Hammersmith

Everytime time I see it, I have this sudden urge to play Warcraft III. Maybe that's just me. "Elves! To battle!"

What part is spin? Taylor offered Thomas a four year contract(2004-2007) with alternating locations(F/GF/F/GF) in May of 2003. Thomas sat on it until that fall before refusing to sign it, all the while telling alumni and the media that he wanted the rivalry to continue. Want some quotes? Oct 2002: May 2003:

Basketball (Early Period): November 14, 2007 through November 21, 2007 Basketball (Regular Period): April 16, 2008 through May 21, 2008 Football (Midyear JC Transfer): December 19, 2007 through January 15, 2008 Football (Regular Period): February 6, 2008 through April 1, 2008 Field Hockey, Soccer, Men's Water Polo: February 6, 2008 through August 1, 2008 All Other Sports(Early Period): November 14, 2007 through November 21, 2007 All Other Sports(Regular Period): April 9, 2008 through August 1, 2008

Never mind. Apparently I went blind last night while I was reading the press release. It clearly says there will be no movement between subdivisions.

You are correct, that is the biggest portion of it.

I don't see that. This legislation prevents schools from joining DI, those schools you mention are already DI. I don't think this will have any bearing on schools moving between FCS and FBS, or even non-football DI schools adding it(i.e. Wichita St.). In any case, you could see this coming a mile away. I really thought Kupchela blew it last year when the paperwork didn't get filed, because I thought this legislation was coming a year ago. Honestly, I don't know if this is good or bad for UND. I guess time will tell. Regarding GWFC autobid: If the GWFC were to get six active members and keep them together or two years or more, there are three possible outcomes. 1. The tournament remains at 16 teams and the autobids stay where they are. Result: no GWFC autobid. 2. The tournament remains at 16 teams and an autobid is stripped away from a current holder. Result: probable GWFC autobid(the NEC also wants one). 3. The tournament expands to 20, 24 or 32 teams. Result: GWFC autobid.

That's what I meant about someone coming along with better info while I was still busy typing. Actually, I think NDSU is moving toward a FSSN-type network except it will be completely controlled and produced by NDSU, who will effectly buy time on KVLY or others to televise most, if not all, home FB games and several home BB games each year. That doesn't count games that FSN will be interested in, either. It's still a few years out, but I think that's the intended course.

It will be on KXJB, that was just the name of the article from two weeks ago. Remember, KVLY and KXJB share facilities (and owners?).

Oh, I don't disagree with you at all about KKAG going head to head in a few years when the WDAY contract is up, it's just that the rules changed with this last contract. Before, I think NDSU would sell the radio rights to ForumComm and then it would be their responsibility to get other stations to make the broadcast statewide. With this new contract, NDSU now has that ressponsibility. It also means NDSU can mix and match stations from different owners to create the best coverage. Now, most of this is guesswork on my part based on what's been printed in the media, but I think I'm pretty close. With that in mind, it could be possible for NDSU to add KKAG even before the ForumComm contract expires, but, since I doubt WDAY wants local compitition, I bet there's some sort of non-compete clause in the contact for the Fargo area. That's what I was alluding to in my earlier post. As for WDAY not submitting a bid, I can think of several possible reasons. NDSU will be paying WDAY for their on-air talent regardless, so maybe they think they can make more money this way. WDAY has been late to replace their standard definition cameras and other equipment; they might be currently unable to produce a football broadcast without a large expenditure to complete the switchover. They might also just be pissed that NDSU is moving its media in-house. Even more reasons are possible. edit: or someone could come along with better info than I have while I'm in the middle of typing.....again. I really need to type faster or write less.

You're correct about UND's contract. I thought the two year contract ran from F2007-S2009 but it actually was signed a year earlier than I thought. Sorry, my bad. The NDSU contract is for three years however. From 2 weeks ago in the Forum: Bohl Show may move to KVLY edit: It took me too long to track down my sources and you beat me to the punch.

