UND92,96

I'm curious whether anyone who has seen May-Port play thinks Kyle Nelson and/or Craig Nelson might be NCC-caliber players? Kyle is a legit 6'9" and has a very nice touch. He would definitely have to red-shirt and get stronger, but it wouldn't surprise me if ultimately he turns out to be a better college player than Tyler Koenig of Fargo North if he works hard to get stronger. It's refreshing to see a big guy who doesn't want to drift outside and shoot 3's instead of planting himself on the blocks. Craig Nelson reminds me a little of ex-East Grand Forks and Mayville St. star Travis Lindgren. It doesn't seem like he's big enough, but he just gets the job done. I don't blame Rich Glas for not recruiting Lindgren out of high school since he's only about 5'8", but in retrospect he would have been a very nice NCC point guard considering the numbers he put up in the DAC-10. Nelson is probably about 5'10", very heady, makes good decisions, and can knock down shots. I'm not sure whether he's quick enough, however. It's tough to tell watching him play against ND Class B competition. I assume he played AAU ball during the summer so that would have been a much better barometer of how he does against better competition.

I would love to see a new basketball facility, but I fail to see the point of making it a 3,200 seating capacity. UND averaged 3,800 in 2001-02 and 3,400 this year. I would think that a 4,500 to 5,000 seat facility would make more sense. It's fine if the bigger games would be moved to the big Ralph, but at least make the new facility comparable in seating capacity to Hyslop so that nearly every game doesn't have to be moved. Otherwise, what's the point in building a new facility at all? It reminds me of Minnesota's building that women's basketball/volleyball facility only to have the womens b-ball games moved to Williams Arena immediately thereafter due to lack of seating capacity.

That's very disappointing to hear about Brennan. He had the ability to be a great player. I wonder if one of the defensive ends will now move to noseguard? I assume Muro may now be the starter, with possibly Shane Duchscher and freshman Kruger in the mix also. Momerak is probably big enough to move over if necessary.

I'm not trying to say that UND should be the favorite heading into next year. On the contrary, I suspect the Sioux will be picked 4th in the league in the pre-season. But I'm just not convinced that SDSU is necessarily going to sustain what they've done this year, either. The reason I feel Pater is a bigger loss to SDSU than Boll and/or Moen are to UND is that UND has shown the ability year after year to reload and replace one great player with another. I don't think SDSU has shown that as of yet, and even with the arguably the best team they've ever had this season, they're still 1-2 against UND. There have been a number of programs that have put together some nice runs, i.e. Cal Poly Pomona, Emporia St., Southern Indiana, etc. However, all of those programs have had some poor years recently, as well. What sets UND apart in my opinion is that year after year, you can practically count on the fact that they will win 80% or more of their games. Very few programs can say that--not even NDSU, as witnessed by last season when they missed the tournament altogether. My point is simply that SDSU hasn't proven anything more than that they are capable of stringing together a couple of good seasons in a row and winning the NCC once. Whether they can beat UND consistently (they're 1-5 over the past two years), and sustain a high level of success even after losing their best player remains to be seen. I think we already know that even after losing the likes of Sheri Kleinsasser, Jenny Crouse, Jaime Pudenz, Katie Richards, Theresa LeCuyer, etc., UND still manages to be at or close to the top year after year.

In womens hoops next year, I think the top four from this year will all be pretty equal again. SDSU returns 6 of their top 8 players, but Pater is a big loss and apparently they have lost arguably their top recruit to UND (Lindsay Draayer). USD has Koupal which is enough to make them very good but they do lose their next two best players. NDSU will be solid. UND could surprise some people as even though Moen and Boll graduate, Leighton and Boese may very well become the best forward tandem in the league next year. A big key is whether one or more of the incoming class of recruits can provide a consistent 3-point threat. Between Carissa Jahner, Jenna Werdell, Jami Glick (red-shirting this year), Lindsay Draayer (if SDSU has released her from her LOI) and Val Sannes (if she recovers from her knee injury), it could be a very good group.

