Sioux94

It will be interesting to see what happens. Since we should hopefully be up in our first game.....might see both QB's play some in that game.....if not all 3....to see what they can do in Live action?

Wow so Bubba's 3rd year he had us in the playoffs, ahead of most peoples schedule, then we take a step back last year with a rash of injuries (yes it's an excuse but it's also fact I don't need a post from you telling me injuries aren't an excuse) and now we should assume it will be a rarity for UND to ever make the playoffs under Bubba. Whatever. We get snubbed from playoffs in his second season, top 8 seed his 3rd year, then don't make the playoffs last year. If you average the last 3 years not sure how you come up with it will be a rarity UND will make the playoffs under Bubba. Even many NDSU people think we should have made the playoffs that year, so if we didn't get screwed that is 2 of the last 3 years in the playoffs. I'm sure others on here would agree.....we expect to make the playoffs every year going forward. Yeah Bubba should have signed better lineman in that class when 95% of recruits already new where they were going by the time he was hired. Fall camp is here, most of us are excited. Yes we do still have questions and concerns....but can you just stop for a while and let this season playout, or at least start? Three negative posts from you before noon today already.....we get it.

He was big last year at 230....put on 20 to get to 250....damn! Do you think they are going to maybe use him as FB or something and told him to bulk up? If he is just going to be a RB....can he still be as nimble as he was when he is at 250?

Since Bubba got hired on like December 30th, I don't really count that first class truly as his class. His first full what I'd call true Bubba class, if redshirted, would be juniors right now. Brady and Santiago were in Bubba's first true recruiting class, but of course we had to pull their shirts so they are seniors. Our redshirt seniors right now......were in a no mans class...kind of in the middle. Not that there wasn't some decent guys in there, but you can't blame Bubba for not have recruited top OL in that class.. Thank god the early recruiting was in effect then or thought would have been really tough going without a coach for a month.

Yeah when you have a roster full of FBS guys and drop down you are eligible to make the playoffs in the FCS, but when you have a roster full of DII guys they don't want you eligible........makes perfect sense......not.

Nice to see him out there. Although he'll have to hang on to those to get those 10+ INT's and 5 TD's

Nice! So was that the QB's throwing to them? I'm so ready for some football....this was a good appetizer though! Hoping the WR's and the passing game can have more of an impact for us this year earlier in games instead of waiting until we need them to make a play.

It's at least 7-4 and making the playoffs this year or it's a Bust for me this year I think, and a disappointment. Unlike some I do think we make the playoffs if we go 7-4 this year, even though it may hurt us not having a conference sticking up for us to the committee. We aren't going to lose a game this year to a team with 1 win like we did last time. Also we are playing in the Big Sky which is one of the better conferences, and we have a tough non conference schedule in Sam Houston and Washington. We will have some injuries this year but I think we have better depth than we've had for a while so that we can hopefully avoid the really 'Bad loss'. If all of our safeties go down or something though who knows. But at least we appear to have 3 legit QB's that even if 2 should go down we will still hopefully be able to put up some points and win with our offense if needed. It will be a rare occasion but I will be pulling for Montana.....to beat UNI, so that we can then beat Montana.

Cieslak seemed like he got a pretty good push in a few games towards the end of the year and was disruptive. He has been around for a while, but could he have a breakout year this year as a Senior?

NAU game probably right? Yes think that was the game he put the offense on his shoulders and carried them, and I think he might have even gotten a little dinged up at one point but stayed in. It's amazing what happens if you just try it. Not that we need or want that type of offense all game long, but for cripes sakes keep the defense guessing at least a little bit. Like Geaux_Sioux said.....man it sure seems like it would be easy to scheme against us as a D coordinator and player.

I think we got a lot more garbage points and easy yards in the second half of games last year because we were so far behind because our defense was so bad. So I'm not sure you can just look at an overall points and average ypg for the year and fully rely on that to get the reality. I don't think our offense was as good last year. Really hoping this is the year they finally put it all together though and show something. Like others I think having a better deep ball passer is going to help. The 2.6 three and out stat though was surprising, would have thought it was a lot more than that. Felt more like 5-6 a game.

I almost wouldn't have minded playing them the first game since their QB is new, get them before they work out the kinks. Maybe rattle him early in the game. Granted we have a new QB too, but he has started FCS games before and we aren't as reliant as much on a passing game. I guess on bright side hopefully our OL will get two games to figure things out so we can pound the rock successfully. Washington I'm sure will be super physical, but will be good experience for our OL.....I hope.

I think it could be this but we beat Montana at home this year, we are so due to beat them. So 7-4 with FBS loss....most likely in playoffsI would think, but not gauranteed. Hoping for 8-3 though, which I think Sam Houston and NAU as the two FCS losses.

Yep me too, my excitement for the season officially hit me this week with all of the news of the commitments (even though they have no bearing on this year) and since it is getting close to August. What day is the first day of fall camp?

Those are impressive numbers for Santiago considering he splits a lot of time with Brady. Moore and Burnell were the featured backs and got feed the rock over and over all game. Hoping our OL comes together and we can get some nice long "So Long Santiago" runs to the house this year.

Played WR and DE in high school...seems like a little bit of an odd combination, also long snapped. Guess he could also maybe make for backup emergency long snapper too.

I like the sound of those two numbers....4.5....and 3.9.

We will see, wouldn't mind making one other game other than road trip to NAU. Wish rental cars at Denver airport weren't so expensive, the UNC tailgate would be fun!

Wow didn't realize he could have returned. That would have been nice to have both Reyes and Harris back this year. And would have been better for Reyes too. Not sure he would have been able to go a full year without getting injured but who knows.

You completely missed my point. I agree the defense was the problem that game and all year. My point is that our offensive averages look better than they probably really were because we always seem to be in shootout type of games because our defense was horrible.

And what were the scouts saying?

I had good luck with using watchbigsky.com last year.

I'm going to the NAU game for sure. Been waiting for 4 years for this game, with the odd scheduling this is the first game with Bubba as the coach with us playing at NAU. That is the bad part for me about us leaving to Big Sky, would have had an easy road trip almost every other year to go to. Still think moving to the MVFC will be better for the program overall though.

I'm not blaming the offense at all on that one, our defense got shredded. But it makes the point that we were in massive shootout type of games throughout the year because our defense was so poor. When we are in shootout type of games and we average 23 points a game....yeah to me that is not impressive. I actually remember our offense scoring some points and somewhat keeping us in it for a little while. But as soon as we'd score, they'd make a big offensive play and score on us. That was so ugly defensively for us, perhaps one of the worst in UND's history given that they weren't even a playoff team.

Facts don't count things like going 3 and out 3-4 series in a row to start a few games, then when we are down by 20 points we get a 100 junk yards in the second half because teams are playing prevent with their cushy lead. Hell didn't UC Davis have almost like 40 points on us by halftime? Nor does it account for having our 3rd string QB being way better than the 2nd string and the 2nd string being so inept in the first half against MT that he has now changed positions. I remember seeing our yards per carry once last year, and it was a good average. Well I'd like to see our average YPC in the 1st half compared to the 2nd half of games. I haven't been as hard as some others on Rudy over the past couple of years, but we need to see something more this year. Scoring 21 points a game will likely lose you a lot of games in the Big Sky, sorry. Rudy has had his moments, we just need to see more. And more of finding ways to get the best out of the players we have, not base plays on the players we wish we had (OL).