Hammersmith

It was a joke. The Gophs have had problems with schools with Dakota in their name. North and South have been spoken for, that leaves East and West. Kinda like the Dakota Fanning jokes that have been circulating. Don't read too much into it. edit: beaten to the punch again

Just wondering because I wanted to know if I could surf between the two. Cableone doesn't put UND games on the popup scheduling guide, and I always forget which channel they put FSSN on. No disrespect meant.

This isn't on TV locally(Fargo), is it?

Next Thursday could be epic. Get there early if you want a seat. We had just over a thousand show up tonight for SUU. Tomorrow night might be the first game under a thousand in about a year due to the UNI FB game being ot TV at the same time. The NDSU/UND game will most likely set a BBF record. The place actually seats a little under 1300, but we've packed 1800 in there in the past. And wear light clothing. It was pretty toasty in there tonight with only a thou, I can't image what Thursday will be like if it's a nice day.

Hey, we're making way more fun of this idea than siouxsports is. In fact, you guys are disappointing me. This is such a horribly bad idea that we should be seeing some epic mocking of it from you guys. I know you've got it in you. Let loose and have some fun with it.

Here are the other two: FCS Coaches' Poll 1. Montana (16) 1-0 662 2 2. Southern Illinois 1-0 598 5 3. Appalachian State (1) 1-0 585 3 4. Villanova (8) 0-1 579 1 5. New Hampshire 1-0 518 9 6. Jacksonville State (2) 1-0 516 17 7. Richmond 0-1 478 6 8. Elon 0-1 443 7 9. South Dakota State 0-0 426 10 10. McNeese State 1-0 378 11 11. James Madison 1-0 357 15 12. Stephen F. Austin 0-1 353 8 13. Northern Iowa 0-0 336 13 14. William & Mary 0-1 285 4 15. Eastern Washington 0-1 273 14 16. South Carolina State 0-1 264 12 17. Delaware 1-0 234 19 18. Liberty 1-0 216 20 19. Weber State 0-1 184 18 20. Massachusetts 1-0 163 NR 21. North Dakota State 1-0 138 NR 22. Eastern Illinois 0-1 134 16 23. Montana State 1-0 115 24 24. Northern Arizona 1-0 107 23 25. Colgate 1-0 81 22 Others receiving votes (points in parentheses): Prairie View A&M (79), Holy Cross (67), Cal-Poly (47), Illinois State (28), Penn (23), Missouri State (17), Georgia Southern (12), Harvard (11), Albany (9), Furman (9), Texas State (8), Arkansas-Pine Bluff (6), Bethune-Cookman (5), Southern Utah (5), Tennessee State (5), Southeastern Louisiana (4), Alabama State (3), Florida A&M (3), Gardner-Webb (3), Austin Peay (2), Dayton (2), Bucknell (1), Butler (1), UC Davis (1), Youngstown State (1) The Sports Network Media Poll 1. Montana Grizzlies (57) 1-0 3,052 2 2. Villanova Wildcats (46) 0-1 2,886 1 3. Appalachian State Mountaineers (8) 1-0 2,774 3 4. Southern Illinois Salukis (3) 1-0 2,716 5 5. Jacksonville State Gamecocks (9) 1-0 2,337 17 6. New Hampshire Wildcats (2) 1-0 2,202 10 7. Richmond Spiders 0-1 2,093 6 8. Elon Phoenix 0-1 2,080 7 9. South Dakota State Jackrabbits 0-0 1,926 9 10. Stephen F. Austin Lumberjacks 0-1 1,729 8 11. William & Mary Tribe (1) 0-1 1,691 4 12. James Madison Dukes 1-0 1,585 15 13. McNeese State Cowboys 1-0 1,531 12 14. Northern Iowa Panthers 0-0 1,298 14 15. South Carolina State Bulldogs 0-1 1,275 11 16. Delaware Blue Hens 1-0 1,249 16 17. Eastern Washington Eagles 0-1 1,144 13 18. Massachusetts Minutemen 1-0 955 NR 19. Liberty Flames 1-0 771 21 20. Weber State Wildcats 0-1 686 19 21. North Dakota State Bison 1-0 635 NR 22. Prairie View A&M Panthers 1-0 631 20 23. Eastern Illinois Panthers 0-1 606 18 24. Montana State Bobcats 1-0 566 24 25. Colgate Raiders 1-0 447 22 Others receiving votes: Holy Cross 439, Penn 358, Northern Arizona 184, Illinois State 158, Chattanooga 130, Cal Poly 106, Wofford 100, Furman 98, Missouri State 60, Harvard 56, Florida A&M 55, Southeastern Louisiana 55, Georgia Southern 54, Jackson State 37, Lehigh 22, Lafayette 21, Texas State 16, Hampton 14, Albany 14, Western Illinois 13, Samford 13, South Dakota 11, Stony Brook 8, Central Arkansas 8, Jacksonville 8, Southern Utah 7, Norfolk State 7, UC Davis 5, Eastern Kentucky 5, Butler 4, Dayton 4, Indiana State 3, Lamar 3, Youngstown State 3, Monmouth 2, The Citadel 2, Brown 2.

