UND92,96

UND has committed 50 turnovers over the past two games.

It's hard to be too confident given the fact that the Sioux are coming off a fairly lackluster performance against Seattle Pacific, but this should be UND's best chance to knock off an opponent from a major conference. Northwestern is 3-8, and only beat another transitional program, Houston Baptist, by eight points.

What a difference a year makes: link

Forum article on Nicole Smart.

I had to leave at halftime. O.K., I didn't "have to", but struggling for the second game in a row against a DAC opponent was just too much for me to bear.

There have been several articles in Minnesota newspapers this past week about UMD running back Isaac Odim, who played a huge role in UMD's turnaround from last year, and in their national championship run. Here's one that was in the Strib yesterday. Interesting reading.

I thought it was ridiculous to make attendance comparisons to past years based upon a combined five home games between the men and women, only one of which (women's game vs. Eastern Michigan) was a matchup that anybody but the hardest of the hardcore fans could possibly care much about. Everybody knew that with such poor home schedules, attendance wasn't going to be good this year. But let's at least wait until we see a few more games against peer opponents, such as USD, before we make any comparisons to past years. In all honesty, besides the January 24 doubleheader vs. USD and the women's game already played vs. Eastern Michigan, are there any games on the schedule that could reasonably be expected to generate any buzz whatsoever? Next year will be better, as some of the dI opponents played on the road this year will be coming to Grand Forks.

A team from the NSIC just won a national championship in dII football. Isn't that one of the signs of the apocalypse?

I definitely agree with you regarding the juco issue for the next several years. But I believe had a player signed prior to last season, he would have been grandfathered in and would have been eligible for this season. The opportunity to play dI competition for a year should have given UND a leg up on most any dII's recruiting the same kid. To the extent there was a failure in juco recruiting, it may have been in not getting a transfer prior to last season who could have given us an inside presence now.

link

I don't know the answer. I guess the staff needs to do a better job of targeting kids who really want to be here. Even taking Rayfield out of the equation, who was not recruited by Jones, two of the first three Jones high school recruits lasting one season or less is not very good. Agreed. We need to be able to win, and usually in convincing fashion, against NAIA/dIII/less-than-fully-funded dII's. The post situation is also a pet peeve for me. I get somewhat annoyed when the excuse of of Lehnertz's injury is brought up. Ben was a walk-on his first few years in the program. These should not be the types of players who are irreplaceable when they get hurt. Even Valley City had post players who could take up space and score an occasional basket. We are using 6'5" small forwards in the post. Were there no 6'7" jucos who could have provided a band-aid until this year's red-shirts may be ready in a year or two? I remember those days well, and it definitely seems like a long time ago. I look forward to the day when I start going to men's games because I really want to, rather than out of a sense of obligation.

I actually grew up about five blocks from Simplot, and the "french fry" smell never really bothered me. Now Crystal Sugar, on the other hand...

Fans have become used to a losing UND men's basketball program, and apathy set in years ago. But let's also remember that a couple of years ago the WBCA recognized UND for having "best fans" in dII women's basketball. So I disagree that nobody cares about basketball in this town.

I believe there are multiple reasons for UND men's basketball having been down for a number of years. Maybe the single biggest reason is a combination of the failure to retain high school recruits, along with a number of injuries which have hampered some of those who stayed. Here's a summary of the high school recruiting classes who came to UND for the 03-04 season through the 07-08 season. I'm excluding all players who I believe came in as walk-on's. 2003-04 Josh Doyle--probably would have been a solid player but for multiple knee injuries. Mike Gutter--fairly talented, but he left after a year, then came back, and then quit again after jr. year. 2004-05 Daniel Harkins--similar story as Josh Doyle in terms of injuries robbing him of what could have been a nice career. At least he's finally healthy this year and playing well. Dane Seckar-Anderson--left after a couple of years. Never played a lot. 2005-06 Travis Bledsoe--has been a nice player. Andy Wills--one year and gone. Jesse Blackwell--one year and gone. Geoff Probst--one year and gone. 2006-07 Derek Benter--has played a fair amount last season and so far this year, but hasn't really distinguished himself yet. Rion Rayfield--signed LOI, but was released after Glas/Herbst were let go. Has apparently been a fairly good player at dII Florida Southern. 2007-08 Pat Mitchell--looks like he'll be good. Denny Dumas--one year and gone. Griffan Callahan--one semester and gone. In addition to the above, we've had a number of transfers not pan out/leave early/have injury problems, which certainly hasn't helped matters. I guess we can hold out hope that this year's red-shirts can reverse the trend of the past five years.

Wes Porter was injured last night, and sat on the bench the second half with one of his feet in a walking boot. Darius Joseph also sat out with an injury, although it doesn't sound like his is serious. Not that it provides any sort of excuse for last night's performance. Maybe it's time to add a player or two from the football team.

I was there, and it was a terrible performance. We didn't deserve to win this game, and Valley City St., although I commend their effort, was not a talented team by any means.

I think the struggles of this season are a combination of this year's version of the Sioux being probably below average compared to most other Roebuck-coached teams of the past 20 years, and a reasonably tough schedule. It appears there's no shortage of weak dI women's teams just like there's no shortage of weak dII teams: link

Considering Youngblut, Guinn and Bagaason combined for three points, I'm surprised it was only an eight-point margin.

UMD is up 17-0 at the half vs. California (PA).

It seems to me that if a lack of athletic ability was a nearly insurmountable problem at the dI level, shouldn't the 2005-06 and 2006-07 NDSU teams have gone virtually winless vs. dI opponents? Seriously, those Bison teams had almost no talent to speak of, and lost at home to the likes of UMD, MSU-Moorhead and Bemidji St., and yet had roughly a dozen dI wins over tournament-eligible teams those two seasons, and suffered relatively few blowout losses. They even had a couple of respectable showings vs. then-ranked teams at Minnesota and New Mexico. This certainly isn't one of the most talented Sioux teams we've seen, but I still find it very disappointing to get blown out by teams that probably aren't that great. Maybe Green Bay is or will be, but Wyoming certainly isn't judging by their other results so far this season.

I interpreted Mussman's comments as meaning if there's a comparable offer to a kid from UND and a post-season eligible program, UND's chances go down "a little bit." That's probably accurate more often than not. But UND does have some advantages as you pointed out. I suspect Mussman was meaning that there are some solid players returning, but we need some real difference-makers along the lines of Digger, Schmidt, O'Neel, etc. Maybe there just aren't any of those types of players in the program right now. I also wonder if Fonseca is still an option? There was some talk of him not red-shirting, but as far as I know he was never on the sideline this year. I can only speculate that there may have been some eligibility issues?

This Herald article contains a lot of good information.

94 UND 71 N. Arizona FINAL

Sioux up 68-43 with just under 9 minutes to go.

It was certainly not dI competition, but UND won the Wisconsin-Parkside tournament today over the host team.