UND92,96

I have no idea how many walk-up tickets are generally sold, but I have to think it's pretty substantial. If the student tickets are all spoken for, I think that's a good sign, and selling close to 2000 today and tomorrow (mostly tomorrow) is probably pretty realistic. I think 12,000 is about right.

The thing about USD's team that strikes me as odd is the fact that they use a position player--one of their receivers who actually plays a lot--as their kicker. That's something you almost never see at this level of football. I really hope Shepard becomes the only quarterback I can ever recall who went 0-4 as a starter against UND. I wouldn't be surprised if that's never happened before.

I swear that guy has been at UND for something like 10 years. He's another John Hoff!

So there were roughly 50 people protesting today. Of that group, apparently there were two AIM members brought in, plus an NDSU professor, Erich Longie and David Gipp. I think it's probably safe to say that Ganje, Annis, Ketterling, Grijalva and Jeanotte were probably there, since they live for this type of thing. So that leaves roughly 40 people. And there are reportedly 340 (give or take) Native American students at UND. Even if the other 40 people at the protest were students--and I highly doubt most of them were--that seems like a very small percentage of UND Native American students, doesn't it?

I see this offense in a similar light to teams like Winona State or Augie when they gave UND problems--perhaps a bit under-sized on the o-line, so they used a lot of short passes and misdirection, with the occasional deep ball. I think there are enough weapons with Bamba, Sutton, Konrath and perhaps Davis to be pretty effective doing this.

From what I can tell without having actually seen the team play in person, we may need to be a pass-to-set-up-the-run-type offense. It just doesn't seem that we have a big or physical enough offensive line to overpower many teams with the running game like we've done so often in the past.

Game Notes

A few numbers: offense 3.0 yards per rush; has yet to exceed 300 yards in a game; has had just nine drives of 30 or more yards. defense 41 ppg; 507 ypg; just one sack. Obviously the SFA game heavily skews the defensive numbers, but they are what they are. I don't have any answers as far as exactly what's wrong. It's been a struggle for several years now. I'm afraid the offense will likely continue to struggle this year, but should get better when the offensive line gets bigger and more talented next year (hopefully). Also, the receiving corps should be deeper and faster next year.

As embarrassing as it is to lose as badly as UND did last night, the reality is that something like this seems to happen at least once to every school during the first two or three years of their transition: SDSU 2004 52 UC-Davis 0 SDSU 63 Georgia Southern 7 SDSU 2006 17 Wisconsin-LaCrosse 3 SDSU NDSU 2005 37 Cal Poly 6 NDSU USD 2009 66 N. Iowa 7 USD

Certainly having Chappell and Murray would help, but whether the o-line could open any holes for them to run through is another question.

The really unfortunate thing is that the class of 2005 had the potential to be really good, but a combination of the early departures of probably the two best players (Chappell and Stroup) along with several others who had outstanding credentials but who simply didn't pan out has led to the sr. class not being especially strong. The class of 2006 is probably about what one would expect given the circumstances at the time they were recruited, i.e. the uncertainty about whether we were staying dII or going dI. Then there was the class of 2007, of which there's almost nobody left besides Hawkins, Saporu, Ankenbauer and Bellmore, and you have back-to-back-to-back classes that simply aren't as good as what we've been used to. That puts a lot of pressure on the classes of 2008 and 2009.

The SFA quarterback threw five picks against SMU, which is one of the 20 worst FBS teams in the country according to Sagarin. I understand SFA also struggles to cover kicks/punts. I'm looking for another big day from Schwenzfeier, and UND's special teams will again prove to be the difference, with Bamba having at least one big kick return. This is also the week that the playbook gets opened up, and we see a significant improvement from the offense. 31 UND 27 SFA

Brock Nelson has committed to UND: http://www.areavoices.com/undhockey/

I just read the transcript from Mick Garry's weekly USD chat on the Argus Leader web page, and he picked a score of 34-10 in the UND-USF game. No word on which team was going to have the 34, though.

Good news--the receiving corps just got deeper: http://www.areavoices.com/waynenelson/

Would you say Sioux Falls is somewhat like some of the Winona teams of the early 2000's--little depth and some pretty big weaknesses but enough skill position players to stay with deeper and more talented teams?

Not too many people will probably get the joke, but that's funny! Here's our logo: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5...eCornPoster.jpg

It would be more intimidating if it was being brandished by somebody out of the classically bad movie "Children of the Corn."

Why do the words "more cowbell" keep popping into my head? I do kind of like the name, though.

Although this class isn't particularly large in numbers, a rather amazing number of them are already playing a lot, or at least are on the travel squad: Watkins, CB, not listed on two-deep, but has been seen considerable action Cameron, P, listed as starting punter, although he's only punted once so far Hendrickson, QB, primary holder Nichols, QB, fourth at QB Magstadt, FB, second on depth chart and has seen considerable playing time Sutton, RB, second on depth chart, but has been the top rusher by far Mersereau, S, like Watkins, he's not listed on the two-deep, but has seen considerable action Wisthoff, TE, second on depth chart and has seen considerable action McGurran, C, starter Gillson, T, second on depth chart Lynch, G, second on depth chart Heimler, WR, third or fourth on depth chart Benjamin, NG, not listed on two-deep, but plays on short yardage situations Brenemann, DE, starter Bamba, WR, starter and top pass catcher so far To the best of my knowledge, there's only one player from this group who possibly hasn't travelled yet this year (and he may actually have last week).

Against NW St., UND rushed 34 times for 96 yards. 47 of those yards were on Sutton's td run out of the so-called wildcat formation. So that means that UND had just 49 yards on the other 33 carries. And I don't think NW St.'s run defense is especially strong, at least judging by what Grambling did. IMO, we may be better served by getting away from a power rushing game and passing more and using more misdirection in the running game, along with some option (possibly with Goska playing a few series per game).

May as well get this thread started. Not much faith in the Sioux over at anygivensaturday. Before the season it looked like NW St. would be better than SFA, but that's not the way things have played out through the first three weeks of the season. SFA likes to throw. A lot. But can they stop anybody? Will the UND offense get into high gear? This will be a tough one, and the Sioux will need to play better than last night, but I think this is a winnable game with a strong performance.

How about the start for Hellevang? 3-3 on field goals, with two 50-yarders already!

A few random thoughts: -the extra week off may have been a mixed blessing--it allowed some players to get healthy, but it may also have resulted in the team not being as sharp as they could have been. -is the relative lack of size of our o-line part of the problem with the running game? When you consider the size of the linemen in the past two recruiting classes, it certainly appears that the current lack of size will be a temporary issue. Also, I believe one of our o-lineman had three penalties yesterday. -the tv announcers commented a few times in the second half how predictable our playcalling was--i.e. run on first and second down, and pass on third. -I'd like to see Davis get more involved in the passing game. It's clear he has some speed, and supposedly the ability to catch the ball is one of his strengths. -speaking of passing, I'd like to see us attempt to stretch the field once in awhile. Landry has a cannon, but thus far he really hasn't had much of a chance to throw downfield that I can recall. -any FCS road win is a good FCS road win.

From Mussman's comments on the coaches' show this week, it sounded likely.