Actually, you've got a few of your facts wrong, Sic. First, WDAY had an opportuity to bid on the TV contract but chose not to. You can speculate on their reasons, but NDSU did not abandon them. Second, neither the UND media contract nor the NDSU radio contract(NDSU has split the radio and TV contracts) end after this year. The UND/Clear Channel contract is for two years(F2007-S2009) and the NDSU/ForumComm radio contract is for three(F2007-S2010).* NDSU's new radio contract does give them more flexability in adding stations to the Bison Sports Radio Network(gods, that's a stupid sounding name), but I think adding WWAG would conflict with WDAY's status as the flagship BSRN station. Just to be clear, three of the Bison's five home games will be televised(SFA/FSN-N, UCD/KVLY, SHSU/KVLY) and two of the six away games will most likely be(UM/FSN-N/ESPN+, SDSU/FSN-N). *Okay, I'm 100% certain about the NDSU contract but only 95% certain about the UND one.

I forgot to add in my previous post that some boards try to get around the problem by having each person use two userid's; one for the political forums and a regular one for everything else. Personally, I think it's probably more trouble than it's worth(especially for the admin), but it is an option.

I know I'm a really just a visitor to your site, but I think this is exactly what happened over on anygivensaturday.com. Since the political forums were started over there, comments on the football and community forums that would've been seen as joking or teasing a year ago are now considered personal attacks depending on the parties involved. I think you've had the right idea so far, and I agree with the other posters who think a political section would be a bad idea. Just my $0.02

I understand that most of this has already been answered, but I thought I'd condense it to a single post. As a NDSU alumnus, I'm a bit partial to the Gateway so forgive any bias. Great West(2008) vs. Gateway(2008) 5 teams vs. 9 teams 4 games vs. 8 games CA/UT/ND/SD vs. IL/IA/MO/OH/IN/ND/SD no autobid vs. autobid run by Summit League vs. run by Missouri Valley Conference considered the 4th or 5th best conference by most vs. considered a top-three conference by most That last one is somewhat subjective, but not the rest. Teams do play against members from other conferences(just like UND is doing this year with Southern Utah and Humboldt State), but if you're wondering if the Nickel Game will be resumed, that's a good question. With the current 11-game season, NDSU will have a pretty full schedule(8 Gateway games + 1 FBS "money" game). With only two slots remaining most seasons, it's unclear whether Talyor/Bohl will want to tie one of them up with a rotating Fargo/Grand Forks UND game. To complicate matters, 2008, 2013, 2014 and 2019 will be 12-game seasons because of how the dates fall and there is a push within FCS to move to a permanent 12-game season to match FBS. My take: If FCS moves to a 12-game season, the Nickel Game will resume; if not, a <20% chance with the exception of playoff meetings. Also, autobid is slang for automatic qualifier(AQ). The two terms are synonymous, but the NCAA uses only the latter. Most fans use 'autobid' because it's easier to say and a lot quicker to type. The problem for the Great West is that there are only eight autobids possible with the current 16-seed tournament format and they are all spoken for even if the GWFC manages to get to six active members.

The GWFC has been struggling with the home/away balance issue since the conference began. With membership changes every two years, they just can't seem to catch a break. I wouldn't be suprised to see an imbalance during the 2008 season, but it should be worked out by 2009. Of course, if they're are more additions/subtractions, that goes out the window...again.

Pure rumor/speculation with no facts to back it up, but some have suggested Sac State as a possible GWFC member in addition to San Diego. The logic is that membership in the Big West for all other sports would reduce Sac State's travel costs while maintaing a similar level of competition to the Big Sky. They would lose the football autobid, but it's not like Sac State has been contending for it anyway. However, Sac State seems to have FBS aspirations and wants in the WAC, so unless Sac State gets hit with a Clu-stickTM, they'll probably stay where they are.