Looks like we just did that with UW-M. Bison defeated them this afternoon 3-2. (25-17, 23-25, 18-25, 25-19, 15-7)

Did we just hit Godwin's Law or not? j/k Yeah, I was just having a little fun. Star and a couple others have made a game of blaming GT for not scheduling you guys(and global warming, WWI&II, the Great Depression & world hunger). Then he says it was Chapman who blocked the games. The two statements are kinda mutually exclusive. If the latter were true, then it doesn't matter what GT said, did, or felt, since he didn't have the power to make the decision. One of my pet peeves is people blaming others for decisions or events outside their control. This is a perfect example of one of those cases. Nine times out of ten I just shake my head and move on; this just happened to be the tenth time. Carry on. Or not. If this really was an example of Godwin's Law, then we are supposed to lock the thread.

No it wasn't. Within weeks of Kelley taking over, the ice had begun to thaw and the "no-UND" edict was reversed. The coaches from both sides started talking during the one year overlap between Chapman & Kelley. The ball was in motion long before Hanson or Dr. B took over. Quite frankly, you can't have it both ways. Either Taylor or Chapman has to be the bad guy. If there was an edict from Chapman about not playing UND(and there was), then you can't blame Taylor for not scheduling UND and having to come up with excuses. If Taylor was the evil one, then you can't blame Chapman for this. Pick one, but don't blame it all on Taylor in one thread and Chapman in another. Next thing you know you'll be dividing by zero and dooming the world.

Never rely on Forum Communications for correct facts. The article in the Forum was corrected once already(and it's only 4 sentences long), and the Herald article is still incorrect. The 12% increase is in international students, not grad students. The number of undergrads increased by 305, and grad students decreased by 40. I don't have my compiled info handy, but this year's freshman class of 2,410 would put it as the 2nd to 4th largest freshmen class in NDSU history. Other than the freak class of 2008(~2,600), the 2007, 2009, & 2010 classes have all been around 2,400. Of course, the real numbers don't come out for another 4 weeks. I suspect the grad numbers will reverse then; they always seem to surge in the first few weeks of class.

One of your players went down with what looked like a knee injury. She already had a brace on the knee she was holding. UND scored their 2nd goal just seconds after play resumed from the injury. I didn't see what happened to her after they helped her off the field, sorry.

Someone will correct me if I'm wrong about this, but I think the following is the way it goes. The three FCS channels are exclusive to cable. If you have a dish or a cable company that doesn't buy FCS and you want one or more of the three, than you are out of luck. Now, DirecTV does have one channel(and an alternate?) that broadcasts some FCS content. I think the rules are that they only broadcast live events on that channel. Coach's shows, replayed games and the like are not shown. If two or more of the three FCS feeds are carrying live events, then one will be chosen to go on DirecTV and the other(s) will not(if there is an alternate, then Direct TV can handle two events, but not all three). Basically, it's a crap shoot if you've got DirecTV. If you've got Dish Network, then you're completely out of luck. To sum it up, you're going to have to continue to watch the Bison Coach's show on the internet because you're not going to see it on FCS Central with DirecTV.

