SiouxVolley Posted November 21, 2014 Posted November 21, 2014 Looks like Cleveland St will add mens lacrosse. With that addition, a Midwest conference, other than the Big10, may soon be available. Detroit, Bellarmine, and Air Force also have teams. Just need a couple more. Interesting reasons for the add: getting better academic recruits and for enrollment growth. Lax only allows 12.6 schollies, but need 60 recruits. Most lax players have to pay their way. Its kind of like club hockey, where players have no full rides. The cost for Cleveland St is estimated at $900,000 a year. Cleveland St has been trying to upgrade their graduation rate and academics more, as they've had improvements over the last few years. Lax helps in that goal, as most lax players are suburbanites. http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2014/11/cleveland_state_university_wil_5.html But I do think there's a strategic reason for keeping baseball. If an FBS Big Sky ever comes about, with UND, it would have the necessary six teams for an autobid league: Sac St Cal Poly UCDavis NDSU SDSU UND Quote
dakotadan Posted November 30, 2014 Posted November 30, 2014 Has there been even the slightest effort to get artificial turf on the outfield at Kraft? I haven't heard it mentioned since they did the infield. At that time they didn't have the funds to do the whole field but wanted to get the infield in for the following spring and stated the outfield would be done in the next year or two. Quote
Schoeney34 Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 I would say they should turf the rest of the outfield and then you could rival Bismarck in having more teams come in and play and not have to cancel as many games. Your not as centrally located as Bismarck and only have one college in town but you could possibly get some Minnesota teams to come in and definitely could have a high school tournament in the spring to generate some money. The problem with dropping baseball is look how NDSU has faired in baseball and there is no reason why UND couldn't have a successful baseball team. In looking at kids that play in the north for baseball, they have to be more driven especially because you don't enjoy the luxury of being able to be outside all the time like you do in the south. Yes the kids down there see a lot of more live reps, but kids up here have to focus on fundamentals in the gym and having a great work ethic. If we got a coach in here that could turn the program around we would not be having this conversation. They should have turfed the whole field and looked at how many teams would come in especially in this period when there is no dome in the cities currently that held a lot of Upper Midwest baseball. Quote
UND1983 Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 I would say they should turf the rest of the outfield and then you could rival Bismarck in having more teams come in and play and not have to cancel as many games. Your not as centrally located as Bismarck and only have one college in town but you could possibly get some Minnesota teams to come in and definitely could have a high school tournament in the spring to generate some money. The problem with dropping baseball is look how NDSU has faired in baseball and there is no reason why UND couldn't have a successful baseball team. In looking at kids that play in the north for baseball, they have to be more driven especially because you don't enjoy the luxury of being able to be outside all the time like you do in the south. Yes the kids down there see a lot of more live reps, but kids up here have to focus on fundamentals in the gym and having a great work ethic. If we got a coach in here that could turn the program around we would not be having this conversation. They should have turfed the whole field and looked at how many teams would come in especially in this period when there is no dome in the cities currently that held a lot of Upper Midwest baseball. How NDSU has fared....LOL. They suck at baseball. They won a 4 team tournament last spring to go to the NCAA tournament. It was a joke the NCAA even let them in based on that farce. 2 Quote
JohnboyND7 Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 How NDSU has fared....LOL. They suck at baseball. They won a 4 team tournament last spring to go to the NCAA tournament. It was a joke the NCAA even let them in based on that farce. Since I've been in school, we have been pretty mediocre. I think one year we were pretty good but lost to Oral Roberts in conference final. Quote
Bison Dan Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 I would say they should turf the rest of the outfield and then you could rival Bismarck in having more teams come in and play and not have to cancel as many games. Your not as centrally located as Bismarck and only have one college in town but you could possibly get some Minnesota teams to come in and definitely could have a high school tournament in the spring to generate some money. The problem with dropping baseball is look how NDSU has faired in baseball and there is no reason why UND couldn't have a successful baseball team. In looking at kids that play in the north for baseball, they have to be more driven especially because you don't enjoy the luxury of being able to be outside all the time like you do in the south. Yes the kids down there see a lot of more live reps, but kids up here have to focus on fundamentals in the gym and having a great work ethic. If we got a coach in here that could turn the program around we would not be having this conversation. They should have turfed the whole field and looked at how many teams would come in especially in this period when there is no dome in the cities currently that held a lot of Upper Midwest baseball. 1 You must be a 5th grader.. NDSU went to the NCAA's last year and lost to OSU 2-1 - You must be thinking of your Base Ball team as a failure. Quote