I did hear awhile back that Shad Carney left, probably due to a lack of playing time and the fact that he was unlikely to play much, if at all, this season. It's unfortunate that he didn't pan out, but the good news was that his departure did open up some pretty substantial scholarship money. Fortunately, between Bowenkamp, Groeschl, Manke, etc., there are still plenty of quality quarterbacks around.

Thanks for the post. I too am pretty excited about spring football and the prospects for the Sioux rebounding back to contending for the NCC title next year. That's great news about Wolf. I had no idea that he was now that big, or that he has that kind of speed. The defensive line should be pretty solid with Brennan, Momerak, Smith, Newhouse, Muro, Wolf, Peterson, etc. The pass rush definitely needs to be better than it was last season, and I hope that Babington-Johnson's speed will help there also, similar to what Eric Schmidt's speed did at the OLB position. The defensive backfield should be as fast and as deep as it's been in a while. Hoffschneider is a stud from what I've heard, Stratton and Gagner are as good a pair of safeties as anyone will have in the NCC, and hopefully between Manke, Brandsted, Franklin, Charles, etc. there will be quality depth as well. Lueck will add a whole other dimension to the offense. You don't find many guys with his combination of height (6'4"), speed (4.5) and leaping abililty (36"-plus vertical) very often. Ahlers and Stattelman are good possession receivers and Alkins and Grossman have excellent speed. Mahmoud is a proven commodity at running back and Beatty and hopefully Jim Miller will make that a deep position. The o-line mostly returns intact with an added year of experience and I'm hoping they will be one of the team's strengths. I will be very interested to see what happens at quarterback, as well. Obviously Bowenkamp has the inside track, but Groeschl may push him with a strong performance this spring.

To the best of my knowledge, Lindahl has done nothing to cause anyone to question his attitude since he's been at UND. His only issue has been whether he can play good enough defense to merit extensive playing time. I suspect that will improve with a year of NCC experience under his belt. At about 6'10" and a great shooter, I wouldn't be surprised at all if he develops into a Kyle Behrens-type talent over the next three years. Dobmeier may have gotten Mr. Basketball over him, but I think that Lindahl will end up having the much better college career when all is said and done. His brother is about 6'6" and also a very talented player. However, I'm not sure whether or not he's division II caliber. I haven't seen him play since his sophomore year at state. I would expect him to either go to DAC-10 school, a juco, or possibly an NSIC school, but that's just a guess.

I don't dispute that SDSU should be the favorite next year. But UND could be a darkhorse. Most people seem to think that once Beasley leaves, the Sioux are done. But Aaron Austin is the real deal, and quite possibly the top incoming recruit in the NCC next year. Jeff Brandt had a sub-par season, but he's still a former NCC freshman of the year and an all-conference pick as a soph. Mike Johnson has really improved and is a very talented player. Todd Rypkema has a huge upside to his game and at 6'11" is very tough to match up with. Add Adam Jacobson and Josh Doyle to the mix, along with an improved Evan Lindahl and hopefully one more talented juco front court player, and UND could be pretty tough next season.

I happened to read in the online edition of the Omaha paper that they were extremely unhappy that they weren't selected for the regional. Hmmm, let's see, maybe it was because they finished 5th in the NCC, and were only 15-10 against division II opponents? They also apparently thought UND should have voluntarily forfeited the games Allen played in. Whatever.

Has UND ever outdrawn NDSU for football? I'm not sure. Quite frankly, considering the fact that the F-M area is approximately double the population of the Grand Forks area, I would hope NDSU could muster a few thousand more per game, although they can't seem to do it for basketball. However, NDSU fans have also shown that they are front-runners, just like anywhere else. The very low attendance for all your home games last year following the UND game is proof of this. For what it's worth, I would virtually guarantee that had the Sioux-Bison game not been in Fargo last year, NDSU attendance would have been less than UND's. That gate was the only thing that saved what could have been a disastrous year financially for the football program. As far as routinely selling out the Fargodome, I wouldn't count on it during our lifetimes. Take away the UND games, and there's nothing to support the contention that NDSU is capable of selling out, or even coming close to selling out the Fargodome on a routine basis. At least unless the team returns to its 80's level of success. Somehow, I don't see how moving to I-AA will make is more likely that NDSU will become a dominating program again.

