UND-FB-FAN

Agree with your assessment. UND is at home. Needs to keep hope alive for 2019; UND absolutely needs to defend their home turf at the Alerus Center and get the win. Losing two in a row against NDSU - visible to everyone - and SHSU at home would be tough on the fan base and even the players' psyche. GO OUT THERE AND TAKE CARE OF BUSINESS, UND. GO HAWKS!

Waiting for NDSU to descend to UND's current level is not a recipe for success. In fact, there's no guarantee it will happen for a long time, if ever. I agree, though, that UND needs to start by focusing on themselves and setting competitive standards. We, the fans, and the UND administration has to hold the coaches and players to these standards, though. No more excuses and leniency with losing to borderline losing seasons. 7 wins should be the benchmark standard year in and year out. When you look at UND's schedule (most years, this year may be the exception), UND should be better than well over half the FCS teams they play. UND has to meet NDSU half way, if you will. NDSU may regress a bit, but not a lot. UND has to be proactive and look to improve by a lot. Ways for that to happen have been suggested above. If no improvement during the rest of this season, then likely it starts with new football leadership. However, the leadership at the AD and eventual new president level for UND is also incredibly critical.

Should have been done YEARS ago. The students get the corner, 40 to 40 on both sides should be for season ticket holders. NCAA policy requires this to happen during playoff games anyways.

Looks like the team had the right mindset going into it. Unfortunately, NDSU just has the better talent on the field. Bubba (or someone) needs to close this gap, though. It is a must. UND will improve throughout the season. How much is the major question. Beat Sam Houston State and go from there. Optmism should be focused on iron sharpens iron with UND’s schedule. Definitely an opportunity to make playoffs this year if players and coaches approach this thing the right way.

@UND Fan I agree with most everything you posted. Most everything you posted I also have posted just over the past week. For starters, NDSU does have better players than UND and that in itself makes it hard for UND to beat them currently, especially with competent coaching. Some of us felt the coaching change to Entz and a new freshman QB would lessen the coach/player differential between UND and NDSU and lead to a close game; as we saw, that is not the case. Entz’ staff coached a good game and Trey Lance is a special dual-threat talent at QB for NDSU. As for how UND improves, they have to better emphasize football and, as such, improve in recruiting. It is a work in progress. Thank you for your donation efforts that allow us to donate directly to UND football. Recruiting is always directly linked to success. The student-athletes are the ones who win the games. How to get the better recruits is the complex multifactorial question. For starters, people need to voice their opinions regarding the next president of UND. We need to hire a president who understands the importance of collegiate athletics in selling an entire university relative to other regional institutions. Furthermore, that president needs to want to further UND football, specifically. It will be easy to find a president who wants to maintain the status quo with hockey, but finding one who wants to also advance football will be more unique. Coaching competency, with Bubba and his staff, will be determined by the team’s final record this season. Against NDSU is one thing, but there is no reason UND can’t compile 6 to 7 wins every season against other FCS programs. We have to recognize anything less is a failure and hold UND football coaches to this standard, strictly. If not, complacency sets in. As for better emphasizing football, beyond coaching, UND needs to get HPC Phase II funded. This is priority #1 beyond coaching. In the meantime, while waiting for the immense funds, UND can invest in locker rooms and turf at the Alerus Center. Uniforms and helmets should be regularly funded and updated as well. Keeping the gameday home (Alerus Center) for UND football up to date is also very important for recruits and current football players. Look at what UND hockey has done with locker room renovations and scoreboard/videoboards etc. UND needs to be proactive in addressing the Alerus Center in addition to HPC. Every detail counts when trying to sign recruits. If we overlook these details and consider them miniscule, then UND will continue to get inferior recruits relative to NDSU, SDSU, UNI, etc. Every detail counts in competition. Focusing on the right geography for recruiting is also key, as some have said. Having a presence in Canada is very important simply based on where UND/Grand Forks is located. Im summary, all in all, let’s see what Bubba and his staff can do this season. Starting with Sam Houston State, UND will now start to play teams with a talent level similar to themselves and the execution & coaching will be the difference. If the season does not end “successfully” (open to interpretation), I think UND and Chaves need to absolutely get a new coaching staff that can sign better student-athletes with different recruiting tactics. Also, the game of football is largely mental. As much as we all love Bubba, the most important thing is the competitive mindset and attitude his players - not us - have toward to him. There is always room for improvement there, in my opinion.

The Hawk is fine. I like it. Just teach it to not hold hockey signs when we are playing a football game.

Agree completely. The X’s and O’s are really just fluff for the fans; it’s always been about the players on the field. Sure, scheme does matter as to not completely botch the game or to determine the winner with evenly matched teams, but games are always won by the players.

If you aren’t sold on Bubba, hard to sell Freund and Schmidt as well, I’m afraid. Why? Because they’ve been on this staff the entire time Bubba has been. They are major staples in the recruiting trend and developing the philosophy and scheme. They are good people. But as coaches, they help form the expectations of the program as is. *IF* you feel UND is not heading the right direction, which I’m not saying is or isn’t the case here, you need to allow Chaves to hire an entirely new coaching staff that can potentially allow UND football to take the next step in FCS football. Fortunately, Chaves knows what that looks like as he was around several good Eastern Washington football teams.