There were some stuctural concerns about this bridge, but a 2001 report determined that no failure was expected over the remaining life of the bridge. One of the major concerns was the lack of any structural redundancy in case of a fatigue break. I'm going to take a guess that the stress and vibration of resurfacing the deck caused a fatigue crack to develop in an already stressed area. Without redundancy, the crack spread and collapsed a section of the span. That collapse tranfered a large load onto the adjoining sections which themselves collaped under the increased load. The process repeated until the entire span had collaped. Cracks had been found in 1997 and 1998, but they had been repaired and the bridge retrofitted to reduce the stresses that caused them. This bridge design has been used repeatedly in Minnesota(and elsewhere?), so the results of this investigation could lead to several bridge closings and repairs/retrofits. source: MN DOT report(2001)(.pdf) http://media.startribune.com/smedia/2007/0...affiliate.2.pdf

Shamelessly stolen from the Bisonville board: Greenie wrote:

Even old New York was once New Amsterdam.

It looks like the investigation's mostly wrapped up. The suspect is the victim's 15 year old adopted(8 years ago) brother. Fargo Forum links: (in chrono order) Fargo Police investigate 16-year-old girl's death [url=http://www.in-forum.com/articles/index.cfm?id=171867]Police investigate Fargo teen

[putting my teacher's hat on] The answer to your question falls into three categories: correct abbreviations, "what is FCS?", and the I-AA/FCS name change. The NCAA and its membership decided a long time ago that the different divisions would be represented by roman numerals rather than arabic ones; i.e. Division I, Division II, Division III instead of Division 1, Division 2, Division 3. The approved abbreviations follow the same rules with the addition of the lack of a space between the "D" and the roman numeral; i.e. DII rather than D2, D-II, D 2, D II or even DivII. Some people are picky about using the correct form of abbreviation and others have a looser outlook. The owner/administrator of the largest FCS fan site(Ralph Wallace at AnyGivenSaturday) is particularly vocal about using the proper terminology and that view has caught on with many(but by no means all) of the AGS members. Since AGS was one of the first places many Bison fans became familiar with FCS, that "correct usage" view has been embraced by many of us to differing extents. So what is FCS? It stands for Football Championship Subdivision and is a part of Division I. DI can be broken down into three groups: schools that play FBS(Football Bowl Subdivision) football, schools that play FCS football, and schools that play no football. There are several differences between FBS and FCS schools. Using DI(no football) as a baseline, there are no additional requirements to participate in FCS and a school can award anywhere from zero scholarships in football to a maximum of 63. Those scholarships can also be broken up into partials and given to a maximum of 85 players. Moving up to FBS raises the limit to 85 scholarships but imposes a number of restrictions. A FBS school must give out a minimum of 90% of the 85(77) and no partial scholarships are allowed. Additionally, a FBS school must offer either a total of 200 full grants-in-aid(scholarships) or $4 million worth of grants-in-aid, whichever dollar value is lesser. A FBS school also faces an minimum average attendance requirement of 15,000 per home game over a rolling two year period(may use paid or actual attendance). Finally, a FBS school must offer an additional two sports beyond the 14 required for DI membership. What about DI-AA? Well, up to about six months ago, FBS/FCS/no football were referred to as I-A/I-AA/I-AAA. There were several reasons for the change and I'm not going to get into them here. For the purposes of this discussion, the only info needed is that the change only involved the names and nothing else. Why "Bowl" and "Championship" in the names? The NCAA does not have any kind of official football championship for schools that participate in FBS. Those schools vie for the BCS(Bowl Championship Series) championship which is a non-NCAA organization made up of NCAA members. The NCAA DI Football Championship is played for by FCS schools. Unlike the BCS, which uses polls and computer rankings to place teams into different bowl games, the FCS championship is a standard 16 seed tournament with eight autobids and eight at-large selections. Lastly, the FBS(I-A) and FCS(I-AA) designations apply only to football. Technically, there is no difference between a FBS, FCS or no football school in non-football sports(i.e. basketball, volleyball, baseball, etc.). There is no I-AA volleyball or I-AA soccer. While most FBS schools do have larger budgets than their FCS counterparts(partially due to the 200/$4M GIA requirement), and thus have more success, they still compete for the same championships [end lecture] I'm sure this was way more information than you needed, but I wanted to answer any additional questions you might have all in one go. The fireworks between Sioux fans(DaveK, et al) and Bison fans(DI IN FARGO/BisonBacker, et al) stems partially from DaveK posting on AGS that he was going to continue to use I-AA regardless of the name change. Added to some previous postings on here from Bison fans talking about the name change(myself included), the standard Bison/Sioux stuff, and an understandable dislike around here of anything NCAA, FCS/I-AA has kinda turned into a knee-jerk topic to several posters here at SiouxSports, at Bisonville and BisonSports, and at AGS.

