Facilities Master Plan

[the green team]

So basically what some people are saying is ya our stadium sucks, but their stadium sucks worse so we don't need a new stadium? Personally, I think if the football program wants to really be a contender then recruits have to have a reason to come here. Its no different then opportunity cost in business. What we lack in things such as weather has to be made up in different areas. If that means improving our facilities to set us apart then so be it. You have to make the opportunity of playing at UND greater than some of the other schools we will compete against or the recruits we need will never come.

I think if we can ever get this practice facility moving, it will move us into a far different level- when it comes to recruiting athletes, because athletes are going to play in a very nice stadium on game day and be able to prepare in a great practice facility in the lead up to it.

[IrishSiouxFan]

I think if we can ever get this practice facility moving, it will move us into a far different level- when it comes to recruiting athletes, because athletes are going to play in a very nice stadium on game day and be able to prepare in a great practice facility in the lead up to it.

Where is this very nice stadium of which you speak of?

[bisonh8er]

Where is this very nice stadium of which you speak of?

Exactly. You can't turn chicken poop into chicken soup. Just because some school in Louisiana has a crappy stadium doesn't mean that we should settle on a little less crappy of a stadium. I just don't see the logic in that. You can look at other schools and point out how crappy their facilities are but how does that justify us having a crappy stadium? And for those of you who don't think the Alerus is a poor venue for UND football, you are outnumbered. By a lot. Last Thursday we were tailgaiting at the game with about 20 people. We started talking about the Alerus and every single one of them thought the Alerus stinks to watch a game in.

[Cratter]

You and your friends must be pretty young.

Memorial Stadium. That "stunk to watch a game in." Cold windy, nobody there, no video replays, they didn't sell beer. My seat didn't even have a "back" on it!

They say the kids nowadays are spoiled. Or is it spoiled by perception?

[darell1976]

You and your friends must be pretty young.

Memorial Stadium. That "stunk to watch a game in." Cold windy, nobody there, no video replays, they didn't sell beer. My seat didn't even have a "back" on it!

They say the kids nowadays are spoiled. Or is it spoiled by perception?

I remember taking a shovel and digging out my seat at Memorial Stadium. That game was fun to watch as the snow melted into ice. Sioux kicked @ss in that game.

[The Sicatoka]

I enjoyed the game at Memorial (one of the last seasons) where the wind was as follows:

• Kickoff: south at 30 mph, gusts to 40 mph
  
• End of first half: south at 30 mph
  
• Five minutes left in halftime: Calm
  
• Second half kickoff: northwest at 35 mph, gusts to 50 mph
  

Visiting team didn't think (or realize what was coming) and ended up making their second half choice such that they played into the wind in the fourth quarter.

That is home field advantage.

[PhillySioux]

I enjoyed the game at Memorial (one of the last seasons) where the wind was as follows:

• 
  
  
• Kickoff: south at 30 mph, gusts to 40 mph
  
• End of first half: south at 30 mph
  
• Five minutes left in halftime: Calm
  
• Second half kickoff: northwest at 35 mph, gusts to 50 mph
  

Visiting team didn't think (or realize what was coming) and ended up making their second half choice such that they played into the wind in the fourth quarter.

That is home field advantage.

That is also disastrous for warm state recruiting.

[tnt]

Exactly. You can't turn chicken poop into chicken soup. Just because some school in Louisiana has a crappy stadium doesn't mean that we should settle on a little less crappy of a stadium. I just don't see the logic in that. You can look at other schools and point out how crappy their facilities are but how does that justify us having a crappy stadium? And for those of you who don't think the Alerus is a poor venue for UND football, you are outnumbered. By a lot. Last Thursday we were tailgaiting at the game with about 20 people. We started talking about the Alerus and every single one of them thought the Alerus stinks to watch a game in.

What was your alternative when asking these people? I think attendance at the Alerus compared to Memorial Stadium has you outnumbered. Now if your alternative is a new 100+ million stadium, then I would vote for that. Will you and all your friends each chip in $10,000 to help make that happen?

[star2city]

I think if we can ever get this practice facility moving, it will move us into a far different level- when it comes to recruiting athletes, because athletes are going to play in a very nice stadium on game day and be able to prepare in a great practice facility in the lead up to it.

Very much agree with this statement.

With a practice facility and the Alerus, UND would have top-notch FCS facilities. The issue is the energy of the fans in the Alerus - not the Alerus. The energy used to be there - it's not there now at all.

But it's in the Betty. How did that happen? Maybe some secret ingredients spelled with the letters W I N and P A S S I O N

[bincitysioux]

Just curious, how many 10,000-15,000 seat football stadiums across the country are superior to the Alerus either amenity wise or atmosphere wise? Obviously haven't been to or am even familar with most stadiums, but off hand I can think of UC Davis, Cal Poly, Montana St.

Not sure how big Southern Illinois' stadium is or Youngstown's, but I understand they are nice and/or provide good environments.

Memorial Stadium has some nostalgia, but honestly if attendance is currently 8,000-9,000 in a state-of-the-art 10 year old Alerus, I'll bet it would struggle to be half of that if we still playe at Memorial.

I know there are alot of mixed feelings on this subject from both the younger fans and the long-time Grand Forkers that grew up with Memorial, but I wish some of the current students and younger alumni and fans ( I'm talkin' to you IrishSiouxFan and bisonh8er ) could have been around to experinence the games during the national championship runs in 2001 and 2003, and even 2004-06 when we were very good. That was great atmosphere..................even better than the Ralph at the time. People pissed and moaned about the REA being a sterile enironment until about 4 seasons ago as well.