He’ll be hurt before you know it. He’s a little b****.

Well, yes. #1 is UND needs better players, obviously. UND is not going to win a conference championship with the roster as is. Now, the other points are basically ways to get the better players. Which is priority #1 is the question. I vote HPC Phase II. Different coaches - unfortunately - is not too far behind that. UND still has enough talent, though, to have a winning season in 2019 and make the playoffs. NDSU will be most talented team UND sees in 2019. Go Hawks! Beat Sam Houston!

UND must defend their home turf given their difficult road schedule. Sam Houston State is not as good as NDSU, but UND has a lot of areas to improve. Can’t switch out players at this point (obviosuly), but Sam Houston will attack UND differently than NDSU so that’s okay. Player to player matchups will be different. UND offense needs to be able to run the ball and UND defense needs to eliminate big passing plays. If these two things happen, UND will win.

Coaching never wins games but it can lose them. Players win the games. Major caveat being the coaches recruit the players. Today, I didn’t see anything schematically (i.e., coaching) that lost UND the game. I saw a significant differential in player ability as we all should have expected. NDSU has way better players; that was the difference. For UND to get to NDSU’s level, recruiting and player development needs to improve. Facilities and institutional support is a key component of this; it’s all connected. Thus, one could argue HPC Phase II still remains the most important piece yet to be possessed. I will say, though, that the coaches do need to keep recruiting and get better players or else NDSU will continue to dominante Head-to-Head matchups. Analytically, UND couldn’t stop NDSU QB run game and UND couldn’t run the ball or hit big pass plays. Why? Without getting into X’s and O’s, NDSU quite frankly had better players. NDSU’s QB is better than UND’s outside linebackers. UND’s dbs couldn’t tackle well; need to be better. And UND’s receivers, although experienced, are not big play guys. Need to get better. QB, RB, and OL are also positions that are just not good enough right now.

Only one of many things UND football needs.

I agree that hindsight is 20/20 but don’t agree with the rest. Why should UND not play the No. 1 FCS team in the country, never mind their longtime rival only 70 miles away? Like said before, if you want to be the best, you must beat the best. UND is currently not able to be the best. That is simply all we learned today. Let’s try it again next year and the next year and so on until we finally arrive. The UND folks who regret that we played NDSU this year and in 2015 are just scared of reality. They don’t want to embrace the fact that UND is NOT under competent leadership currently and also is NOT moving with a significantly positive trajectory. Implicitly, perhaps, you all support mediocrity. UND cannot ascend mediocrity if it does not play the best and ultimately beat the best. It did not happen today. UND is not the best. That is what we learned. Re-group, keep playing, and try again. That is the nature of competent competition.

Honestly, one of the most stupid, ignorant statements anyone from UND can say (although it gets said a lot). Definitely a pet peeve of mine.

It’ll be several weeks before Ketteringham is healthy so I imagine we have to ride with Zimmerman for awhile. Grover is not a long-term option and they want to retain shirt on Schuster. UND needs speed on edge so have to keep Boltmann out there. Zimmerman should get better. He’s only had one start (today) and it was against No. 1 FCS team in the Fargodome. I expect his timing with Wanzek, Maag, Toivonen, etc. to improve with more game reps. With all that said, the running game hasn’t got going these first two games and that is most concerning to me. Offensive line needs to play better. None of the 3 starting RBs have jumped out, either; each is OK in certain situations (JJ short yardage, McKinney on edge, etc.) but none are all around every down backs. The defense was not awful today, but the lack of ability to contain the QB run game was their downfall. They should look better against Sam Houston State at home, but getting Holm and Jer Dominique back healthy for that game will be key. SHSU will be slingin’ it around the Alerus. UND will need to get good pressure on their QB. SHSU running game won’t be near as good as NDSU’s.

Yeah. Not just another loss, but another deflating performance. Damn Beat Sam Houston next week and get back on track.

Of course expect to win every damn game on the schedule on to sam Houston state in the alerus win all games in the Alerus Center - good teams defend their home turf

Couldn’t stop the NDSU QB running game at key moments. Poor tackling like some said. Disappointing. und offense also too inconsistent. Timing was off with Zimmerman and receivers, which is expected I guess considering it’s Zimmerman's first start. UND running game never got going. All in all, this game was worst case scenario for UND minus any major injuries. Damn, Damn, Damn oh, and screw the bison. UND and Bubba have a lot of work to do.

I do not see that many points being scored. Total points around 50.

Don't overthink it. Beat NDSU. GO UND!

NDSU doesn’t have Wentz this time around. Wentz was the difference in 2015. Not saying the guy NDSU has now isn’t good, but UND has to hope he makes some rookie mistakes for UND to win.

Like most games: turnovers, turnovers, turnovers. If Zimmerman can somehow avoid interceptions and everyone for UND can hang onto the ball, that will give UND a chance. UND will have an even stronger chance if their defense can stop the run and force NDSU’s freshman QB to throw them the ball. Key for UND to win this game: stop NDSU’s run game (will be very tough but Schmidt actually did it in 2015) and then force NDSU QB into mistakes. This is much more a possibility than many think.

Schuster is not going to start any games this year intentionally. Don’t have to worry about “the shirt” on him.

UND-NDSU is not Alabama-Tennessee ... It will be close/competitive.