have said that such a post will appear to many of us to be an attempt at trolling. If that appearance wasn't obvious before, it is now. Fortunately, someone who actually doesn't want to troll would want to avoid giving such an impression in the future; so, if the intent truly wasn't to troll, then we're all cool from here out.

Athletic Department, Student Government reach student seating agreement

Since they go solely by regular season seeding, why wait until the playoffs end to announce it? However, this page does indicate that you're right, in saying:

A Pioneer Press article covering the NHL playoffs noted: If Zach goes late first-round, as is often predicted, it could be a moderately successful playoff team that grabs his rights. Here's another chance for someone to teach me something new-- how do the Wild know they will have the #20 pick (as indicated earlier in this thread)? I thought 1st round picks below #15 weren't determined until the Stanley Cup Playoffs end?

A Gopher fan coming to a thread about UND's potential NHL draftees to post nothing but a list of Gopher players and a smiley face is most certainly an attempt at taunting/trolling, and it's really not welcome here. Back on topic -- anyone have any insights on why Beaverson wouldn't have opted in (or did his stock plummet so much that he fell of the list)? I thought that since he hadn't yet started playing in college that he could opt-in without losing NCAA eligibility, despite being 18. Or would opting in affect his USHL eligibility, since he does intend to return to the Gamblers next season?

Final NHL central scouting rankings are out (mid-term in parens for comparison): 9 (11) Zach Parise 51 (44) Matt Smaby * (98) Luke Beaverson 148 (153) Chris Porter 183 (176) Brady Murray * - hasn't yet opted in, so could replace one of the blank placeholders at #92, 95, or 107 Keep in mind that these are rankings for N.A. skaters, so actual draft position will be considerably lower when you add in Europeans and netminders.

Star2city pointed this out in the D-IAA forum, which I know a lot of people avoid. Today's GF Herald reported: I guess the thought is that UND will still be competitive until NDSU has had quite a few years to ramp up scholarships/build up the team. Good news for Sioux/Bison rivalry fans everywhere.

I agree that there has to be some sort of external stimulus or catalyst, but I think having a new President who hasn't yet confronted the issue is what allows it to get traction. I would argue that there are frequent catalysts, but that they now don't elicit as big a reaction because the current administration has already studied the issue and made its conclusions. Drop in a new administration, and the first name issue to arise becomes a big concern. As was pointed out when the homecoming incident took place, that sort of incident was not quite as isolated or unique as a lot of people liked to claim. I suspect under Clifford it would've led to some stern warnings and maybe some new policies on punishments for future such incidents; I think only because it was a new President, Baker, in office that it led to another study of whether the nickname was still suitable. Similarly, I don't think Strinden's release of the new logo (without having first run it by the President) coincidentally took place under a new President. In hindsight, the timing of that release had a lot do with REA, but I would argue there were definite back-room political considerations and close watching of Presidential opinion and power. Unrelated to the name, I hope Kupchella stays. From far away he seems to have done a great job of managing and smartly growing the school. If he leaves, I honestly hope you're right and I'm wrong, PCM, but I'm not completely convinced