This is just a guess, but I wonder if it has to do with the relative profitability of UND and NDSU football. First, as far as I know, both are profitable for their respective facilities. Also, I'm pretty sure that NDSU football is more profitable than UND football, but that doesn't matter in this case. In the case of the Fargodome, when you look at the three major profit centers of concerts, trade shows and NDSU football, football is the least profitable of the three. It makes good money, but not as much as the other two. It also generally ties up the Fargodome for more days with no additional profit. A trade show may tie up the dome for 4-5 days, but you get 3-4 days of revenue. Football can also tie up the dome for up to 4-5 days(depending on the number of indoor practices), but it only generates a single day of revenue. Also, the Fargodome hosts a lot of high school football games in the fall/winter that are basically losses for the dome. It could very well be that the concert and trade show situation is so bad at the Alerus, that UND football ends up being the most profitable of the three. That would explain why the Fargodome does better in the spring and the Alerus does better in the fall. It's just a guess, though. One more thing about the year the Fargodome is having. This has been a year when the stars have aligned just right. I doubt there's ever been a year before when the Fargodome has managed to get 6 of the top 20 current acts. It might have even been 7 if the Simon and Garfunkel tour hadn't fallen apart. The reason the current profit figure for the Fargodome is so high is because 5 of those 6 events have already happened; only the Reba/George Strait concert is yet to come. On top of that, all the big trade shows happen in the spring. The boat show is in January, the home & garden show is in February, and the sportsmen's show is in March. Put that all together, and you get an abnormally good year. Unless something weird happens next year, the Fargodome will be back to its regular $100k-150k profit; maybe $175k if the Bison turn things around this year.

While the Fargodome has a profit of almost a half million to this point in the year, that number is going to come down a lot as the year comes to an end. It has been a great year, so it's possible the FD may crack $200k in profits by year's end, but it won't be anywhere close to the current number.

I don't think it's today's concert industry that's the problem, I think it's the state of the industry ever since the Alerus opened its doors. The Alerus was planned in a time when the concert industry was running extremely hot. During the time between the opening of the Fargodome and the approval of the Alerus Center, the Fargodome was posting fantastic profits because of the state of that industry. The Fargodome made a profit from day-1, and the annual profit was racing toward $1 million(I think it peaked at around $800,000). At the time, there were actually more profitable concert tours than the Fargodome could handle. That was the environment when the Alerus Center was approved. Then came the tech crash, followed by 9/11, followed by the wars in the Middle East, followed by the mortgage crisis, followed by the credit crisis. The concert industry fell apart after the tech crash, and it's never recovered. Every small recovery has been erased by another economic crisis. The Fargodome hasn't been immune to this. From the high point just as the Alerus was being built, the Fargodome profits fell to less than $20,000 just a couple years later. Today, a profit of over $100,000 at the end of the year is considered good, and anything approaching $200,000 is nearly beyond hope. With the construction of the Alerus and Ralph, and the state of the concert industry since the late 90's, we've been playing a zero-sum game in the RRV. There just aren't enough profitable concerts to go around anymore, and Fargo has significant advantages over GF when the concert promoters make their choices. The Fargodome ends up getting the sure things and the near-sure things, and the Alerus has to take the risky ones. I honestly think you could have the best management staff in the history of mankind, and the Alerus wouldn't make a profit right now. Maybe it wouldn't be losing quite so much, but I don't think you could break even. I believe the Alerus was just planned and built in a time that doesn't exist anymore. It's only bitter irony that it never even got to experience that time. And I don't envy the choices faced by the city, Alerus commission, or the management company. Do you continue to take risks and probably lose money? Do you challenge the Fargodome for the sure-fire concerts knowing that the only way you'll get them is by undercutting the Fargodome so much that you'll hurt your bottom line and jeopardize your bargaining power in the future? Do you go for tiny concerts that are guaranteed losses, but small ones? Do you give up on concerts altogether and take the political hit? I don't know the answer, if even there is one. All I know is that a chunk of Grand Forks fell to the "if they(Fargo) can do it, so can we" fallacy, and that too many people bet on the best-case scenario when the economic models were studied. The Fargodome had back up plans if everything went to hell(hockey among other things), the Alerus did not. Now it's time to make the best of a bad situation. Accept that the decision was made. Accept that the Alerus will continue to lose money. Come to a consensus on which is more important: money, or the quality of life improvements brought by the concerts. And hope that the economy eventually recovers to the point that the hot days(or at least warm ones) return.

