UND92,96

I must admit that I really thought this might be something of a rebuilding year for the Sioux after losing two All-American players, and I kind of expected that UND may finish as low as fourth in the NCC for the first time in a long, long time. But through the first 17 games of the year, UND may very well be the best team in dII. I'll be the first to admit you can't put too much stock into comparing scores against common opponents, but you can't help but notice, for example, that UND beat UNO by 51 one night after NDSU beat them by 12, and UND beat USD by 23 (and the game really wasn't even that close) one night before USD beat NDSU. SDSU has also shown to be pretty vulnerable judging by their loss last night at St. Cloud and their two non-conference losses to NSIC teams. Enthusiasm probably has to be tempered somewhat until after the next couple of weeks, however. UND faces arguably its toughest three-game stretch of the regular season with consecutive road games in Brookings, Sioux Falls and Fargo. If the Sioux can win two of those three, then I think the sky's the limit for this team. Even one win out of three will keep the Sioux in pretty good position for a possible NCC title.

I thought Mueller was terrible last night. Actually, he's looked pretty worthless the last two times USD has come to Grand Forks. He insisted on taking the ball inside on several occasions only to get his shot blocked. Probably not too surprising since he's about 5'11" with what appears to be about a 2" vertical. How's this for a slump: USD has now lost eight straight against NCC opponents going back to last year. They dropped their last four conference games of the 2002-03 season, lost in the first round of the NCC tournament, and are now 0-3 in the conference this year. As for the Sioux, is Lindahl the most improved player in the league or what? 26 points, 16 boards, 2 blocks and 2 steals. He's gone from averaging under 5 points per game last year to 15 per game this year. Plus he's become a pretty effective rebounder as witnessed by last night's game.

From allcanadagridiron.com: It's pretty doubtful we would have much of a chance of getting this kid if he's drawing serious IA interest, but it's pretty impressive that we could get him to visit. I believe he's one of the top few running backs in Canada.

An update on Matt Lien of Duluth Denfeld (you need to scroll down a little bit).

I got my SI yesterday, and as expected, UND and/or Grand Forks were well-represented in the ND feature. Some of the highlights were UND hockey being listed as the favorite college team, four of the six "alltime best" athletes being Grand Forks or UND athletes, four of the five "numbers" factoids being about UND athletes or coaches (including Bowenkamp's dII title game record 28 completions), and Grand Forks having the most factoids in the "who and where" section. NDSU fans can't be happy about being referred to as the "Bisons."

While I would agree that the UND front seven is not particularly big, I don't think this year's roster was very accurate and thus, it might be a bit misleading. Cases in point: Shane Duchscher was listed at 237 in the "official" roster, and 260 in the media guide. Jason Peterson listed at 230 in the roster, and 257 in the media guide. Digger Anderson listed at 210 in the roster, and 222 in the media guide. Eric Halstenson listed at 210 in the roster, and 227 in the media guide. Tony Hermes listed at 200 in the roster, and 227 in the media guide. Brook Meier listed 210 in the roster, and 230 in the media guide. Jake Nordick listed at 210 in the roster, and 224 in the media guide. There are other examples as well, but you get the idea. I believe that whomever was compiling the roster was using old information in many cases, and in some cases two and three year old information. Chris Kuper made reference to this fact in an article posted awhile back in the Anchorage newspaper about how he didn't have any idea why he was listed at 280 in the roster when he's actually closer to 315. With all that having been said, I think the only guys who are significantly undersized for their position(s) are probably Dahlen, who probably isn't any more than about 200, and Babington-Johnson, who is probably about the same. But of course, Dahlen was all-NCC as a sophomore, and Bab-John has shown the ability to make plays, so their lack of bulk hasn't been and probably won't be a problem.

From allcanadagridiron.com:

I guess it just all depends on how a person wants to define what it means to be a sports town. For me, I couldn't live in Bismarck because I love college sports and Mary and BSC aren't too enticing to me personally. They do a nice job with hosting state tournaments, however, and in terms of providing opportunities for participatory-type sports, maybe they are better than GF and Fargo. Although I'm sure many NDSU fans would disagree, I think Grand Forks is the best sports town in terms of having the most and best variety of games to attend. UND football, mens and womens basketball and hockey, state high school hockey every year, state track every other year, state football every other year, recently hosting state Class A girls basketball and state volleyball, occasional NHL exhibition games, world junior hockey coming up, dII mens basketball elite eight coming up, etc. Really, about the only major state sporting event Grand Forks doesn't have is state Class B boys basketball, which admittedly is probably the best ND high school event.

Getting back to the matter at hand, UND is apparently recruiting another kid from Alaska, according to this link.

That could be. White does have the big frame (6'6") that you typically like to see in an offensive lineman, but upon further review you're probably correct.

First, to say that these schools have historically been better at hockey than UND is your opinion, and not a very informed one at that. Second, what exactly is your point? It seems to me that UND has been doing just fine in football, thank you.

It never ceases to amaze me how certain ignorant people want to portray hockey as some sort of boogeyman. Not to mention the irony of a fan of a school where basketball is clearly number one lamenting how a football player would attend a so-called hockey school. Classic.

