NDSU grad

There's no way you're making it to downtown Minneapolis in an hour unless you're traveling at 2 in the morning/ I've come through the cities about three times in the last month and the fastest I've made it through (I-35 "splitoff" to 494/94 intersection) is about 1 hour and 15 minutes. They've got to get the construction on 494 done. Now, back on topic, can St. Cloud's stadium be expanded easily. It seems like with the layout if they do have overflow there would be plenty of nice standing room.

Alot of Bison fans raised a stink about charging for the internet, but I didn't mind at all. It was horrible last year, buffering about every five minutes and reaching server capacity so you couldn't log on at all. I've only listened to the Valpo game this year but in three quarters of listening it buffered only once, so it seems like they actually did spend money in upgrading the server. I've never seen dataflix, but from reading the posts it sounds pretty worthless, is that correct?

Try telling somebody from Idaho that Idaho State is the flagship university in that state. I guess the SUNY's must be better schools than Cornell by the same reasoning.

I really don't think it was meant to be a comprehensive list of all public flagship universities. Oregon State, the University of Idaho, and the University of Utah were not on the list. They would have to be considered flagship universities (I would think) in their respective states.

Thanks for the wonderful insight . Massey's not a poll, it's a rating system, and I'm just curious as to how it's computed with any sort of precision.

What I've never understood is how people say they use statistics to figure out these ratings. How can you gain any precision in these ratings when the games aren't replicated? Perhaps I know just enough about statistics to ask really stupid questions, I don't know.

If UND said tomorrow they're moving up, they would have to give the NCC 18 months "notice", correct? I guess that means that next year could be the transition year, and 2006 would be the first year as DI?

At most places the school owns the coach's football show. This is actually pretty normal. I really don't know why this is a big deal

Let's say Montana is playing the SU's. They fly to Fargo, play a game, and stay overnight. The next day they bus to Brookings (I don't think the Big Sky plays games on consecutive days so they might have to stay in Brookings), and the day after they play SDSU. Bus to Sioux Falls and fly home. Now let's say they're playing Northern Arizona/Weber St. Fly to Phoenix, bus to Flagstaff, play a game, probably stay overnight in Flagstaff. The next day they fly to Salt Lake City (pretty far to drive), bus to Ogden, stay overnight. The next day they play, bus back to Salt Lake City and fly home. So really, a trip out "east" is in the long run probably easier (certainly not more difficult) than some of the current trips they already make. Also, traditionally NDSU (and probably most of the NCC schools) have had greater attendance figures for conference games than non-conference games. The same may be true of the Big Sky. It's just another thing to consider. The main point I'm trying to get across is there's alot more involved than just miles, and I'm sure these points are what our AD will stress when talking to Big Sky officials.

92, 96, I definitely think NDSU needs a new facility, no argument there. Sicatoka, you've finally figured out; geopgraphy as it relates to cost and travel time. I think you'll find costs and travel time would not be much different for the four schools involved. Especially since only the SU's offer a travel partner package.

The "conference average" rule went away on 08/01/04 when the new 15000 average went into effect. The rule in place now does allow use of a "neutral" field for one game a year by a school and calling it a home game for attendance counting purposes (ala Wyoming playing Tennessee in Nashville and counting it as a home game for attendance). PS - In 2003, Montana averaged over 19000. Everyone else in the BSC was under 10000. BSC #2 in attendance Montana State averaged 48 more fans per home game than North Dakota. (Data from the NCAA stats site.) We're talking a 50% increase in attendence for almost the whole league to be DI-A.

I don't really think we need a detailed analysis of the latitude and longitude of the four schools to know that NDSU and SDSU are farther away from the Big Sky schools than SUU and UNC. As Bisonguy stated, that is one of many criteria. I'm not saying the SU's are a lock for the Big Sky, but it does look brighter than just a few months ago.

I don't usually do this but I have to give that post a WTF. And just for good measure,

Those two examples pretty much make my theory bunk. But I guess you would have to try and estimate what those games would have drawn at Hyslop. Also, the "newness" of the REA is pretty much offset by the "newness" of the Betty. But in the long run, I think you're right. Have one arena you bball team can call home. Unless you're expecting a huge crowd (conference championship on the line or something like that) play all games in the Betty.

OK, I have to admit the love coming my way from you guys is more than a little freaky. I found the link to the MSU game at the REA from 2002. Beavers draw 7542 I don't know how I remembered that (actually I do, I think it was disbelief that you guys drew 7000 for the Beavers). I doubt that kind of attendance would be the norm for ooc games, but I say if the building's available play in it.

I checked your guys' volleyball schedule and basically the regular season is over on November 13th. I would speculate they want to play every game possible in the Ralph, thinking the arena itself would draw more fans. Didn't UND draw something like 7000 for a Minot State game in the Ralph a few years ago?

Minot State would sometimes fill the lower bowl of the Dome for big conference games in the late 80's. I would guess that would be close to 5000 people. I think they would do ok attendance-wise for bball, but having never attended a Beaver football game I can't comment on the football program.

In 2000 Delta State had extremely small linebackers. They ran a 3-4 and one of the inside linebackers was about 190, and they had an outside lb that was in the 165 range. But they also had a noseguard that was about 330. I think now their coaching staff is much different, so I they may look quite different. It should be a great matchup.

According to this Fargo Forum articleBrady Trenbreath is playing in the East West Shrine game. If so, that's great news. When the accident first occurred, I wondered if he would ever be completely healthy again, and now it looks like he's recovered enough to take contact. I wish him the best.

Corella, you are definitely the guru when it comes to college basketball. You need to post on Bisonville more often. It appears that a conference would not really be penalized for taking the SU's when it comes to RPI. Let's say the mid-con takes us and expands to 12 teams with a two divisions. That would be 16 DI games. I don't think it would be that hard to find 5 or 6 nonconference games to fill out the schedule, so IMO it is not really a risk for a conference to take a provisional team.

I actually thought it was pretty funny. Any idea how old that is?