UND92,96

With the graduation of Gottbeheat, Nolte and Farstveet, depth at defensive end behind starters Bellmore and Brenneman appears to be lacking, so I fully expect Lundeen, Stanchik and/or Cole to see playing time next year.

Is it possible he was the victim of some sort of Abscam-esque ruse whereby unscrupulous UND fans, posing as DeBoer associates, fed him mis-information?

I assume it got to a point where it was too late in the season for Sharkova to start playing even if she was cleared by the NCAA. It would have been a waste of a year of eligibility. She's still on the bench so apparently she hasn't been ruled ineligible, at least not yet. In any event, either she'll finally be cleared, or else there will be another scholarship available. As for Privatsky, it will be difficult to recover from two serious knee injuries, but not unprecedented. I haven't heard anything about the likelihood of her playing again.

Besides Youngblut and Lof, it is extremely difficult to project a 2010-11 starting lineup. I'd say Privatsky at point guard, health permitting. Sharkova at center, NCAA permitting. The other spot is probably Rothfusz, unless one of the true freshmen really impresses. I'm still hoping for a couple of juco additions, just because there will be no other juniors next year (aside from hopefully Sharkova), and we desperately need scoring. It's been at least five years since a true freshman has stepped in and provided scoring immediately, so I'm not counting on the incoming recruits to provide much offense next year.

From Sid Hartman's column the other day: I wonder if he's confusing UND and NDSU? Not that Sid is ever confused about anything...

Looks like they died by it again--lost today at Texas-Pan American.

Per Wayne Nelson's blog, Archer is out for the rest of the season with a serious knee injury.

Looks like it's going to continue to be tough to be a Gopher football fan for at least a few more years: http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/267416/group/home/

I'm going off on a tangent here, but had the Alerus never been built, UND would be in serious need of a new football stadium. I can't even begin to imagine trying to recruit if we still played in decrepit Memorial Stadium.

USD is a difficult team to figure out. They obviously played well in Grand Forks last weekend, but somehow lost last night at Houston Baptist, which has an RPI of 330!

63 UND 47 Texas-Pan American final

This is probably beyond the scope of the question Miller is posing, but I really don't like watching games at the Betty. I didn't like it when it first opened, and I don't like it now. The lack of a concourse drives me crazy, as I feel like once I'm in my seat, I'm more or less captive until the game is over. At Hyslop, the Ralph or the Alerus, you can/could get up and walk around at halftime, between games or to take a restless kid for a little walk, but that's not a realistic option at the Betty. So from an admittedly selfish point of view, I welcome games at the Ralph. Or the Al for that matter.

Good point, the level of competition may be suspect. But he is ranked quite high by ESPN (#141 shooting guard in the country), which presumably is basing much of the ranking on summer AAU play: http://insider.espn.go.com/ncb/recruiting/...cruitId%3D44528

http://www.areavoices.com/gfsports/ This topic has been discussed many times before, but here's another opportunity. Thoughts?

Since we clearly need some positive news relative to UND basketball, Troy Huff appears to be having a very good sr. year: http://www.wissports.net/sports/hoopsb/seasonleaders.asp

IMO, Mitchell needs to be playing inside. He's 6'7", 240 pounds and has above-average athletic ability. Benter and Archer are nice role players, but neither is going to produce many points from the low block. Mitchell has that ability. While he can knock down 3's when he's on, there should be enough other wing players who can also fill that role.

That brings up a point that's bothered me for several years. You need to go all the way back to Jeff Brandt in the 2000-01 season to find the last time UND has had a freshman--whether true or red-shirt--step in and be a double-figure scorer. It seems like that should happen more often than once a decade. The women have gone through a similar drought, albeit shorter, as they haven't had an immediate impact freshman since the back-to-back years where Langen and Kimbrough came in.

While I believe Jones to be a nice person and is undoubtedly working as hard as he can, when you look at the body of work through nearly four full seasons, there simply isn't much reason to expect that things will get better. Let's look at his two best seasons so far: 2007-08 (15-15) 10 of the 15 wins were against: Dickinson St., Minot St., Mayville St., Jamestown, Bemidji St., UMC, Mary (twice) and Upper Iowa (twice). And this was a team that had two or three legitimate dI-caliber players in Little, Youmans and probably Harrison. 2008-09 (16-12) 11 of the 16 wins were against: Bemidji St., Illinois Tech, Wisconsin-Parkside, Valley City St., Dickinson St., UMC, Minot St., Mary, Mayville St., Upper Iowa and Hamline. Prior to this year, about the best thing that could be said about Jones is that he managed to beat the teams he was supposed to beat. Now that we're playing far more challenging schedules, and are probably less athletic than most of our dII years, I just don't see any reason to think more success is on the horizon compared to what we're currently seeing. I hope I'm wrong.

I saw one player who fits that description last night. Unfortunately, he plays for USD and his name is Jake Thomas. And he's a true freshman.

I was there, and while the announced attendance was probably a big stretch, the crowd wasn't bad all things considered. Unfortunately, the play by the home teams was another story...

From today's Herald:

Utah Valley won 86-68.

Interesting article. I didn't realize Jud Heathcote had any ND roots.

A new Tran blog: http://www.areavoices.com/gfhcitybeat/

I have no problem with a game or two per year being at the Ralph. It actually worked out fine 6-8 years ago when there were a number of games there. Of course, with the teams not having impressive records, and the impending winter storm, I'm sure attendance won't be as good as what it was the last time the teams played there, which I believe was about five years ago.