That's interesting. I remember when he signed out of high school he was considered quite a catch for the Sioux. I think he was also voted offensive scout player of the year in 2001, but unfortunately he wasn't able to get any higher than about fourth on the depth chart during the 2002 season.

Based upon an article in the Herald a few weeks after the season ended, I'd say Braegelmann might be in the mix in the offensive line, also. In that article, it listed as offensive newcomers to watch Braegelmann, Bauer and Andy White (was an olb/de coming out of high school so apparently he changed positions) on the line, Presthus, Weber and Ott at receiver (no mention of Ranson--I hope he'll be a factor, also) and Drew Thomas at tight end. It should be a battle for the backup quarterback postion, with Belmore, Manke and possibly Groeschl if he doesn't stay at receiver being in the mix. Somebody had mentioned that Carney may be back also, but I haven't heard any confirmation of that. It will definitely be interesting to see how the receiver position shakes out. Johnson and Grossman would seem to have the inside track for two of the top four spots. Weber, Ranson, Presthus, Ott, Van Dyke and Loegering will all potentially be in the mix, also. I am anxious to see Presthus play as I understand he has great hands and at 6'4", he'll be a tough matchup for most db's.

Just a couple of comments on Jackson's place among the all-time greats of ND. First, we have to remember that the NBA of the 60's had far fewer teams than today, so the mere fact that he carved out a fairly lengthy career is pretty impressive in and of itself. Also, he played college ball in an era of freshman ineligibility for varsity sports, so the fact that he still scored over 1,700 points and the fact that he held the all-time UND scoring record for more than 20 years is pretty impressive, also. He also led UND to two final fours in the old "college division" of college basketball. As for his coaching, that is also factored into the equation. If you look at the SI list of a few years back, Amy Ruley was listed as number 8 despite the fact that she's not even a ND native and never played any sport in the state, so Jackson's numerous NBA titles probably did put him over the top of Erstad and others. I have to give a couple of plugs to fellow Grand Forks Central grads Cliff Cushman and John Bennett also. Both won olympic silver medals in the 50's, Cushman in the 440 hurdles and Bennett in the long jump. The odds against a North Dakotan ever winning another olympic track medal are pretty staggering, so you have to give a lot of credit to those guys.

For what it's worth, new Nebraska coach Bill Callahan has fired all but two of Solich's assistants, including the defensive coordinator and the secondary coach, according to this link. How this would affect any recruitment of Rory Manke, I don't know.

Take this for what it's worth since it's third or fourth hand information, but I spoke with my "source" and he hadn't heard of any commitment by Manke as of this past weekend. He said that Rory still had a couple of visits yet to take, but that as far as he knew, UND was still very much in the picture. Again, I can't vouch for the 100% accuracy of this, but it sounds quite possible that no decisions have been made as of yet.

On the one hand, this wouldn't surprise me because I believe it is his goal to play IA football. On the other hand, since Callahan hasn't even hired a staff yet, it would seem like an odd time for anyone to be committing to Nebraska since whomever is doing the recruiting may not even have their job in another day or two. Also, I believe Nebraska has really put a premium on speed in the secondary and although Rory has good speed, it's certainly not in the legit 4.5 or better range. It wouldn't have necessarily surprised me if he had committed to Minnesota since I believe they have been talking to him for awhile, but Nebraska? I'm not doubting your info, it just seems a little odd under the circumstances. I know someone who is friends with his family so I'll try to get some kind of confirmation of this.

From allcanadagridiron.com: Looks like it's going to be tough for UND to sign this kid. Also, there's a kid from Donovan Alexander's high school in Winnipeg named Chaanse Fennell who is 5'11", 200 lbs. and who ran for 1279 yards (more than 10 yards per carry) and 17 touchdowns in just 7 games. I don't know whether UND has looked at him but he sounds like a pretty decent prospect.

After being on the short end of a 30-point blowout to a not overly talented team one night removed from a home loss to NDSU, of all teams, it looks like a goal of a .500 conference record may be too high--much too high--for the UND mens team. Pretty pathetic performance last night. With two tough home games coming up next weekend, followed by three more road games, wins next week are imperative. EDIT: I spoke with someone who was at the game and he said that the Sioux showed very minimal intensity and just kind of sleep-walked through the game. When you don't have much talent to begin with, you certainly should be willing to at least out-work and out-hustle the opponent, even if ultimately you lose due to the opponent being better than you are. I don't know what to make of this team right now.

I believe last year's game set an NCC attendance record with a crowd of over 8800. I doubt that record will be broken (unless it happens with this year's UND-NDSU game) since no other arena can hold that many. But without Beasley as a box office draw and with neither mens team likely to be an NCC contender, I doubt this year's crowd will be as large. I hope I'm wrong.

I suppose to be more accurate, this year's games should be touted as the last matchup as division II opponents. I don't believe anyone really believes that the series is permanently over. There will probably only be a period of a few years where the teams won't play. More than likely, the two teams will be in the same division again within five to ten years.