UND1983 Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 You must be a 5th grader.. NDSU went to the NCAA's last year and lost to OSU 2-1 - You must be thinking of your Base Ball team as a failure. You lost 2-1 to OSU!!! Nice work, sounds like a moral victory. Congrats on winning the Summit League tourney, too. That was impressive. 2 Quote
Schoeney34 Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 I would be referring not to the last two years in which they were 1 game from .500 but in 2012 when they were 40-20 if I remember right. What i'm getting at is that you could put out a winning team on the field with the right recruits. You pump money into Kraft field and now you just wanna get rid of baseball it doesn't make any sense. If you wanted to cut the baseball team why pump the money in for High School baseball. Quote
Bison Dan Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 You lost 2-1 to OSU!!! Nice work, sounds like a moral victory. Congrats on winning the Summit League tourney, too. That was impressive. How'd you guys do??? Isn't that the point to get into the NCAA tournament? Quote
jdub27 Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 How'd you guys do??? Isn't that the point to get into the NCAA tournament? The best team in the conference couldn't play in the tournament and a waiver is needed to even have an autobid. Pump that moral victory against OSU though. Quote
bincitysioux Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 I would be referring not to the last two years in which they were 1 game from .500 but in 2012 when they were 40-20 if I remember right. What i'm getting at is that you could put out a winning team on the field with the right recruits. You pump money into Kraft field and now you just wanna get rid of baseball it doesn't make any sense. If you wanted to cut the baseball team why pump the money in for High School baseball. What is the return on baseball though? It generates no income, and more than that, little to no interest. It is hands down the worst investment for the Athletic Department. 1 Quote
Schoeney34 Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 It would generate interest if the team wins. Believe it or not, when a team is successful people hop on board. Look at all the bandwagon NDSU football fans. Not saying I want bandwagon fans, but winning helps. For heavens sake, I can't even walk into Scheel's without having to look at bison crap. I don't care that the headquarters is in Fargo or not. If the rivalry is going to pick back up then that needs to come to an end. You don't go to Chapel Hill and find Duke stuff when you walk into a sporting good store. So what you drop baseball and pick up lacrosse? I find it hard to believe that Lacrosse is going to be a saving grace. I'm also pretty positive one reason why they haven't been as successful is because I'm sure they don't get a whole lot of money. Quote
UNDBIZ Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 It would generate interest if the team wins. Believe it or not, when a team is successful people hop on board. Look at all the bandwagon NDSU football fans. Not saying I want bandwagon fans, but winning helps. For heavens sake, I can't even walk into Scheel's without having to look at bison crap. I don't care that the headquarters is in Fargo or not. If the rivalry is going to pick back up then that needs to come to an end. You don't go to Chapel Hill and find Duke stuff when you walk into a sporting good store. So what you drop baseball and pick up lacrosse? I find it hard to believe that Lacrosse is going to be a saving grace. I'm also pretty positive one reason why they haven't been as successful is because I'm sure they don't get a whole lot of money. Winning isn't going to get people interested in watching UND baseball. The team needs to be cut and the funding reallocated to basketball and/or football. 2 Quote
Schoeney34 Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 So why would you turf the infield of Kraft field to then cut UND baseball? A big reason why is to have it available in the spring for high school and UND. Dickinson did it for the high school and DSU. Bismarck because of it being at Shiloh and having it private but they are also making a lot of money off of teams coming in. Obviously you don't like baseball. My opinion is to put a winning team on the field. Yours is to cut it. Thank goodness we live in America with freedom of speech. Quote
bincitysioux Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 We can all agree to disagree, that is fine. Personally, I really like the sport of baseball. After football, it would be my favorite sport to watch. It was my best sport as a player in school. But I also like to think I am practical. The season is just a little over 3 weeks away. The average high temp in Grand Forks on February 13 (Opening Day) is 21 degrees. This has been a mild winter, but on average, there is already 13.5 inches of snow on the ground by the date of this year's opening day. On top of that, during the first 3 months of the NCAA baseball season, Grand Forks receives an additional 15.9 inches of snow. There are few quality baseball players from outside the region that would come to North Dakota to further their baseball career. The best players from this region are going to go to warmer climates to further their careers. Unless there is a major benefactor making baseball self-sufficient, no one will ever convince me that it is a good investment at the University of North Dakota. As I said earlier, It worked in the NCC because virtually every team was just a short bus trip away. Back then, the weather caused postponements rather than cancellations. I wouldn't be in favor of adding Lacrosse. It would just be another sport that nobody cares about, however I think there would be a much bigger upside to lacrosse than there is for baseball. If I were AD for a day, I'd drop baseball and women's hockey and divert all the resources to football and basketball. That may be unpopular, but being practical often is............... 1 Quote
