jimdahl

I've searched for a minimum but been unable to find it. Unfortunately, not finding a reference proves nothing. Bemidji would really surprise me. Though they have a hockey team like most teams in the NCC, the NCC doesn't even sponsor hockey. The NCC is all about football and basketball. Bemidji is a horrible fit with the other NCC members in those sports. That's been my argument -- the difficulty is finding someone who we want AND who has a reason to want to move. However, the NCC is still arguably one of the top D-II conferences with UND, Mankato, UNO, USD, SCSU all being pretty competitive in a lot of sports (all were top 50 in the Sears Cup last year). UMD seems to continue that tradition with their recent football success. This is a bold prediction that just demonstrates that you haven't been paying attention. At UND, hockey is a profitable program. Our D-I hockey program provides a profit to the athletic department that makes it easier for UND to fund the non-revenue sports. I would actually guess that the effect of dramatic scholarship reductions would be to break the camel's back and forced UND to reconsider moving up. I guess time will tell which of us is right.

I know it was mentioned leading into the game, but just thought I'd point it out for those who missed it. Last season UND finished 16-19-2. So far this season they're 16-1-1.

This thread is about SCSU. SCSU doesn't even have one D1 national hockey championship. Regardless, I fail to see the relationship between SCSU's lack of athletic success and the problems with racism and anti-semitism that pervade their campus. Yes, we do see a certain irony in the institution that's the loudest critic of UND's nickname being continuously in the news and under Federal investigation for institutional racism. Don't feel leftout, I'm sure sometime soon SDSU will have some problem with racism on their campus and jump on the nickname-protesting distraction-from-their-own-problems bandwagon like NDSU.

Many of us don't actually get to go to the games, you know. We demand a picture of the wookie.

The AD's certainly know each other because we schedule them in hockey regularly. I was wondering about Morningside myself, but wasn't sure enough to speak up. No worries, though, the NCAA will take care of this problem for us by reducing the permitted scholarships in D-II so every conference can be as good as the NCC. Sigh.

Yeah, they must not have had Subway lined up as a sponsor yet when that was entered. Not coincidentally, that's the same language USCHO uses. Clearly "Subway Holiday Classic" is the newer, preferred term.

Pretty weak attempt at distraction, yourself, SDSU. But sadly for your point, Tony is not a UND fan. He, like JBB, is actually a friendly Bison fan (and even runs a nice web site devoted to it). Speaking of distractors, what's up with the dig at a community for having been hit by a flood? I hope your community is never ravaged by a natural disaster. Those are the sort of immature digs that destroy your credibility here and prove that your real motivation is just to put down UND.

Well, his stats were taken from hockeydb. To duplicate his format, you'd just need to look up the pid for each player that you want to track and create the links right into the hockeydb site (like the following, which leads to Eddie): http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/pdispla...ay.php3?pid=295 If you want to see ALL UND alums (not just those currently playing) you can go right to the UND alum page in hockeydb: http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/alumni.php3?tid=582 (with stats inline) or http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/ttotdis...ay.php3?tid=582 (links to stats)

MN's favorite columnist, Virg Foss, reports: http://www.grandforks.com/mld/grandforkshe...rts/4729310.htm At first glance it is an interesting statistical anomoly. When you look at the conference standings UND has 36 GF and 30 GA, a surprisingly low differential for an 8-1-1 team (UMD also has 36 GF and 30 GA but is 5-4-3). However, a more thorough check reveals that only one school in the WCHA has better than a +6 goal differential, runaway leader Colorado College. Yes, you've figured out the punchline-- Minnesota has only a +6 goal differential with 34 GF and 28 GA. It's true, the season isn't over yet and Minnesota and ND have played vastly different portions of their conference schedules. However, it's still pretty funny to see MN fans crowing about goal differential.

After UMD it becomes a lot less obvious. Nebraska-Kearney is often mentioned because of their geographic fit, natural rivalry with UNO, and they already often schedule competitions against NCC teams. However, it's been speculated that the Lopers don't have the money or inclination to leave their current conference. There are some other appealing schools in the RMAC, but the same situations probably apply. That's going to be the toughest part -- finding a school that fits that also has a reason to want to move.

So the Sac Bee this morning reports: http://www.sacbee.com/content/sports/story...p-6549931c.html I also remember a previous article in which he articulated his family's excitement over the prospect of the move. Really makes it seem like his big concern was the instability of the institution (particularly not knowing if the new president would be supportive of the move to improve athletics). The Fargo Forum also had an article which indicated that Lennon said "the timing wasn't right" (hmmmm.... very interesting) and that he was concerned with the lack of previous success at Sac State (he didn't want to literally build a program from the ground up). Keep bringing home the titles and the opportunities will only improve, I say.

Apparently surprise is a relative term based on each individual's expectations of the future. I don't know anyone (outside of you, apparently) who honestly expected the Board of Regents to intervene in SDSU's decision. They took a firm position of saying that SDSU was solely responsible for any negative fallout from any negative impact of their decision, but allowed them to make their own decision. A wonderful decision that I never had any doubt they'd make -- let the school move up, but don't foot the bill if something goes wrong. You honestly thought they would forbid SDSU from moving up?

