Gothmog

I'm not trying minimize anything. Those are legitimate questions and no one on this forum knows the answers. Obviously, if NDSU staff did give the player the supplement, or if more players are involved, that's a problem. But we don't know that that's what happened, and until you do you're just engaging in wishful thinking about a rival. You want this to be true. But the evidence just isn't there.

If you don't know the answers to the following questions, you have no basis for any conclusion: What was the supplement? Exactly who was "distributing" it to players? Which players actually took this supplement, whatever it was? How often did the players use this substance? What performance benefits might a player actually be expected to receive from this substance (why is it banned)? I may have missed it, but don't see the answer to any of these questions anywhere in this thread.

There's nothing to worry about. NDSU will have superior talent to most ,if not all, FCS teams next year as usual. It''s likely that they'll be the preseason #1 again and should be the favorite to win it all again. UND fans imagining that NDSU will inevitably "fall from grace" or "come back down to earth" is nothing more than wishful thinking on their part. Good teams usually stay good.

I see no evidence that it would have made any difference had it been reported earlier. NDSU got no competitive advantage ... the player didn't play. That's what's required.

The whole thing amounts to absolutely nothing. It made no competitive difference in the game itself, and delaying the announcement in no way harmed the player or anyone else.

I would suggest that you pay attention to your own ethics. There's really no evidence that either NDSU or the Fargo news media has been unethical at all regarding this story. All we know is that one player apparently did something he shouldn't have and got suspended for it. This whole thread is just an example of wishing in one hand and crapping in the other. As usual, the outcome is predictable.

NDSU losing its NFL 1st round draft pick QB for 8 games, including 3 playoff games, doesn't seem very lucky to me. NDSU has had its share of both good and bad luck during this run.

Who said I don't care about UND? Obviously that's not true. I grew up in ND, so I'll always have an interest. But that does not mean I consider UND to be NDSU's primary football rival. Those are two different things. For example, I now live in the Twin Cities, so I am interested in Gopher football, but I don't consider them to be a rival of NDSU's at all.

Not much happening there.

Unlike you, I'm not saying that I know the thoughts of any Bison fan other than myself. Nor do I pretend to have a crystal ball to tell me much about the future. I will say that NDSU has had a much more productive relationship with SDSU since they moved to DI together than it ever had with UND. I could be wrong, but think that positive, constructive relationship is likely to continue in the future.

Have you ever been to the SDSU forum?

Did it ever occur to you that neither I, nor NDSU fans as a group, can be wrong about who we collectively consider to be NDSU's primary rival? If we say you're not our primary rival, then you're not. It's that simple.

I find it odd that UND fans insist on telling NDSU fans who their rival really is. I don't doubt that UND considers NDSU its primary rival in football, and I would never presume to tell a UND fan that they were wrong about it.

No, there was no correlation between the face value of individual game tickets and the package price of season tickets. OK, I should rephrase this. Season ticket prices where not equal to the sum of the face value of game tickets, and they did not increase by an equal amount.

Hmm, UND is NDSU's biggest rival because: a) Attendance and ticket prices are higher for the UND game than other games, and b) Bison fans don't want to schedule UND out of spite? You don't see the contradiction?

Actually, your argument runs contrary to the idea that NDSU's primary rival is UND, and that Bison fans are more interested in playing UND than any other school.

It's not random, but it could just as well be. The total price for all the tickets in the package is the only number that matters.

No, I'm saying it's irrelevant to the season ticket holder. You get the same tickets at the same price regardless of what face value is printed on any of the game tickets.

Surely you understand that ticket demand will be naturally be higher for Bison games involving UND simply because there are more UND fans within easy travel distance to the Fargodome than there are fans of any other school. High ticket demand for the UND game does not necessarily mean that Bison fans are more interested in seeing NDSU play UND than any other school, SDSU for example. Also, most of the tickets to Bison games are sold as part of a season ticket package, so it is impossible to separate the sale of a ticket for one game from all the other games in the package. For that reason, the individual face value of game tickets is meaningless for those tickets that are sold as part of a season ticket package. All that really matters is the total for all tickets.

No, you have it backwards. As much as UND people would like to be NDSU's primary rival, it's been too long since UND accomplished anything NDSU fans respect on the field for that to be the case. Like it not, until UND builds a program worth respecting, SDSU will be NDSU's primary rival and the Marker Game will remain the most important, and the hyped, game on NDSU's schedule.

Same thing happened in 2013. NDSU survived and prospered. Will that happen next year? I wouldn't bet against it..

You may be forgetting that NDSU also lost 22 or 23 seniors from the best senior class in its history along with its head coach after the 2013 season. They finished 15- 1 with another championship in 2014. UND could beat NDSU next year. But I'd give them no more than a 10% chance.

NDSU has lost about 1 regular season game per year during its championship run. So far only YSU has had an appearance in Frisco after beating NDSU in the regular season and that was years later. It just doesn't follow that beating NDSU would somehow be magic for UND's playoff prospects.

Here is the post I was responding to. I certainly interpret it as beating NDSU in 2019 will be the catalyst for UND's emergence as a championship caliber team. IMO, it wouldn't be any more than it was for SDSU, UNI, Indiana State, or USD. That's my point.

No it's not a straw man argument. The original argument was that beating NDSU would help UND to build its program to the point that it it can become a championship caliber team. NDSU is obviously already a championship caliber team and the OP stipulates, or at least implies, that UND is not. If that is true, what other than luck would at this point allow UND to beat NDSU? The whole idea is, unfortunately, bass ackwards.