jdub27

Has their been anything more predictable in this whole saga than the showdown between allowing this to happen and the backlash if/when they don't allow it?

Close enough, though I've made it clear I thought they eliminated a handful of nicknames I feel would have been better options for reasons I disagreed with. In reality, the criteria was a pipe dream for plenty of reasons. There is no all-encompassing, magic nickname out there that no one has thought of, checks every box and someone isn't going to find something wrong and/or offensive with. Every single individual has a different opinion on what is required to meet those requirements. What one person feels is unique and promotes a sense of strength, another thinks the exact opposite. People have different perspectives, which is why a large committee wasn't going to come up with a handful of choices everyone agrees with or thought fit the criteria. That being said, they had no choice but to use a big committee because people complain so much that their voice wasn't heard or their group wasn't represented. We've already seen those complaints twice since then (logo and now the mascot choice). My overall point is that people keep blaming the committee because UND ended up with the most generic nickname of the bunch. They shoulder a bit of the blame for not eliminating it, however the true blame is on the stakeholders who twice voted it as their top choice. That group was well aware of the criteria as well, yet Fighting Hawks managed to come out on top in both rounds of voting.

Four of the five choice for stakeholders had to choose from wasn't a bird or color. Quit shifting the blame off the group that is the one that actually picked the nickname.

He never claimed UND received less money, he claimed they received a smaller percentage of their revenue from the state, which are two different things. On top of that, a 2015 budget isn't going to show what actually happened over the biennium in terms of actual revenues and breakdown of where they came from.

Interesting comment by Kennedy. Will be interesting to see the responses to this.

Did he rig the voting? People wanted a voice, so they were given input. No one forced the stakeholders to compound and then finalize something that you can claim as a mistake the committee made. They were tasked with coming up with a new nickname and gave people 5 options and the vote of the stakeholders is why we are where we are. This blaming the President or the committee is a complete cop-out. The stakeholders picked Fighting Hawks as their top choice twice.

I don't see how that's still on the stakeholders for voting it the top choice twice and making the actual selection. They had two chances to remedy what the committee missed and didn't do so. They pretty much had to do a top 5 to include Nodaks in the vote after the backlash about removing "no nickname" (which should have never been considered in the first place). However even if they would have just went with the top 3 choices, I can't imagine there still isn't at least a similar type of argument going on today because if we're being honest, for a large contingent of those opposed, whatever was picked wasn't going to matter, they were going to hate it.

Tough to put it all on the committee when students, faculty and staff (including retirees), alumni, donors and season ticket holders were the ones who actually picked it. Complain all you want that the committee (chaired by former hockey player Karl Goehring) failed by leaving it in the finalist group, but the blame lies on those that voted for picking it over Nodaks, North Stars, Roughriders and Sundogs. Looking at how the committee actually ranked the 7 original finalists using the criteria you mentioned, they preferred Roughriders (48 points) followed by Sundogs and North Stars (46 points), Nodaks (42), Fighting Hawks (41), Green Hawks (35) and no nickname (21). The people that voted had two different chances to eliminate Fighting Hawks, when the list was narrowed from 5 to 3 and the final vote. Yet it came out on top both times. Again, the committee may have left it on there but it wasn't them that picked it.

That's a fine position to have, but my point is they are doing their thing in a way that is detrimental to UND, the University they supposed support (or I guess the University that sponsors the hockey team they support ). If they weren't, I wouldn't care. The fact that this whole disaster has been going on for over a decade and finally appeared have a resolution and UND was going to be able to put it in the past, move on and focus on promoting itself instead of having to battle it's own supporters, yet here we are.

It's better than whatever SDSU is doing....

It was worded poorly on my part, but UND is trying to move forward and people are undermining that. UND should be done wasting time and resources on the Fighting Sioux nickname, however it does appear that they are actually still spending time on the Sioux Forever people because I have seen multiple responses where a UND official account has had to correct a flat out lie on social media by pointing them to very accessible correct information because apparently facts don't matter when you're still fighting a battle that was lost over a decade ago. They also have to overcome the constant negativity coming out of that group, which takes more resources than if people would accept reality and move on or at least accept reality and quit with the negativity towards the University they support because they don't agree with a new nickname and logo.

Because they are undermining the efforts UND is making to finally move forward and quit wasting time and resources on a fight that was lost a decade ago?

You're really grasping at straws if you're trying to use social media comments as some sort of scientific evidence to back up your claims, especially considering the majority making those comments never have given a penny to UND or attended. Talk is cheap, people love to hear themselves complain and judging from the comments, apparently have no concern for actually accuracy while making those claims. When you see people's argument against spending $35K on a mascot (from private, donated funds) is they should instead use the money to bring back the $2MM/year black hole that was women's hockey, you can have them on your "side" all day long. Their opinion has no bearing on the actual situation or reality for that matter, but you can continue to count them in your "97%" since that apparently makes you feel good about yourself and stance that continues to be further and further in the rear view mirror.

I mean, yeah. They are the ones literally booing their own team's mascot at every mention at the REA and posting the continue negative comments on social media...

Other than at hockey games, we'll have to agree to disagree. For how much everyone keeps repeating how no one will accept it, I've been surprised at the amount of FH gear that I've seen in public and at community events. Parents are even dressing their kids in it!! Also, I'd like to know where all this free stuff is handed out at so I can get some as well. Other than Junior Champions Club (which has always given out free shirts and paid for by a sponsor business), I can't think of any great examples of mass amounts of free gear being given out or at least anything outside what was previously done.

I'm confused why people are so surprised about a bird logo and/or mascot looking like a bird.

Yep, really tough to distinguish bird feathers from ones that look like some sort of a headdress.

Predictable responses on social media. I think everything was covered in the first 30 minutes of the designs being released: Sioux Forever (just need a little more time to move on I guess) Waste of money, should be used to bring back women's hockey (math must be hard) Local company should have gotten the work (lot of those around ) The right group of people didn't get input (still working on finding that right combination) I think they did a decent job. It looks like a bird. The clothing is interchangeable. The committee wanted to make sure all three had fairly neutral clothing during the voting process so it didn't influence anything (hockey jersey, football jersey, etc). It clearly states on every single on that the attire can be changed. Biggest difference between them is the head shape/design and leg color, otherwise they are pretty similar.

Kennedy doesn't have a vision of FBS. Nor do the majority of other schools you listed. UND is currently at where they belong. You claim UND doesn't want to associate with those schools, yet you have continously linked them to schools that are much worse than those. You keep tieing UND's move to the Summit as some sort of tie to an FBS move. I am unequivocally telling you that it had absolutely zero to with that. That is coming from people involved in the discussions. The only move they may come from the Summit by July 1 is the loss of IUPUI and/or the addition of another though, possibly UMKC. There will not be any realignment announcements. I like the idea of some sort of combination of Summit and Big Sky schools forming a Great North type of conference, however I don't see a situation where it ever happens

I did listen to and in fact have heard the stories in person from him prior to the podcast. I have also heard his thoughts and vision on where UND should be and what you're describing isn't even close at this point in time. FBS is not in the radar, there are a lot more important things to address. No need need to take Faison's word on the Montana's not moving east, there are plenty of other people who have a lot more knowledge stating the exact same thing. I also told you UND was going to Summit/MVFC shortly before it happened yet you were insistent that it wasn't. Sometimes you need to listen to what people actually say instead of trying to interpret some secret meaning out of everything. It's fun to speculate some of these things but to present them as absolute fact when they are just pure guesses at best and almost all of them don't happen really hurts your credibility. You still haven't given a timeline on these big moves.

That "solution" just creates a different set of issues that are, in my opinion, worse than what we currently have.

That and over half of the committee that came up with the finalists are students.

Do they think real hawks are free? Like you just catch one and then you just have it and then that's it?

I listened to Chaves most recent podcast and Faison's from a few months back. None of what you stated is in any of that and in fact Faison was pretty clear about the Montana's having no desire to look east. That being said, what's your timeline on this?

I mean one of those is the actual current nickname of the University, which they are putting time and effort into marketing and one isn't (and the reasons why it isn't and can no longer be aren't even debatable anymore). Seems pretty obvious why one group would be confused by the other's insistence. I really wish there was a video of Bubba's speech at the logo unveiling, really puts things into perspective for those who are stuck on supporting a nickname instead of a University regardless of what logo/nickname they have. EDIT: Turns out there is, should start at the relevant point.