As expected, the SD Higher Ed Board of Regents has decided to allow SDSU to move if it can first secure a conference affiliation. The Regents President expressed skepticism about the proponents' arguments, but said he won't stand in the way of SDSU taking care of itself (but stressed that SDSU is responsible for self-funding the move via athletics revenues only): * The regents dictated that the schools will not get additional funding from student general activity fees or state taxes to support such a move * They cannot cut academic scholarships to fund athletic scholarships * Any deficit in the athletics budget must be dealt with by cutting athletic programs, scholarships or coaches' salaries No surprises in this step (most people thought there was very little chance of the Board of Regents rejecting SDSU's own decision, an extra hurdle that ND schools don't face). SDSU won't actually submit an application and move unless they first secure a conference affiliation (the biggest hurdle that NDSU bypassed). Nothing here to really tip UND's hand yet, as nothing's really changed. If SDSU finds a conference and then moves, it will be interesting to see if 3 teams leaving the NCC is enough to force a response from UND. http://www.aberdeennews.com/mld/aberdeenne...ews/4724889.htm

At any level below NFL head coach, a highly successful coach will always have the opportunity to move up to the next level. I'm tremendously happy to have had a coach who brought home a national championship, conference championships in half his years coaching, and now has the opportunity to move up. I wish him well, whatever his ambitions! (I can understand how NDSU fans who are considering buying out their coach to make him leave have a bit more sour attitude, though).

This makes it sound like the deal is almost signed: http://www.sacbee.com/content/sports/story...p-6526339c.html

Odds are they were responding to the same events of the previous night that caused this thread to start. However, it's generally good advice to bear in mind when posting that this is a public forum that is visited not only by fans but by much of the UND community including athletic staff, other media, players' families, etc... For every person who posts there are nine who are just reading.

I've used my 3-year-old Sprint PCS phone to look at scores on Yahoo! Sports. I presume if you have an HDML or WML browser in your phone that you could do the same.

The vast majority of readers are passive participants. To vote in polls requires you to have a message board login, be logged in, and choose to participate in the short window that the message is active. 50 is about the number I would expect.

Engelstad: A champion for the common man Ed Koch, Las Vegas Sun

Are you thinking of Wallinheimo? He was good enough that he didn't care what we thought. He'd always put on a little show (especially at opposing rinks) skating around and shooting at the crowd with his stick, etc... I think he was around 92-95 or something like that.

It's this very "rule" that I'm calling a rumor. It's hard to prove a negative, so I can't prove the rule doesn't exist. I've yet to see ANYONE in about 4 years of USCHO discussions prove that the rule does exist, though. Once someone does, I'll then accept it as truth. In the meantime, I can't imagine why 6 Big Ten schools would want to form their own conference (as already stated, the current 5 cannot). Clearly if there were enough Big Ten schools playing hockey, they would want to form their own conference. However, that won't be a concern for a long, long time. I just couldn't let this one slide by. The reason Notre Dame is not in the Big Ten is simply because Notre Dame says no every time the Big Ten comes begging (every couple years for as long as I've been following Big Ten football). I've actually heard the proposition that it would be easier to create a Big Ten hockey conference filled out by D-II or D-IAA institutions than to invite D-I institutions who are members of other D-I conferences for other sports. Wishful thinking by D-IAA/D-II institutions, most likely. I would expect the most likely situation to be that the Big Ten would just form it's 7-8 member conference when the time came and have a hefty non-conference schedule of traditional rivals (UND, etc...)

The biggest rumor is that if a 6th Big Ten team starts D-I hockey that they will obligated to make a Big Ten conference. That's what usually starts up this discussion, when people speculate that if Penn State starts up hockey, the Big Ten schools will have to abandon their traditional conferences. Fortunately, it's not true. Though you can't form an auto-bid eligible conference with fewer than 6 teams, the Big Ten has no bylaws about its members having to play together in all sports (the usual rumor). It's certainly entirely speculative with only 5 Big Ten schools fielding D-I hockey teams. It won't even become a possibility until there's a sixth, and even then it would seem kind of silly.

As Sauer said in his INCH column when asked his favorite arena: So far we haven't given opponents much reason to fear the new REA. Give it time...

Though computer rankings have flaws of their own, looking at the RPI tells an interesting story: http://slack.net/~whelan/tbrw/2003/rpi.shtml UND is #7. Despite having the #1 record overall, our strength of schedule is #39. There's been enough interleague and league play such that RPI is becoming relevant this time of year. (BTW -- we're also #7 in PWR). One could make the argument that UND has done all they possibly could, given that they've had an easy schedule. What more could you ask of a team than putting together the best record in the NCAA? I guess my answer is that we could have been more convincing against mid-tier SCSU and Mankato. It's all academic at this point, as the Sioux will play more difficult opponents soon and get a chance to prove were they belong.

The thing that bothers me about Wisconsin is that you can be up on them 5-0 in the third, they'll get a goal, and the Kohl Center will go crazy with the sieve chant. They even sieve the empty net. The M-I-N-N-E-S-O-T-A is definitely annoying, but I think only because I'm the opponent. I had season football tickets to the gophers a couple years when I was a student there, and it's quite a different feeling to be on that side of 40,000 people chanting the same thing in unison. Gotta admit, UND has nothing similar. It's sort of the same feeling I get when Wisconsin breaks into "varsity" or when that old Wisconsin guy leads the crowd in big cheers -- angry, but probably somewhat respectful because we have no such traditions (no, the chicken dance and beer song don't count).