UND92,96

Since Drew will be playing for the Sioux for the next four years, I kind of doubt RT would want to move away just now. Not that living in Sioux Falls would make it impossible to go to all the games, but it would make it more difficult. Plus, it might be viewed as politically incorrect for the commissioner to go to all of one school's games.

I'm surprised that this Herald article hasn't generated any discussion yet. To me, it seems so obvious that it would be a win-win situation for the Alerus and UND if UND were given a bigger percentage of the ticket revenue and possibly a break on the rent in exchange for not objecting to the Alerus selling beer in more than just the small designated area of the concourse. I don't see how UND can possibly justify taking the completely inconsistent positions regarding beer sales at the REA/BEA compared to the Alerus. Hopefully this is simply a negotiating ploy as opposed to Kupchella or one of his underlings honestly thinking that selling beer at football games is somehow a bigger problem than doing the same thing at a hockey or basketball game.

It looks like Austin is going to give basketball one last try this season, at St. Scholastica link. This will be his fourth different school in five years.

It appears the above speculation (sorry for quoting myself) is supported by the following article excerpt printed yesterday in the Omaha paper: I'm not so sure that UND going division I is exactly imminent, but nevertheless what UND decides to do probably does hold the key to the future of the league.

So do Roebuck, Glas or even RT have much input with regard to which arena the games will be played in, or is the decision essentially made 100% by REA? I want what's best for UND athletics, of course, but I don't necessarily trust Todd Berning to make that call since I would think such decisions as where home games should be played should be part of the a.d.'s job.

I'm not sure whether Glas would prefer to play all games at the Betty, but Roebuck made his opinion clear in the article in last Saturday's Herald:

It's probably not much of a surprise that schools in Florida will do well in sports like golf, tennis, baseball and soccer. Weather is a huge factor in being good at certain sports. However, as we all know, a school is not going to get as much notoriety for winning titles in tennis, golf, soccer or even baseball compared to football or basketball. And aside from one title in men's basketball, the Sunshine State has not done well in the sports most people deem the most important. That's probably why the Sunshine State never seems to come up in discussions regarding which dII conference is considered the best, regardless of how many titles they've won in tennis, golf, soccer and baseball. A conference without football, particularly one that is not even very good in basketball, is probably never going to be considered a strong one overall.

If you're interested, you can research it here.

I believe this is patently false. All property tax info is available on the internet, and I did a little research on the issue. Any discrepancy between taxes in the two cities of that magnitude would ONLY be in a situation where the Fargo property was in an older neighborhood with no remaining specials, and the "comparable" GF property was in a neighborhood with specials remaining. For example, a $120,000 home in Fargo in an older neighborhood has a consolidated tax amount of $2625. A comparable property in GF would have a consolidated tax amount of $2775. Whether $150 is substantial or not is a subjective thing, but I certainly wouldn't move based upon a savings in that amount. For newer homes with significant specials remaining, a $190,000 home in Fargo would have a consolidated tax amount of $4160, PLUS specials with a yearly installment of $1840. A comparable home in GF would have a consolidated tax amount of $4435, plus specials in the yearly amount of $990. I don't know whether these specials are typical of a new Fargo neighborhood or not, but in any event, it would appear that it's quite possible that when factoring in specials, it may actually cost more in taxes for a new Fargo home than a new GF home, despite the fact that the consolidated amount of taxes is a little higher in GF.

I'm not sure what the deal was with that Minot game drawing so well. By way of comparison, the other non-conference games played at the Ralph (aside from the Kansas game) have been UMC in 2001-02 (1812) and Minnesota-Morris last year (2278).

I'm almost positive that beer will be available just as at the Ralph.

At least in the short-term, I'm sure there's something to that. For example, last year there were four regular season men's games played at REA, with an average attendance of 4554. That's compared to the average overall of 2585. Of course, there are other variables there, including the fact that the counting at Hyslop tended to be extremely unreliable and the fact that apparently, Hyslop didn't count students as part of the overall attendance. In any event, at some point it must be decided whether it's more important to create a "true" homecourt by playing all or nearly all games at the Betty, or whether making a bit more $$$ is worth the adverse effect on the atmosphere of the game, see the NDSU game last year at the Ralph as Exhibit A of a terrible atmosphere despite the biggest announced crowd of the year.

I agree that even if 4000 turns out to be too small, it would be a good "problem" to have. According to the basketball media guide, the highest average attendance of 4432 occurred in the 1990-91 season. Probably not coincidentally, that was the second of two consecutive Elite 8 seasons, so fan interest was probably at an all-time high. Even if we could get back to having teams and crowds comparable to those from 89 to about 93, having demand exceed supply by a few hundred would be pretty cool. In terms of having a homecourt advantage, of course having a sold-out 4000 seat arena would provide an infinitely better atmosphere than having 4500 to 5000 in an 11,000-plus arena. However, whether the administration and/or REA would voluntarily give up the revenue of a few hundred tickets in exchange for maximizing atmosphere and home court advantage by keeping games in the Betty is another question. I guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

No question, this should be a great game and a big test for the Sioux. Delta St.'s offensive numbers sound very similar to what North Alabama brought to town last fall, in terms of yards and points, and the Sioux defense held them in check for the most part so I'm fairly optimistic that they can do the same to Delta if the defense plays up to its capabilities. While I won't go so far as to say Delta's players will be intimidated playing indoors, on turf in front of a hopefully large and loud crowd, I do think the unfamiliarity with the atmosphere and turf will help the Sioux, just as it has done in most of the home playoff games so far in the Alerus. It's also happened a number of times to pretty strong (on paper) out-of-region teams playing NDSU in the Fargodome early in the year.

Yes, I saw it also. He said flat-out that he is very interested in the job. Since I can only assume that he's well aware of what an assistant coach makes compared to what his current salary is, it certainly sounds like he is willing to take a pay cut in order to come back to GF.

I'm pretty sure something happened to the link overnight since yesterday it was linking to an article about Mary and division II. In any event, if you go the current archives of the Tribune, you will find the Mary article.

From the Bismarck Tribune: link

From a recent St. Joseph (MO) newspaper article:

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking, so I hadn't replied until now--not that I'm an expert, anyway. According to a January 22, 2004 Herald article, the Alerus Center gets one quarter of each year's city hospitality tax, in addition to the sales tax it generates itself from ticket sales and concessions. In 2003, the amount of that hospitality tax was $304,000 according to the aforementioned article. The article also stated that the arena made a $162,000 profit, while the convention center lost $322,000. I'm not sure the convention center itself will ever turn a profit--nor was it necessarily ever contemplated that it would. I do think that it's safe to say that there will be far more big conventions once the Canad Hotel is completed. That should give a truer indication of the extent of losses the convention center can expect in the future.

I think most of us are used to not getting much love from pollsters, so not very many UND fans will get very worked up over a perceived slight like this. With that being said, all you can do is laugh at any poll that has Nebraska-Kearney as high as 11.

Thanks for the post. I was curious as to why the games aren't played at Memorial. I suppose the other alternative would be to see whether the Grand Forks Public Schools would allow the team to play games at Cushman for a nominal fee. Natural grass, plenty of seating and parking and no snow fence! I don't see much of a chance that UND will ever build a soccer facility, nor is it probably cost-effective, so Cushman may be the only real alternative. With football at the city-owned Alerus and baseball at the park district-owned (I assume) Kraft Field, such an arrangement wouldn't necessarily be unprecedented, other than UND would be dealing with the school district instead of the park district or city.

I just got the new issue of Sports Illustrated in the mail, and Weston Dressler was one of the "Faces in the Crowd." It reads: