Bison06

FCS football and NCAA hockey are nearly identical in their fanbases, mostly made up of alumni of the power schools and the regions immediately surrounding them. What gives FCS football the advantage in my opinion is that it just happens to be the most popular sport in the United States. Given the option between the two, the casual observer would likely choose FCS simply because it is Football, the more popular sport.

If it would have had the same impact on your season and you say that injuries happen to every team, what is the point of bringing it up and calling me out by name specifically? Every team in the nation deals with injuries, your original post seems to imply that I've somehow forgotten that UND dealt with injuries at key positions and that a team taking advantage of those injuries was the reason UND didn't have a more successful season. You don't think teams played NDSU any different without Wentz? It's just smart football. My point is, injuries can't be used as a reason a team didn't accomplish something no matter how impactful they seem. The truth is every single team is injured to a certain extent, which is why many posters have pointed to UND's lack of depth as the real reason they were unable to win those two games. UND is in the process of building that depth and will be able to weather the injury storm much better in the years to come if recruiting trends the way it has.

So if that same injury had occurred during a play you consider to be not a cheap shot it would've affected UND's season less?

Not to belabor the discussion, but the original point of looking at viewers was to show a comparison between the two sports. When you consider having 751K viewers in what you have said is the inferior timeslot, on the inferior channel, is still higher than every NCAA hockey game quoted above, your post actually speaks more to the contrary argument than yours.

UND Football 2015. The only team in the FCS to have injuries at key positions. Won't even address the dirty play issue, it's been beaten to death.

By best team in the country I meant historically(the last 4 years)I can see how you would have read it the way you did. You're right, stick isn't wentz. But that isn't what I claimed. What I'm saying is the play calling was too reliant on Carson, theories abound about why that may be. Coaches trying to show we can pass, trying to showcase an NFL arm too much etc. Without Carson, NDSU returned to a much more historical style of their offense and it has worked much better. We are a ball control, field position, grind you out team. Under Carson, we lost that identity in my opinion and put our defense in tougher positions. Would I take Carson if he were healthy for the championship. Absolutely, but only if the play calling is more in line with what we've seen them call for Stick.

Oxbow further dug his feet in with his point when asked directly, so not sure what your talking about actually.

Also, I would argue that without Wentz our offense has actually been more in line with what has made NDSU the best team in the country. The play calling was too heavily reliant on Wentz arm. Without him the offense has been much more balanced and other stars have emerged. I'm not saying they are better off without him, but in some ways the play calling has been much improved without Carson.

I watch every NDSU game and I watched this last one twice. NDSU has a way of making teams look much worse than they are by dominating the line of scrimmage and beating teams down over time. NDSU's defense is playing at an amazing level right now and would have made any team in the country look bad Friday night. Richmond was a damn good team, if you don't believe it's true, that was the only Richmond game you watched all year.

Huh? UND lost to the best team on their schedule in Fargo and got crushed by the 3rd best team on their schedule in Missoula. Portland State was a nice win.

Let's see if I can go 3 for 3. UND fans are basing this fictional line of thinking on beating one team that made the playoffs and lost in their first playoff game? Makes sense I guess. Winning games to end a season is far better than losing, so I understand why UND fans are feeling optimistic about the future. But the groupthink that has led to this false sense of feeling like UND was one of the best teams in the country at the end of the season has gone too far IMO. UND was a nice team at the end of the regular season, but realistically, UND didn't show enough against the good teams on their schedule to give anyone other than a biased observer any reason to think they would have made noise in the playoffs.

And NDSU fans are the delusional ones?

Again, you do realize you are saying that a 7-4 team that missed the playoffs is better than a national semifinalist right? What about the NDSU/UND game makes anyone around here think UND would have done better than Richmond? The scores were nearly identical.

And some of you are wondering why an NDSU fan is saying UND fans think they are a snubbed invite away from making a championship run? Now UND is better than a national semifinalist? UND was playing better at the end of the season compared to the beginning, but so are most teams who are playoff caliber. I find it interesting that UND fans think they would give NDSU a better shot now, it's quite clear that NDSU drastically improved over the course of the season as well, eg Montna games.

Honest answer: I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't know a whole lot about Parise and Oshie. I've rarely heard them say much about hockey on that show.

Every argument you make against FCS football could be turned 180 degrees back on college hockey. The average sports fan couldn't name the NCAA hockey champ from last year or any year for that matter. The point is, they are both "secondary" sports to FBS football and NCAA basketball. In that way, I see them as on equal footing in the minds of sports fans across the country. Otherwise how do you account for the fact that more people watch the FCS playoffs than watch the Frozen Four?

I don't understand this argument and I never have. The discussion is about which brings more exposure and is considered more prestigious. Not which pipeline sends more "stars" to their respective professional league. I think it could be argued, quite well, that the exposure a school gets from playing in the FCS playoffs is higher than what that same school garners from a run to the national title in NCAA hockey. We could go round and round all day, but if we look at the TV ratings and exposure, I think you'll find that the two are pretty well even, with FCS football coming out slightly ahead. http://www.sportsmediawatch.com/2015/01/unc-louisville-ratings-espn-basketball-epl-nbcsn-most-watched-fcs-college-football-championship-espn/ http://www.sbncollegehockey.com/2015/4/15/8384553/2015-frozen-four-tv-ratings-providence-boston-university-jack-eichel

Actually, that isn't all that is needed to be known. Of course all three are good, but this is sports, there are winners and there are losers. There are varying degrees of "good" and that is what's being discussed here.

I'm not saying anything, I'm merely asking a question that many people are asking today. Is the Big Sky style of play built to win in the playoffs? I believe UND is headed in the right direction under Schweigert, but given some of those "big wins" turned out to be against teams that may not have been as good as they looked at the time(I think that's a fair statement) does that do anything to temper the excitement of going 7-4? It wasn't meant as a knock in any way. If NDSU was in the same situation and beat let's say a 9-2 UNI team, and then UNI lays an egg in the playoffs, I would wonder how good of a win that UNI win really was. I'm guessing many UND fans may be saying the same about the PSU win at this point. Like I said, I think you are all correct in your optimism about the direction of the program, just wondering if that optimism is hedged a bit given the outcome of the Big Sky teams in the playoffs. The vast majority seem to say it doesn't, great, it's just a discussion starter.

This is going to come off as smack and it's a difficult question to ask this passionate group, but does seeing the lack of Big Sky success in the playoffs do anything to temper the excitement of what I consider to be a successful season for you guys? I hope that doesn't come across as an a-hole question, I'm sure it has crossed a few of your minds this morning. It would mine if the tables were turned. BTW, I was actually impressed with PSU last night, it's hard to gauge a game that's played in such crappy conditions though.

I'm not understanding what you're trying to get at. I was impressed with UND's run defense, sure, but as others have said, UND was so intent on stopping the run and hanging their hat on that against NDSU that they couldn't stop the passing attack. To say NDSU COULD NOT RUN isn't true either, they ran for over 100 yards. Frazier ran for over 80. And running stats don't get "inflated" due to long runs, those are part of the stats and typically how running backs get their yards. eg Adrian Peterson. With all this "you should see UND play now" talk, it's hard for me to understand why some on here seem to think UND is the only team that progressed over the course of the season. NDSU is also an extremely young team and IMO is dramatically better on defense then they were early on. Honest opinion, if UND and NDSU played again today, I believe NDSU would win by even more. NDSU left a lot of points on the field in September and I believe our offensive coaching staff's play calling has gelled with the player's abilities well in the second half of the season.

Every win in the playoffs is a good win. MVFC will likely be 2-1 when all is said and done today.

My apologies, I wasn't aware.

I come here because people actually like to have discussion on football vs. the circle jerk, group think, clique that bisonville has become in the last 5 years. If there is discussion that I can contribute to, I'll chime in. Has never been about telling anyone how great NDSU is, that I believe is evident without me saying a word.