Yeah, and the selection committee sucks. I understand that when you are the beneficiary of a highly questionable decision, then it's human nature not to be very critical of it. Unfortunately, decisions such as this undermine the entire selection/seeding process. If a committee isn't going to bother following the criteria chosen by the NCAA, then at an absolute minimum it gives an appearance of impropriety, if not outright corruption and/or incompetence. Last season, this committee--with mostly the identical membership--actually selected more RMAC teams for the tournament than NCC teams! Can you imagine the idiocy such a decision requires? While they didn't have the audacity to try that again, they still managed to find another way to screw over UND for the second year in a row.

According to the NCAA website, there are six different criteria used to select/seed teams. They are, in no particular order of priority, as follows: 1. overall record 2. head-to-head results 3. record vs. common opponents 4. record within the region 5. overall strength of schedule 6. strength of schedule within the region overall record UND 25-5 NDSU 25-6 advantage: UND head-to-head results each team was 1-1 advantage: none record vs. common opponents UND 16-4 NDSU 14-5 advantage: UND won/loss record within the region UND 20-5 NDSU 16-5 advantage: UND overall strength of schedule index UND 10.6 power points per game NDSU 10.74 power points per game advantage: NDSU strength of schedule within the region UND 10.74 power points per game NDSU 10.32 power points per game advantage: UND So if you're keeping score at home, UND has the advantage in four of the six categories, is coming off an NCC tournament title including wins over the supposed top two teams in the region away from home, and yet is seeded two spots lower than NDSU. Is this fair? Perhaps if you're an NDSU fan, but probably not by any other standard.

What I find so annoying about these seedings is that coming into the NCC tournament, UND and NDSU were essentially dead even. They tied for third in the NCC, had the same number of losses overall, and split the season series. So you would think that whomever did better in the tournament would gain the upper hand. UND goes out and wins the tournament, including a convincing win over USD and a win against the number one team on their home court. Those wins count for huge power points. NDSU gets hammered in the semi-finals at SDSU, making them 0-3 on the year against the Jackrabbits. UND, by comparison, is now 2-1 against SDSU. I would defy anyone to make a convincing case that NDSU merits being seeded higher than UND after this past week. I don't think it's possible. Either the committee somehow got UND and NDSU confused when doing the seedings, or some people on this committee are dishonest and/or incompetent. This is the second year in a row that UND has been screwed in the seedings so draw your own conclusions here.

Unbelievable. The UND women are seeded fifth? Give me a break! How the hell can NDSU be seeded third? This may be the most brainless committee ever. You would swear that the committee thought NDSU swept the season series with UND or something. UND was 4-4 against the other three good teams in the NCC. NDSU was 2-5, with three of the losses being total blow-outs. I guess there wasn't really any point to the playing the NCC tournament because UND gained nothing by beating the supposed two best team in the region on the road (or on a neutral court in the case of USD), while NDSU wasn't penalized at all by getting hammered yet again by SDSU. What a joke.

This is strictly a guess, but here is how I see the seedings for the regionals: Women 1. SDSU 2. USD 3. UND 4. Kearney 5. UMD 6. NDSU 7. Regis 8. Southwest St. If Kearney loses today, they would fall down to about sixth. It would certainly be interesting to have a UND-NDSU match-up in the first round. The Herald speculated that UND could be seeded as high as second, but I doubt the committee will jump the Sioux ahead of USD considering USD was the co-champion of the league and won two of three against UND. Men 1. Kearney 2. St. Cloud 3. Fort Hays 4. Metro St. 5. SDSU 6. UND 7. Fort Lewis 8. UMD or MSU-Moorhead Northern State should be out because they were only ranked 10th last week, lost in their conference tournament, and lost head-to-head to the Sioux. UNO was only 8-8 (10-9 counting the tournament) in the NCC and lost two of three to UND. NDSU just had too many losses and the home loss to UND should have ended their hope of getting the nod over the Sioux. Nobody else seems to have much of a case for getting in.