Unless you already did something to fix the favicon issue, never mind. The problem may have been on my end. I flushed my cache(I forgot to do that before I posted - and I know better, too) and the arrowhead is back. I do like your skin over the default, and for the same reasons. And overall I like the user layout area better than vBulletin - which has always struck me as a little garish. I've never tried setting up a message board, but I can imagine all the work in the details that must go into it. I'm sure it's hard to tell, but I'm something of a perfectionist. You've gotten this skin to the point where it's just little nitpicks to comment on. A few of those really minor nitpicks - not problems, just aesthetic choices: - On the forum pages(not the thread pages), the green in the bars for "UND Sports," "UND Community," etc. is dark enough that it blends in with the charcoal bars below. That line created by the shading in the middle of the green bar is also a little off(I also see it in the default skin you linked to, but it doesn't show up as much in the blue). Maybe a single color gradation from top to bottom instead of two gradations, meeting in the middle? And it might look worse, but I wonder if putting the dark end of the gradation at the top and the light at the bottom might give the border between the green and gray more definition. - I actually like the black buttons. It's too easy to go overboard with school colors <cough>bisonsports&sdsufans<cough>. It's just that alignment issue that's the problem. I was originally thinking of the username switching to green, but I think that would make it even worse. - I don't like the placement of the friend and pm icons. If you(IP Board "you", not jimdahl "you") have to have them, I think they would be better underneath the profile info(Joined date). This is one area where I like vBulletin over IP Board; I've really come to like the drop down menus for those sorts of things. - This one is super-nitpicky: I don't like the way the main bars, background side bars, and the boxes interact at the top of the page. It's like an irregular step-in. The main bars go to the edges, then you've got the white background field with the gray sidebands, then you step in again with the forum/thread/message boxes(depending on the page). I think what's causing it to look wrong to me is that the horizontal distances aren't the same or they're not different enough. I think they're in the no man's land in between(if that makes any sense). It's probably just one of those things I'm noticing because it's new, and my eye won't see it a week from now. - I like the code function much better than the old IP Board software(that pink and gray box was annoying). It's going to come in real handy when I need to post a list or chart. I wanted to scream when I tried posting one on the ORU board and saw that phpBB doesn't use Lucinda Console for the code font. What's the point if you don't do that? As always, thanks for the work you put in here. Oh, and I like the green for the quote boxes. I guess it's part of the default skin, but it works nice on a green-themed board.

Starting to get used to it. Style still seems a little "clunky" to me. That's a comment about the IP Board software interface, not Jim's implementation of it, BTW. Two real comments, though. First, it looks like the favicon hasn't made the move. I'm getting the generic Invision Power blue V, not the Siouxsports Sioux head. Second, I'm noticing that it's hard to see the identity of a poster at a glance. Maybe I'm spoiled by vBulletin which makes it bloody obvious, but my eyes are just sliding off the username now. I think it's because the "Back to top" and "Report" buttons are so close, nearly the same color as the username, and are also comparatively large. If others are having the same problem, maybe increasing the size or changing the color of the font would help, or maybe changing the placement of the username by shifting it over to right a bit. After thinking about it some more, maybe centering the name over the profile information and bumping up the size one notch would do the trick.

Which do you think will come first: Altru(or Aurora) or Medcenter One in western ND? I think Sanford will eventually absorb both, but I don't know the order or timeline.

D'oh, you're right. Midco is in so many SD communities that I got confused. My bad. Still, Midco does have the primary market of Sioux Falls and the next closest city of Watertown.

Sorry, but duh. Who is the cable provider in UND's local market(GF)? Midcontinent. Who is the cable provider in USD's local market(Verm/SF)? Midcontinent. Who is the cable provider in SDSU's local market(Brookings)? Midcontinent. Who is the cable provider in NDSU's local market(Fargo)? Cableone. [music] One of these things is not like the others. [/music] Now, Midco has surrounded Fargo by adding locations in West Fargo and Moorhead. There are always rumors that Midco is going to challenge Cableone in Fargo once the latter's exclusive contract with the city comes up for renewal(don't know when that is). If Midco were to get into the Fargo market, then NDSU would be added to the broadcasts immediately. Until that happens, however, Midco won't do anything to help their competitor.

Hmm, Boise is a city of over 200k and a metro of almost 600k. That makes it roughly five times the size of Grand Forks. It's one of the largest 100 cities in the US. It has air service with Delta, United, Southwest, and four other smaller carriers. It's a half day drive from Salt Lake City(<6hrs) and a bit more from Portland(<8hrs); both are straight shots. It's also fills a void in the northern Rockies; the next closest major arena is in SLC. In contrast, GF has one major airline(Delta), and one minor(Allegiant). It's a half day from MSP(<6hrs), but not a straight shot(though going through Fargo isn't exactly a big deal). But the real kicker is this: why would the NCAA chose to put a subregional in GF and have almost all of the people fly in through MSP rather than just choosing one of the three comparable or better venues in the Cities(Metrodome/Target/Xcel) plus everything else the Cities give you? Budge or don't budge, I don't really care. But GF is not getting a MBB subregional no matter what REA does or doesn't do. And Fargo ain't getting one either, no matter what NDSU & the city do for a basketball arena. We could build a 25k seat palace to BB that would put the REA to shame and we still wouldn't get a sniff unless bribes were involved. MSP is just too close and too well equipped as a city. GF needs to focus on getting whatever hockey games they can, and Fargo needs to focus on WBB and as many Summit tourneys as possible. Anything else would be a waste of time, energy and money. And with that, I'm done on the nickname forum for another couple months, or the next time I get really bored.