nodak651 Posted January 21, 2015 Author Posted January 21, 2015 So why would you turf the infield of Kraft field to then cut UND baseball? A big reason why is to have it available in the spring for high school and UND. Dickinson did it for the high school and DSU. Bismarck because of it being at Shiloh and having it private but they are also making a lot of money off of teams coming in. Obviously you don't like baseball. My opinion is to put a winning team on the field. Yours is to cut it. Thank goodness we live in America with freedom of speech. You would cut baseball after turfing the infield, because it is a sunk cost. There isn't enough money to go around to make UND baseball competitive - they can't even properly fund basketball. As far as I'm concerned, turfing the infield was a huge waste of money! Why would they not do the whole field? (oh... right.... not enough money) It was like building a house without putting a roof on the thing... Quote
choyt3 Posted January 21, 2015 Posted January 21, 2015 You would cut baseball after turfing the infield, because it is a sunk cost. There isn't enough money to go around to make UND baseball competitive - they can't even properly fund basketball. As far as I'm concerned, turfing the infield was a huge waste of money! Why would they not do the whole field? (oh... right.... not enough money) It was like building a house without putting a roof on the thing... Was that a UND or a Grand Forks Park District project? Quote
fightingsioux4life Posted January 21, 2015 Posted January 21, 2015 Was that a UND or a Grand Forks Park District project? I think it was a Park District deal. A lot of high school and American Legion games take place at Kraft Field, so even if UND dropped its program they still need a decent baseball park there. Quote
choyt3 Posted January 21, 2015 Posted January 21, 2015 I think it was a Park District deal. A lot of high school and American Legion games take place at Kraft Field, so even if UND dropped its program they still need a decent baseball park there. Which makes saying that putting turf on the infield was a waste of money, in regards to UND baseball, is a pretty silly take. Quote
bincitysioux Posted January 21, 2015 Posted January 21, 2015 It was a cost sharing deal between the Park District and UND. 1 Quote
The Sicatoka Posted January 21, 2015 Posted January 21, 2015 The current roster of UND Mens sports (10): Baseball Basketball Cross Country Football Golf Hockey Swimming & Diving Tennis Track & Field (indoor) Track & Field (outdoor) The current roster of UND Womens sports (11): Basketball Cross Country Golf Hockey Soccer Softball Swimming & Diving Tennis Track & Field (indoor) Track & Field (outdoor) Volleyball I count T&F "indoor" and "outdoor" because that's how the NCAA counts them when it comes to meeting sponsored sport minimums. Quote
The Sicatoka Posted January 21, 2015 Posted January 21, 2015 The Operating Code of the Big Sky Conference requires (Article I, Section 1, as of 2010-2011*) core sports: Men (6): Basketball Cross Country Football Tennis Track & Field (indoor) Track & Field (outdoor) Women (7): Basketball Cross Country Golf Tennis Track & Field (indoor) Track & Field (outdoor) Volleyball *Too lazy to look for newer. Quote
The Sicatoka Posted January 21, 2015 Posted January 21, 2015 And, on a whim, in case SiouxVolley is reading, 20.02.6 Football Bowl Subdivision Conference. A conference classified as a Football Bowl Subdivision conference shall be comprised of at least eight full Football Bowl Subdivision members that satisfy all bowl subdivision requirements. An institution shall be included as one of the eight full Football Bowl Subdivision members only if the institution participates in the conference schedule in at least six men’s and eight women’s conference-sponsored sports, including men’s basketball and football and three women’s team sports including women’s basketball. A conference-sponsored sport shall be a sport in which regular-season and/or championship opportunities are provided, consistent with the minimum standards identified by the applicable NCAA sport committee for automatic qualification. The Big Sky would need to add a conference level womens sport to qualify to FBS minimums (6 mens; 8 womens). Probably the easiest* to "add" for the BSC would be either golf or soccer, maybe softball. *Remember, eight conference members have to participate for it to count. Quote
bincitysioux Posted January 21, 2015 Posted January 21, 2015 And, on a whim, in case SiouxVolley is reading, The Big Sky would need to add a conference level womens sport to qualify to FBS minimums (6 mens; 8 womens). Probably the easiest* to "add" for the BSC would be either golf or soccer, maybe softball. *Remember, eight conference members have to participate for it to count. The Big Sky has softball, they started it shortly after UND joined....... Quote
SiouxVolley Posted January 22, 2015 Posted January 22, 2015 The Big Sky has softball, they started it shortly after UND joined....... Softball isn't mandatory, but Montana is adding it. Only waiting on Montana St and EWU. Quote
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