The problem is he said he read it in the Argus Leader but when questioned, he can't give any specifics and he refuses to search the AL website to provide a link. He says it's a waste of his time to produce proof and that everyone else should take his word for it. Needless to say, he's done this so often over on AGS that few still take him seriously. He's become something of a running joke.

Almost, I think. The main difference is the quality/comfort of the actual seat. I think the Ralph uses a standard bar-type high chair w/ back for those seats. Pretty much like you'd find along the bar at most chain bar and grills. In current usage, a loge seat is nicer with some padding and some give. Often, it can swivel and rock a bit. Rather than one long row of seats, they're often grouped together in twos or fours. Often they're tiered like at the Ralph, with bars to set drinks and food on, but some stadiums use the word to simply decribe a better type of seat. Many years ago, the red seats at the Fargodome might have been considered loge seating because of the padding they have. A few years ago, the bar seats at the Ralph would've been loge. Today, you generally see the bar setup with more luxurious seats being called loge. Court-side loge seating is being considered for the new FD arena plan in place of a larger number of suites. I think some in Fargo might be wondering if Fargo is just about suited-out between the FD, Newmann, and the future UP arena. Loge seating with an option to add more suites at a later date might seem like a better deal to the FD Authority. It's all guesses at this point, though.

This will probably be one of the last articles on the incident; it's got most of the facts: http://www.dailyinterlake.com/articles/200...ts/sports02.txt Basic facts(from the article and other sources): Two incoming MSU football recruits attended a party where booze was being served. Another group of teenagers nearby egged several houses, then fled to the same party. Police arrived and several partygoers fled, including the two recuits. One recruit(Bignell) was part of a group of runners who entered the Mayor's home through a basement window. Another member of that group was friends with the Mayor's son and had used the window with the son in the past. The other recruit(Ogden) was not caught, but later turned himself in. Both have pled guilty to their respective crimes(criminal trespassing for Bignell and obstructing a police officer for both - all misdemeaners) and recieved community service/probabtion. Neither was charged with vandalism(the egg throwing), nor consuming alcohol(whatever Montana calls it); there's a report that neither recruit was actually drinking that night. Both will keep their scholarships but will not play this year(coaches had planned on redshirting them before this anyway). Part of the university's punishment was to apologize in person. Odgen's letter was apparently voluntary. note: I think I was too hard on blaming the reporters. It seems they were just quoting inital police sources who commented to the press before all the facts were known. Articles published on the 27th have the incorrect facts; articles published later have access to the final police reports.

It looks like the reporters out in Bozeman got part of the story wrong. The two football recruits did go to a party, and did run from police when the party was busted, but they were not the individuals who broke into the Mayor's home, nor were they the ones responsible for the house egging that got the cops called in the first place. The reporters made an premature assumption and linked the stories when they should've waited and confirmed the facts. One of the recruits is visiting the neighborhood and has written the following letter that is being sent to the same.