NDSU grad

Does anyone south of Omaha care about college hockey?

Just some ramblings from a Bison fan. I think you can throw the size factor out the window. Everybody was talking about the enormous size differential between the Bison and Statesmen in 2000, and UNA's linebackers are enormous compared to Delta State's. I think one of Delta State's outside linebackers was 5'7" 165, and one of their inside backers was 5'9 190.

Didn't Hudspeth used to be at Delta State?

That was kind of odd. Maybe in their hearts they knew it would be their final game of the season and it was kind of their way of thanking him. At any rate, it seems that the players respect Bohl and the coaching staff, which I'm not sure was the case under the old regime.

Umm, I think that's what Bison1234 was trying to say, but I agree with you also. The inane SOS index that DII employs makes it downright stupid to play a DI-AA. I can complain about NDSU not making the playoffs, but we had our shot at blew it with losses to you guys and SCSU. Just think about Catawba, a loss to a top 5 DI-AA and a loss to the co-champ of the conference, and they're not in. And don't get me started about IUP; that's the biggest shaft job ever in the history of DII playoffs. At any rate, I don't see much benefit to either school in continuing the rivalry until the Sioux move to DI-AA.

Wow. I really don't like the Sioux, but this kind of sucks. No NCC school should ever lose to a DAC-10 school by that margin. Will Glas last the year?

Hockey may be more popular than I'm willing to admit, but it is not nearly as popular as college wrestling. I can't back this up with attendance numbers, but the media coverage around here is dominated with stories about Cael Sanderson etc. I guess it's possible hockey could gain that popularity if one of the universities added hockey, but I don't think that will ever happen IMO

Just as your previous post can't refute my statement. We'll just have to agree to disagree. I can't speak for the other regent universities, but the chances of ISU adding hockey are about as good as UND adding wrestling. They cut men's swimming and baseball two years ago, and just recently announced a cut of about $500,000 from the athletic department. Of course, when your athletic budget is about 28 million, that might not hurt so much.

There's so much interest that the Iowa High School Athletic Association doesn't sponsor it. But I guess I don't know anything since I actually live in Iowa.

ISU's club hockey is pretty good I think. I really don't know what their attendance is like though. There will be a blip about them in the student paper every once in a while though. Scott M. I really don't know what you're inferring to when you speak of myopia, but tell me why you think college hockey would be successful in Iowa. Based on the USHL attendance figures, I don't think 3000 fans/game would be a moneymaker for an athletic department after you figure the additional scholarships that would need to be added for womens sports.

I don't think hockey would be that popular in Iowa. Believe it or not, wrestling is king down here, and is a very close second to basketball as the most popular winter sport. The wrestling coaches at ISU and UI have alot of influence and I don't think hockey would get a second look.

You don't have to tell me about fans in Green Bay. My wife and I visited some friends in the upper peninsula of Michigan for Thanksgiving last year. On the way back home (Ames, IA) we ran into stand-still traffic about 45 miles north of Green Bay at 9:30 in the morning. Unbelievable. Also, NDSU did lose playoff games at Dacotah Field. We lost the last game played there to Pitt State in the 92 playoffs when Mark Hansen was stopped a foot short of the goal line on a two-point conversion that would have won it.

Thanks for your opinions. Do you know who's going to play the point for the Sioux this year.

This seems to be a lot more common with juco's. Whenever NDSU signs one, I don't get really excited until they've played about half the season. I'm not trying to flame here, but there seems to be alot of attrition on the UND basketball team lately. Does Glas kind of turn off some players or what. To be fair, I think NDSU's football team suffered very high player departures during the Babich era.

RD17, I think that was Bisonguy's point. It appears that the NCAA places more weight on strength of schedule than head-to-head based on what was going on with Winona and CSP. I totally agree with you on the point that the Bison are the highest rated two loss team in the region because of our wins against good DII competition and not the DI-AA games.

Actually, one of the guys who took the nickel is now a vet, I don't know what the other guy does. Ag is not a dying profession. There is always money to be made in the agricultural and food sciences industry, unfortunately it is not usually farmers who make the money. We're still the North Dakota State University of Agriculture and Applied Science, a name I'm very proud of. Back on topic, GO BISON.

Trying to get things back on topic a bit, I do think the Bison corners are probably the weak spot in the defense. However, it's my understanding that we rarely play man to man anymore, so deep coverage may be the responsibility of the safeties more than the corners. If we utilize zone blitzing schemes, we may be able to confuse Wilson/Bowenkamp. Of course, it's all speculation and we'll have to wait and see. I do think the Bison will be able to run on the Sioux (I capatalized it for you Jim), and I don't think the opposite is true, IMO.

Sic, Title IX takes alot more into account than scholarship equity. Equal practice opportunities, comparable facilities for men's and women's sports, etc. What I am saying is there are a lot of ways to "get around" Title IX. I also believe most universities are not in full compliance right now, but have shown the NCAA they are willing to take steps into assuring athletic opportunities for women. I don't think Title IX is as big a hurdle as some make it out to be.

Actually, SW Mo. St. is I-AA. You may have meant NW Mo. St. Anyway, I pretty much agree with the previous posts. NDSU has had decent home crowds when they've scheduled the likes of West Georgia, TAMUK, and most recently, UC-Davis. I don't know what the attendance was for the game vs. Crookston, but I think ticket sales would have to be better if top-notch competition is brought in.

UND92,96, I think you're partly right, UND would have a fine attendance if they brought in a quality DII opponent. But when is the last time, and I'm not trying to be mean here, that UND brought in a quality non-conference opponent. I really think they have to start re-thinking their scheduling, especially with a 7 team NCC.

Yeah I did miss the previous thread. Thanks for the link.

I'm surprised no one has posted anything on here about this yet, but did anybody see the piece on Sportscenter on Greg Lotysz. It was on the 5 p.m. SC on Friday. My wife lived on the same floor as his wife so even she was interested. I'm obviously no fan of UND, but that surely is a tragic story. I hope he takes the Jets for a lot of money.

Since Tony seems to be getting double-teamed here, I thought I would join the fray. I find it odd that Carr said a conference affiliation was needed before reclassification. Do you guys think that is possible? It's looking to me like no DI conference will offer membership to a DII school. You're probably going to throw UC-Davis invitation to the Big West in my face, but that looks like the exception rather than the rule. What do you guys think?