UND92,96

Has anybody heard anything further about this rumor?

Here's a Tom Dennis column on current and future Red River flooding. It's quite disconcerting that the river will get to the 46-48 foot range despite a winter in which we didn't have a tremendous amount of snow.

Mesa State confirmed: link.

Forum Communications is apparently quite interested in buying the Herald. link.

Per the WDAZ sports last night, Lennon has named Mannausau and Kelling co-defensive coordinators.

Yes, he was hired after the 88-89 season, which led directly to that outstanding recruiting class.

Of course I'd love to see a repeat of the 1989-90 season--Vonesh came back from an injury; Guldseth and Burkett transferred in; Jacobson and Robertson were recruited (along with Gardner who red-shirted); and together with holdovers Boschee and Ayinla, a team which was terrible the season before became great. However, I can't help but notice that the two teams that played in the region title game a few weeks ago--Winona State and Northern State--were comprised almost entirely of high school recruits. I guess my point/question is: how realistic is it that a large group of newcomers, no matter how talented they may be, will be molded into a good team? It rarely seems to work (see recent Bemidji State teams as Exhibit A), but anything is possible I suppose. I fully realize that the staff no longer has the time to recruit and develop high school talent. They need to win big next year, and bringing in a bunch of transfers is probably the only way that can happen in such a short period of time. I'm just skeptical because there have been so many talented transfers in recent years (Lolar, Austin, Allen, Swan, Phillips, etc.) who haven't panned out.

I had heard Mertens was going the juco route also, but it's hard to explain why this would have been in the Herald a couple of weeks ago if he was so sure he was going to a juco:

Are all three offers to jucos/dI transfers?

With the apparent departures of Blackwell, Probst and Wills, I would think that signing Travis Mertens would be a good idea. Additionally, I suspect the signing of a juco guard is a must. Besides Doyle, and perhaps incoming freshman Rayfield, the pickings look pretty slim since it appears unlikely Bledsoe will play any time soon, if at all.

I'm just going by the fact that traditionally, that league isn't very good (Bentley is generally the class of the conference and they've never won a title or really come all that close), and AIC only got THIRD in the conference! AIC wasn't even ranked in the last poll, and probably rightfully so given their record and the conference they play in. There's no question in my mind that they were nowhere near as good as SCSU (who wasn't as good as UND), but sometimes strange things happen in sports, and this was one of those times.

I'd be a bit surprised if Huse doesn't get the Montana State job. Oh, well. At least we can wait another year to see if Smith can have three straight great seasons at Mayville. If so, then I'm convinced he's the man for the job.

A potential starting frontcourt of Koenig, Dryburgh and Kruse would certainly be an upgrade over this past season's, especially in terms of rebounding.

Wow, from an original recruiting class of four high schoolers (Wills, Blackwell, Probst and Bledsoe), plus four transfers (Koenig, Gutter, Phillips and Miller), we're down to three remaining players less than a year later?

Did you coach the team? If so, nice work.

I believe Kruse was a pretty sought-after prospect a year ago. Any idea why things didn't work out for him at Illinois State?

I'll go out on a limb and guess the best friend from NDSCS is Thomas Dryburgh.

I'm pretty sure he is. And I think he'll have a big year.

This was in a Herald article a couple of days ago: It doesn't confirm the Mesa game, but since it says there are 10 games so far, odds are that the Mesa game is probably happening and it's just the August 26th date they're still trying to fill.

Getting talent and developing/utilizing it are two very different things. UND has had at least a couple of very talented teams in the post-Mac era, but not much to show for it. 20-22 wins and a 3rd or 4th place finish in the NCC seems to be about the ceiling for a Rich Glas team without Greg McDermott on the staff.

Here's a Herald article on the start of spring ball.

I wouldn't be all that surprised if Grand Valley is on the schedule next year. UND played them in the 2003-04 and 2005-05 seasons (both were Sioux wins).

Upon further review, Henderson is a Creighton transfer. He was Winona's 5th leading scorer on the season. In any event, the point still stands that it shows that relying on juco and dI transfers is not the only way to put together a nationally competitive dII team. I know UND recruited Jonte Flowers for football, but did we recruit him for basketball, as well? He is a good player.

I don't know about anyone else, but based on what I saw in the national championship game, I don't think either of those teams could have stayed with UND had the Sioux played an average game.

Congrats to Winona State for winning the dII title today. It should provide a certain amount of hope for a lot of teams in the NCC and NSIC as Winona won without an especially athletic backcourt or a great deal of size. They were well-coached, they could shoot the ball, and they played solid defense. I don't believe any of their main contributors were juco or dI transfers, either. Nice job, Warriors.