UND92,96

Although Belmore is a good quarterback and has put up very good numbers, I'd really like to see him improve on his pocket presence. He has a tendency to stand in the pocket too long when it should be abundantly clear that things are caving in around him and he needs to either throw it away or take off and scramble. There was a play yesterday where he avoided a defender, and then stood there looking for a receiver when he should have realized that the guy he had just avoided was going to hit him again. He's a very effective runner, and I'd like to see take off a little more often, and do more roll outs where he can either throw or run. Maybe he's not very good throwing on the run, I don't know, but I just hate to see him stand in the pocket on obvious passing downs, because he's been sacked a few too many times this year, and several of those sacks have been at least as much his fault as the line's.

SDSU played their home game against UC-Davis yesterday at Sioux Falls. According to an article in the Argus-Leader earlier in the week, they apparently had high hopes in terms of attendance--somewhere around 10,000--but only drew a little over 7200. That would have to be considered a disappointment all things considered.

I think Duluth has a good team, but frankly, beating Omaha right now, particularly at home, is not that big of an accomplishment. Omaha's defense is horrible, and with Denney out and Day severely hobbled, their offense is not particularly strong, either. A lot of pressure will be on Duluth's freshman quarterback to produce, because they won't be able to run the ball at all against the Sioux. They couldn't run the ball today, and Omaha's defense is not even close to UND's. I'm glad Duluth won, but in all honesty, with UNO's injury situation, the Omaha team Duluth beat by 3 in Duluth would likely have been beaten by about 28 had they played the Sioux at the Alerus today. It will be a tough game next Saturday, but a game UND should definitely win if they play the way they have through the first seven games. Duluth is not as good as St. Cloud State, in my opinion.

Here's confirmation from the Herald of the Youngblut commitment.

Jim- Forgive me for copying a post from another forum, but this was posted on d2football.com by the PSAC commissioner and it contains some interesting information:

I'm assuming it must have something to do with post-season field goals made, as this was in the Forum article this morning:

The minutes from the May, 2005 meeting have been posted. It's apparently expected that there will be a budget shortfall of about $250,000 for fiscal year 2005.

Here is a Forum article on the Big Sky meeting from yesterday. Is it a surprise that a 12-team, 2-division Big Sky didn't even warrant much discussion?

Maybe I'm missing something here, but even IF UND were to officially drop the Fighting Sioux name and logo, why would the logos have to be removed from either the Ralph or Betty? My understanding is that the Ralph wasn't going to host any more regionals anyway due to the movement to keep those tournaments from on-campus arenas. As for basketball, any regionals could easily be held at the Alerus, if necessary. Unless I'm misreading the NCAA edict, they're saying that the list of supposedly offensive schools can't host an NCAA post-season event so long as they persist in using the name(s), and they can't wear uniforms containing said names/logos. I don't think they can or would require the logos to be removed or covered unless perhaps that particular arena was going to be hosting the post-season event. The following is a quote from the NCAA press release announcing the denial of UND's appeal:

Here they are:

South probably has the best team, but it looks like they may have to make a return trip to Bismarck in the semi's if Central wins out and gets the number one seed from the East. Beating Bismarck twice in one year on their home field will not be any easy task. My prediction right now is a Central-Bismarck state title game. Central over Minot, and Bismarck over South in the semi's as both teams get revenge for early-season losses.

This was a good day for UND's strength of schedule index as well, with West Chester, Winona State and Central Washington all winning to go 4-2. I will be shocked if UND is not ranked number one in the first northwest regional poll this week, regardless of what Grand Valley State does tonight. Grand Valley is apparently struggling as they're up just 14-10 at the half at home vs. winless Wayne State. EDIT: GVSU ended up winning 36-22, and they had to score the last 14 points of the game to do it. Let's see--no wins over ranked opponents, and back-to-back close wins over unranked teams. How can anybody still be voting them number one?

Pitt State lost in OT.

I'd be surprised if we see him again this year, but hopefully it wasn't as serious as it looked.

Congrats to GFC for a very hard-earned win last night over the top-ranked team in the state, Fargo South. I can probably count on one hand the number of time Central has beaten South in football in the past 25 years, so this win is especially gratifying. Hopefully Central can run the table in the final three EDC games and get home field for the quarterfinals and semi's if they make it that far. AAA football is wide open this year as there are no unbeatens left, so this is probably as good of a chance as any for a GF team to break the long state title drought.

New roster has been posted.

I could buy this scenario a lot more easily had this been a case of NDSU recruiting her hard only to ultimately lose her to UND. In that situation, calling her and wishing her the best and giving her the "if you decide to change your mind, our offer still stands" line would probably have been fine. However, the Herald article on her verbal commitment, which presumably contained information directly from Jossy, said this: Why not include NDSU in that group if they had shown her any serious interest? The article strongly implies that any attention NDSU had given her had either been tepid at best, or had occurred some time ago, at least in Jossy's opinion. Under these circumstances, why would an NDSU coach have bothered to call her AFTER her verbal commitment when they apparently hadn't been recruiting her much if at all during the several months BEFORE her verbal commitment became public knowledge? I know bisonguy is not dumb by any means, but I just can't buy that his scenario is a logical explanation under these particular circumstances.

It appears that a lot of tickets have been sold so far. I just went on ticketmaster to see where the best seats available are, and they are currently in section 201, which is one of the four corner sections--which are also the four smallest sections in the Alerus. I would think a crowd in the 12,000 to 13,000 vicinity is a very real possibility.

I agree that speed isn't everything for a back, see Shannon Burnell as exhibit A, but it's a very rare occurrence for a dI program to offer a scholarship to a smallish running back who doesn't have true sprinter's speed. Even Phillip Moore, one of the fastest running backs ND has ever produced, only attracted dI attention as a defensive back. You're evidently pretty tuned into the South program. Which schools do you see recruiting him (and Richard)?

I have to think this story will come out before too long in either the Herald or Forum. I suspect Ruley will simply offer up a "no comment" rather than having the audacity to plead ignorance regarding Jossy's commitment to UND. I don't believe for a minute that either Roebuck or Ruley isn't aware of a ND kid verballing to the other program within a few days of it happening. And this verbal happened a few months ago, even though it only recently found its way into the papers. Heck, all Amy had to do was ask Jossy's brother Chad about her situation before calling her. He's on the track team at NDSU.

I can confirm that Amy Ruley did indeed contact Jossy Bergan and offered her a scholarship within the past few days.