I feel a little bad for Dana College. The top the NAIA for the second straight year, and they won't have a chance at a third because the college just closed its doors.

Never, ever going to happen. Regionals go to major cities or metro areas with large to huge facilities. The 2011 facilities are the Superdome(55k), Alamodome(20k-40k), Prudential Center in NJ(18.5k), and the Honda Center in CA(17.5k). Even if you meant the subregional(or 2nd/3rd round site), those still go to places like the Metrodome. The smallest of the eight sites for the 2011 tournament is the 14.5k seat McKale Center in Tucsan(home to the U of Arizona). Even the site(s) of the First Four is/are going to large cities like Dayton, OH. There will not be a DI MBB tournament game in the Dakotas for at least 25 years*, and I seriously doubt there will be one even after that. The NCAA has been moving the WBB subregionals to smaller, on-campus sites rather than major venues mainly due to poor attendance. They also doubled the number of subregional sites from 8 to 16 starting in 2009. Other than ice hockey, WBB is the only DI tourney that the REA has even a chance to host a part of, and even that's a long shot. Local volleyball subregionals will continue to go to the UofMN or Iowa State since those are given to the seeded team in the pod, and UND(and NDSU, SDSU & USD) will never be a top 16 team. I don't follow hockey site selection, but it seems like most of the posters here acknowledge that the NCAA is looking at larger facilities in bigger cities for the Frozen Four. Maybe a regional is possible, but the Xcel Center and the Mariucci Arena in the Twin Cities are some pretty tough competition when you consider air travel, hotels and food availability. Hosting a women's hockey tournament game is by far the most likely of all of them, and it's pretty tough justifying the cost of the conversion just for that. As for the conversion, the first major deadline is Dec 31, 2011. That's when all the circular brass plaques in the railings need to be removed(not the ones on the ends of the aisle seating) as well as the lighted outside logos. So, the REA has got about a year and a half to make their final decision. *25 years is as far as I will make a prediction for anything, no matter how unlikely I believe it to be.

Yikes. I rarely come into this forum anymore, and when I do, the current topic being debated is one that can be put to bed with 10 minutes of researching. (Of course, the most recent tangent of the thread was started by MplsBison, so I really shouldn't be surprised.) From the settlement agreement: It looks like the only thing at stake is whether UND wants to host one of the DI men's hockey regionals, the DI women's hockey Frozen Four or a first round home game, or maybe a DI women's basketball subregional. That's it. If the REA refuses to make changes, things will continue to go on just as they have with these few exceptions(and the only one of those with a real shot is the first round women's hockey game).

Actually, it reeks of poor retention among the 2007-2008 classes. I forget which, but one of them has dropped below 50%. We also don't expect to get that many of them. Most will accept FBS offers just like most of your 21 offers. Maybe we'll get lucky on a half dozen or so, and then another wave of offers will go out in the fall. That's life in the most aggressive tier of FCS: Snatch a few from the big boys and get the rest before your peers do. On a side note, I've been meaning to say the following for some time now. In the last six months or so, I've read a lot of comments on here about how great it is that UND has opened up recruiting pipelines in distant parts of the country. Many of these posts are almost word for word from what Bisonville posters were writing three or four years ago. I'm just saying you might want to temper your enthusiasm a bit until you find out whether or not you can avoid our mistakes when it comes to out of region recruiting. Not saying local boys are automatically saints(Bobby Stroup anyone?), but TX, CA, AZ, etc. kids can bring in additional issues that can bite you in the ass if you're not paying attention. I believe our problem was too many, too fast. The large number allowed a subculture to form within the football team, and that was the root of most of the problems. I think we've got that subculture dug out now(hence the large recruiting classes this year and last that are focusing on the Mid-West), but you guys should be wary of a similar thing happening to you.