fightingsioux4life

Whatever we pick, someone will twist it into something negative.

How about the UND Bombers? We have an Aviation school. We have an Air Force Base (as does Minot). The Unmanned Ariel Systems mission is taking off at Grand Forks AFB. It's simple and straightforward, which North Dakotans (and Midwesterners) always like. It's not wimpy (like Sundogs, Flames or Spirit). I could think of some really cool logos we could use! What say you all?

Free to Air......I believe it refers to those old satellite dishes that are as big as a house. They were common-place during the 1980's.

Preseason polls are meaningless. It's what we do on the field in our first Big Sky season that will matter.

Yeah, but better late than never.

Okay, you all have convinced me that my sarcastic aside was not accurate.

This is great news!

Don't apologize for opening this can of worms, this is what is needed to wake UND up from it's self-imposed malaise of poor marketing and poor advertising. Now that we are full-fledged Division I in a legitimate Division I conference, we have to ramp everything up. Either that or we shouldn't have moved up in the first place.

Be careful westsidesioux, you'll be criticized for bringing it up because it's just "not feasible" for UND to do that. All sarcasm aside, I agree with you 100%. It is high time we start promoting our newly minted Division I programs as Division I programs, not like they are still Division II programs and treating them like they "just don't matter" because they aren't hockey.

Good article on how West Acres Shopping Center in Fargo came to exist: http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/241830/ Shopping malls have definitely changed the landscape of America over the past 50 years. PS: It's a good thing Bill Schlossman wasn't a resident of Grand Forks. He would have been told that his idea was "not feasible" and not "cost-effective" and it just never would have happened.

I think what Sandusky did would have been exposed much sooner in a place like Ann Arbor, Michigan or Columbus, Ohio. Just too much media coverage and reporters snooping around 24/7 looking for a story. Happy Valley, OTOH, is a smaller and more tight-knit place. It's a heck of a lot easier to cover up a major scandal in a place like that. Paterno was basically Dictator-For-Life there and was running the place for years. As we've seen with what happened to Gino and Wooger, that isn't the case in Grand Forks or Minneapolis. This was a one-of-a-kind situation that just doesn't happen much in big-time sports anymore. Coaches are much more expendable than they used to be.

Which was my point, but thanks for making it again.

Sorry Johnboy, but you brought it up and now you'll have to deal with the consequences. If anyone is to blame for "thread drift" in this case, it is you. This is a classic example of "Imperial Cass County Superiority Complex". I explained this in the Wal-Mart thread in the Community forum: Fargo really believes they are just like Minneapolis. The fact is, compared to "real" metro areas, they are merely the size of a suburb (like Bloomington, MN). My take on this is very simple: Fargo is a bigger version of Grand Forks, Sioux Falls is a bigger version of Fargo and Omaha is a bigger version of Sioux Falls. In other words, the only differences between the various cities I have listed are based on quantity, not quality. Some have more of the same stuff than others, but they are all very Midwestern in their cultural attitudes and beliefs. Which is why so many young people leave for places like Minneapolis, Denver and Chicago. Back to the topic of the thread: We have several years to decide what name we should adopt, so I think we should all just chill out and focus on our first season of Big Sky membership.

I know one place you should not patronize....Ruby Tuesday's. Me and my wife went there the day before Thanksgiving last year. The servers didn't know what was on the menu, they had about a dozen cooks in the kitchen and it still took forever to get our food and the place wasn't even full.

Apples and Oranges. Paterno was at Penn State much, much longer than anyone you listed. Football at Penn State is worshipped way more than hockey is at North Dakota or Minnesota; Happy Valley is more insulated from the outside world than Grand Forks or Minneapolis is. And that's a big reason why Sandusky was able to get away with all that crap for as long as he did.

How many of those kids will have Penn State on their list without Paterno in charge of the program? He was the heart and soul of their program and now he's gone.

I agree with you, but it's easy to say that from a distance. Imagine if we were Idaho and NDSU was Boise State. Would you "embrace" being left behind by NDSU? The right thing to do is not always the easy thing. I think if they did drop down to FCS, they would win more games and that would make the move easier to swallow. Losing is just no fun.

I guess I want UND to subject NDSU to this type of marketing. Fire up all the UND alums that live in Fargo; that will serve the duel purpose of annoying the heck out of Bison fans and building our own programs up in the media (both traditional and social). When UND won the Division II Football title in 2001, there wasn't enough fist pumping from our fan base like there was when NDSU won the FCS title last year. Same with the 1997-98-99 women's basketball titles vs. NDSU's women's basketball titles. And I really don't want to hear the usual comebacks to those examples (hockey is all that matters in GF and football doesn't mean anything; Fargo is a bigger media market so they get everything and we get nothing), because if we keep thinking like that, our move up to Division I will not be successful beyond having a winning record every year, having a good won-loss record at home and upsetting a few big-time schools every couple of years. The contract with Midco Sports and the solidifying of the coaching staffs of all our teams are good steps in this direction. But we'll have to have the resolve and determination to see it through to the end.

You didn't read what I wrote all that carefully: I said they make it seem like they are on someone's radar and that can help win recruiting battles and make the whole campus feel like it's going places. Building a successful athletic department is more than bricks and mortar and dollars and cents. It's how you project yourself to current and potential stakeholders.

This attitude is precisely why NDSU has done a much better job of marketing their programs than we have over my lifetime. They always have made it seem like the whole world is watching NDSU and Fargo, ND. The whole world isn't watching them, of course, but this type of marketing and promotion helps draw top-notch recruits, private donors for scholarships and students. In today's hyper-media driven world, how people perceive you is just as important as what you actually are. A vibrant, outgoing media personality like Dan Hammer will help us in this area. So will the investments Midco is making into their sports division. Bottom line: If you come across as backwater, bush league and "local yokel", then that is what you will become.

Compared to the Great West, the BSC is big-time.

So UND hockey should have the "feel" of minor league baseball or Mississippi high school football? I don't think that is the type of "charm" that a world-class program like ours should use to promote itself.

The 2007 settlement does not allow us to remain nameless.

I guess I am just trying to be positive about it. Hammer did some hockey games back in the 1980's and has remained familiar with it since. Getting a big name from another market might not work out like you are thinking it would; that person wouldn't know Jack Squat about the program or what it has accomplished over the years. I say give "The Hammer" a chance before we break out the torches and pitchforks.

Dan Hammer is a big upgrade over Pat "Story Hour" Sweeney.