UND-FB-FAN

For what it's worth, I have spoke to many fellow long-time UND supporters who have negative things to say about Faison. It's become a majority opinion. He really isn't that friendly with North Dakotans who are of the traditional variety. UND athletics could make huge strides with a more competent athletic director, because by no means is the UND athletics' department yet maxed out.

Very good points. As we see by both NDSU and now UND, playing physical defense and ball controlling offense really neutralizes wide-open passing teams. Without his own recruits, Bubba has already managed to even up UND with most Big Sky clubs. After a couple seasons of recruiting, the Big Sky best watch out for UND and Bubba. Really, only Montana and UND are playing traditional tough football right now in the Big Sky.

Kelley lacks something known as common sense. Typical of most academia of his background.

No argument here. UND needs to improve the running game, but that is happening week after week due to the inexperience of the offensive line when the season started.

Very good point and something I too have observed. Both Faison and Kelley need to be more active promoting football. Hiring Bubba was great in the fact that he is respectful and capable of successfully communicating with everyone from alumni to students to his players. He is picking up some slack that Faison and Kelley could definitely help with.

I won't say my prediction until Friday or so but I really doubt Portland State can keep this one close. Homecoming excitement/noise plus the way the defense is playing will make the Alerus a living hell for Portland State...

Both the offense and defense are largely juniors and sophomores. As soon as next year some real good things may be happening...

Another one of them expert opinions from down south...

Nearly every pass-play NDSU and Montana run in normal down and distance situations is play-action pass.

Don't agree. Not saying UND is where it needs to be offensively, because they aren't, but if an offense can effectively run the ball, play-action passes really are effective. See NDSU and even Montana. These teams focus on running the ball, and once they can do that, then those exciting deep passing plays can happen. UND is hoping to get to that point, but first they need to eliminate penalties and consistently gain better on first down running the ball.

Woodsmall was playing well. Could hurt the defense some. Hinojosa needs to play big minutes now.

Ha! Nice!

http://m.espn.go.com/ncf/story?storyId=11652187&src=desktop&rand=ref~%7B%22ref%22%3A%22https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F%22%7D Article on how Michigan State AD is upset about student attendance at football games. Brian Faison needs to be proactive about this too. If the student sections are not being best utilized to HELP the team competitively, then some of those sections should be made available to the public and season ticket holders.

Amazing how much this team has changed in one season. Best players are now playing and the coaching is much improved. To top it off, the recruiting is much better too. Don't know if Mussman was that bad or if Bubba is that good, but it may be a combination of both. Go UND!

Absolutely, nice to see UND be able to play physical and run the ball (Norberg had 73 yards rushing) despite UND's best offensive lineman missing the game. Should help build better depth along the OL with Brandon Miller getting that valuable playing time.

Portland State Vikings enter the game with a 2-3 record. Two of those loses came to Pac-12 schools in Oregon State (29-14) and Washington State (59-21). The other loss came to Big Sky Conference opponent Cal Poly in a blowout (42-14). Both of Portland State's victories came at home against Western Oregon (45-38) and UC Davis (23-14). The UC Davis game was their most recent game (Oct. 4). UND is coming off their most emotional loss of the season; it will be interesting to see how they respond. Do they play flat after the disappointing loss or do they play tough resilient football looking for that first conference win? One thing of note: Portland State has yet to win on the road and the Alerus has potential to be loud again as it is homecoming. Look forward to seeing great effort by UND's defense assisted by crowd noise, and hopefully improved offensive play. UND needs a win to get some confidence and move towards an overall .500 record (6-6) after two tough conference loses. Source: http://www.goviks.com/schedule.aspx?path=football

Exciting thing about the defense playing good is that the offense is improving enough to compliment them. Although the offense didn't score bunches yesterday, they were efficient. Also, most of the offensive mistakes are of the rhythm/timing variety, which means the offense should definitely continue improving with each week due to increased experience among the offensive lineup.

Feels like UND football tradition has been restored; although UND hasn't won that signature game yet this season, it does feel like UND should compete and expect to win every conference game they play in. That is encouraging and a huge improvement over last season.

Yeah, but if EWU is still ranked number 2 and we beat them because Vernon Adams is out, then that will still be a quality win that could perhaps get us into the playoffs if we finish 7-5.

Things are falling into place for UND. Bubba is doing a great job! Go UND!

UND should win more than 5. At least 6.

Hardly a cheap shot; Will Ratelle is not classless. It's not his fault the Montana quarterback is built like a punter. Plus, the refs babied the Griz with some late-hit/unnecessary roughness calls all game. Otherwise, things would've got even more physical. No question UND was the more physical team yesterday.

Encouraging that this team has come close to defeating a couple ranked FCS teams the past couple weeks and the only thing that held them back were penalties and mistakes (bad snaps). Why is that encouraging? Because they're correctable in the short-term; Bubba and UND could be going on a winning streak to close out this season if the necessary improvements are made.

Absolutely. From this point forward in terms of this season, UND should expect to win every game. As for next season, the team will have a lot of returning contributors, which usually always translates well to success.

Certainly the best way to look at it from a players and coaches' perspective. One game at a time; not going to argue that. Team should look to come out with a lot of energy on homecoming and get a much-needed rebound victory vs. Portland State.