Good news--St. Cloud beats UNO in mens basketball. Better news--UND women defeat SDSU in Brookings 90-87! Just when I thought the Sioux were down and out after blowing big leads to USD and NDSU, they rebound for their third straight NCC tournament title. The bad news is that had they not blown those two big leads, odds are that UND would have hosted the regional. At least they have regained momentum heading into the playoffs.

I completely agree that the regional committee should not be able to hold the whole Allen situation against UND when it is selecting teams. My concern is based on the fact that this rumor about how it MAY be used against the Sioux has been mentioned by Rich Glas, the UNO coach in the Omaha paper, and in more than one article in the Forum. Of course, since NDSU and UNO might benefit from such a ruling, it probably shouldn't come as a surprise that they are floating that idea around at every opportunity. The committee would have a credibility problem in my opinion by jumping NDSU, USD, UNO (if they lose tonight), etc. over UND because IF they were going to somehow penalize UND for the Allen situation, then they should have just been up front about it and not been including UND in the rankings at all to this point. It's not like this just now became known. Also, the criteria about considering the availability of players was clearly adoped in the event that a star player should go down with an injury late in the year. For example, had Jerome Beasley been injured against UNO, then I'm certain that this would have been a consideration used against the Sioux. I DON'T think this criteria has any relevance to Allen's absence. Finally, while the make-up of the committee is different from the football regional committee, I think it's relevant that UNC was not penalized for their use of an ineligible quarterback for three games and was chosen for the playoffs.

The men really need St. Cloud to knock off Omaha tonight, and for Northern State to win the NSIC tournament. I have a feeling that the RMAC will get four teams in and the NCC is only going to get three teams into the playoffs. St. Cloud and SDSU are locks from the NCC which probably leaves only one spot. If Omaha happens to beat St. Cloud, the Sioux are in big trouble and I don't believe they'll make the field. While it's certainly possible that the Myron Allen situation will be used against the Sioux (seven wins with an ineligible player), I don't believe that the committee can do what the NCAA itself did not do, i.e. count those games as forfeits. UND probably has the third-best credentials among the NCC teams, played very well down the stretch (aside from Tuesday's game) and obviously did finish third in the conference without Allen. While it's not technically a criteria used by the committee in selecting teams for post-season, these are the records of teams on the bubble (including UNO, Northern St. and Fort Lewis if they don't win the conference tournament and get an automatic bid) against dII opponents: UND 17-8 UNO 15-9 (pending the outcome of SCSU game) NDSU 16-11 Northern 17-7 (but only 1-4 against the NCC) Fort Lewis 18-9 UND does have the head-to-head advantage against Northern St. and UNO. I'm not including USD due to their lengthy late-season losing streak, but I guess they are also conceivably on the bubble.

I don't think the two are mutually exclusive. Why not educate students as to what is and what is not appropriate behavior, while at the same time moving them from immediately behind the opposing team's bench so that those who aren't willing to be educated can't do as much damage?

The bottom line to me is that if the seats immediately behind the opposing team's bench are reserved for fans of that school--as is done at UND--you don't have anywhere near these kinds of problems. If somebody is heckling you from 50 or 100 feet away, that's one thing. But when that person is 5-10 feet away and practically in the coach's face, it's a little different. I imagine if a large group of UND students were sitting 5 feet behind Amy Ruley, things would get pretty ugly, too. Fortunately, UND reserves that section for fans of the visiting team. I don't think it's too much to ask for NDSU to do the same.

According to Tuesday's Herald, 6'0" forward Lindsay Draayer of Owatonna, Minnesota has given the UND women a verbal commitment. However, according to the SDSU website, she signed a letter of intent with them back in November. Does anybody know what the deal is?

UND recruit Aaron Austin is having quite a year at Fergus Falls Community College. They won the Minnesota state tournament over the weekend, with Austin going for 33 in the title game against Minneapolis Community and Technical College. Austin was also named tournament MVP. Fergus is now 27-1 on the year. Coming into the tournament, Austin was averaging 21 points, 2.5 steals, and 5.4 assists per game, and he scored well above his average during the tournament. He's going to have a big impact for the Sioux next year.