UND92,96

The receiver situation will be very interesting to watch. If Bamba doesn't make it back, we could possibly see the top three receivers being a couple of red-shirt freshmen (Hardin and Townsend), and a true freshman (McGill). That's not to say that the upperclassmen should be written off, but they will need to improve significantly from last season in order to stay ahead of the young players IMO.

I wonder whether KFGO has cheap buyout clause?

Ethan Magstadt ruptured his achilles, and is likely out for this upcoming season: http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/arti...0/group/Sports/ With Binns allegedly leaving, the running back position isn't as deep as it appeared it would be. I suspect that could mean Breon Butler may not red-shirt.

I haven't heard anything about a transfer, but I know his brother plays there.

Herald article. Sharkova won't be back, and it sounds unlikely Kuehl will be able to play next year. But Privatsky has been cleared to start playing again.

I don't think there should be any expectation that FCS football will ever be a cash cow. But on the other hand, I don't think de-emphasizing football is a prerequisite to having a good mid-major basketball program, either. I would prefer to aspire to be more like UNI or SIU than Butler or Gonzaga or Creighton or St. Mary's because I don't want to sacrifice football, even if it's never going to turn a big profit.

Apparently you don't even need to draw all that well to be able to afford to pay a coach big bucks. SIU averaged 4780 per game for basketball this year, and 9297 for football. And yet they pay their basketball coach roughly eight times what we do, and they pay Lennon probably well over double what we pay Mussman. Their ticket sales are relatively modest, which would seem to point to some big donors footing the bill for these rather high salaries.

SIU must have some alums with very deep pockets to be able to operate their football program at a significant loss every year, AND to pay their basketball coach $700k!

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UND has apparently offered a DE from Houston: http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/recr...college_choices

I agree--USD should be a bit down next year. Which is why we as fans should be upset if we aren't as good or better than them next season. It's kind of the opposite on the women's side--we should be down next year, whereas USD returns most of their team. If we're still better than them next year, it doesn't speak well for their coach.

Three of USD's four leading scorers were high school recruits (Cain, Krogman and Thomas), and the fourth was a dI transfer from a few years ago (Gentry). UND has been red-shirting pretty much everybody, whereas USD hasn't. Other than that, the approaches are basically the same.

I think everybody understands that recruiting is a challenge during the transition. But what bothers me is how far behind USD we are right now. We're better than them in football. We're better than them in women's basketball. So why are they so much better than us in men's basketball? That's not a transition issue. Is it a coaching issue? Perhaps. USD loses a ton from this year's team. If they're still clearly better than us next year, it will be very telling.

That's some very encouraging news. I think Mussman can add a lot to the offense, and I'm excited about getting back to more of a pure 3-4 defense, and to have somebody well-versed in it calling the shots.

I have to ask--what exactly is it about Jones that makes you think that the only thing(s) holding him back are the transition and/or the lack of an autobid conference? The transition excuse can only go so far when a coach has no real track record of success. Had Jones stepped in and clearly done better than Rich Glas in our last two seasons as a dII program, or had he been a head coach before at any level with a good deal of success, then maybe he could be cut more slack now. And I kind of hate to even bring this up now, but I don't think we can just ignore the fact that Jones was hired by Tom Buning. Remember him? Look at the respective volleyball coaching hires of Buning and Faison, and the results speak for themselves.

Ben is getting a nice raise at UNI: http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/273289/group/home/

Burck and Roehrich have been named as first team all-staters, and Buck was named to the second team: http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/arti...2/group/Sports/

I like Tubby Smith, but in a way it could be a good thing for Minnesota if he moves on to Auburn or Oregon or wherever, because he's probably not worth the $1.8 million per year he's being paid. Minnesota could hire Ben Jacobson for what, $700k to $900k per year? And Ben could potentially stick around for a long, long time, whereas Tubby is almost certainly not the long-term answer at his age.

I believe spring practice was supposed to have started March 30th last year, but was pushed back a few days due to weather. Based on that, presumably it will start March 29th or so, weather permitting. The spring game was April 25th last year, so I'm assuming it may be on the last Saturday in April again this year.

Wow. I knew UNI was a good team, but I have to admit that I didn't see this coming. Congrats to Jake--I'm sure all of ND is proud of you!

Obviously St. Mary's turned out to be very legit, as they're now in the sweet 16.

Jake sure didn't hurt his chances for moving up the coaching ladder yesterday. Now there are rumblings that Tubby Smith could be moving on to Auburn. So...how about Ben Jacobson to Minnesota?

This point has been made a number of times by other people, but there was a time not so long ago when men's basketball was huge at UND--the early 1990's. That happened to coincide with a very down period for UND hockey, but I don't think that fact alone contributed all that much to the popularity of UND basketball. It was a great product, and 3,000 to 5,000 people consistently filled Hyslop. Can that kind of interest occur again? I don't see why not.

According to Wayne Nelson, Jake is also being mentioned as a possible candidate for the Oregon job.

I believe verbal commit Josie Dillon's Benilde-St. Margaret team is in the 2A tournament.