Like I've said countless times, everyone loves a winner, especially in Grand Forks. WHEN North Dakota starts putting a Big Sky Conference contender on the field in the next couple years, the Alerus will be rockin' again. If they continue to churn out 6-5 seasons, you can build your 25,000 seat retractable roof stadium, but it will still only have 8,500 in it..................

[bisonh8er]

What was your alternative when asking these people? I think attendance at the Alerus compared to Memorial Stadium has you outnumbered. Now if your alternative is a new 100+ million stadium, then I would vote for that. Will you and all your friends each chip in $10,000 to help make that happen?

Attendance from Memorial compared to the Alerus is totally irrelevant to anything. You comparing a stadium and attendance numbers that have no meaning. The city has grown, the school has grown, the football program has grown, and most of all expectations have grown. The Alerus isn't a piece of crap, and I'm not trying to say it is. I'm saying if UND wants its football program to be at an elite status in the FCS, the Alerus doesn't cut it. Im saying schools down south have a distinct advantage when it comes to recruiting. Recruits don't hear "come to UND" and think I have to be there. The program has to have a legitimate reason for recruits to come here. Facilities, in my opinion, are the one thing UND can do to set themselves apart for other FCS schools. The Alerus might be an ok facility. But is ok good enough at this level? I just think if you want to be an elite program, then you have to give recruits a reason to think you are an elite program. The Ralph took UND hockey recruiting to a new level. It also took attendance and revenue to a new level. Do you not think a new stadium would do the same for the football program? If you build it they will come. I'm not saying they need to build a new stadium in the next 5 years. But it would be a damn shame if they haven't already started setting money aside to build one in the next 10, 15, 20 years. I would expect some of the 50 some thousand dollars I've spent on the school to go to something like that.

[IrishSiouxFan]

Attendance from Memorial compared to the Alerus is totally irrelevant to anything. You comparing a stadium and attendance numbers that have no meaning. The city has grown, the school has grown, the football program has grown, and most of all expectations have grown. The Alerus isn't a piece of crap, and I'm not trying to say it is. I'm saying if UND wants its football program to be at an elite status in the FCS, the Alerus doesn't cut it. Im saying schools down south have a distinct advantage when it comes to recruiting. Recruits don't hear "come to UND" and think I have to be there. The program has to have a legitimate reason for recruits to come here. Facilities, in my opinion, are the one thing UND can do to set themselves apart for other FCS schools. The Alerus might be an ok facility. But is ok good enough at this level? I just think if you want to be an elite program, then you have to give recruits a reason to think you are an elite program. The Ralph took UND hockey recruiting to a new level. It also took attendance and revenue to a new level. Do you not think a new stadium would do the same for the football program? If you build it they will come. I'm not saying they need to build a new stadium in the next 5 years. But it would be a damn shame if they haven't already started setting money aside to build one in the next 10, 15, 20 years. I would expect some of the 50 some thousand dollars I've spent on the school to go to something like that.

I agree, I think the majority of us who want a new facility are really only asking does UND have a long term plan and what are they doing to make it a reality. They haven't done a particularly great job in communicating with us what the over-arching goal is. Sure we've seen these amazing conceptual renderings from several years ago, but not one mention of them in quite a while. I really hope a state of the art IPF comes to fruition within the next year or two, it would be huge in terms of recruitment but that seems to be a pipe dream. I think the main reason that fans like myself are in the "hurry up and build it" mindset is that a lot of things are changing in the landscape of college football and their will soon be a huge and seemingly permanent divide between the haves and have nots. As a loyal UND supporter I would rather see my institution I would rather see my school on the short list when the realignment Armageddon begins and with several schools in the Big 12 threatening to seek litigation on A&M and the SEC we have been granted a short stay of execution, we have to spend this time wisely rebuilding if we want our football program to remain relevant in the 21st century. I think we can all agree on that.

[Bison Dan]

But it would be a damn shame if they haven't already started setting money aside to build one in the next 10, 15, 20 years. I would expect some of the 50 some thousand dollars I've spent on the school to go to something like that.

WOW you really are delusional. The only time the Dome and the Alerus isn't a good venue for football is when it's 50 or more outside. (I'd rather be outside watching) Two things every team needs - good schedule and to win. Everyone likes a winner.

[darell1976]

WOW you really are delusional. The only time the Dome and the Alerus isn't a good venue for football is when it's 50 or more outside. (I'd rather be outside watching) Two things every team needs - good schedule and to win. Everyone likes a winner.

We get part A next year, and for part B we can do that this year and set us up really well for next year. But if we do another 3-8 this year, I think attendance will suffer even with a good schedule.

[siouxjoy]

I know there are alot of mixed feelings on this subject from both the younger fans and the long-time Grand Forkers that grew up with Memorial, but I wish some of the current students and younger alumni and fans ( I'm talkin' to you IrishSiouxFan and bisonh8er ) could have been around to experinence the games during the national championship runs in 2001 and 2003, and even 2004-06 when we were very good. That was great atmosphere..................even better than the Ralph at the time.

There were games in the Alerus that were so loud and crazy I could feel my skin vibrate (like when the Sioux came back from 11 pts. down against Grand Valley State in the playoffs), and I thought the roof was going to come down. I can't wait for those days to return!

[JohnboyND7]

There were games in the Alerus that were so loud and crazy I could feel my skin vibrate (like when the Sioux came back from 11 pts. down against Grand Valley State in the playoffs), and I thought the roof was going to come down. I can't wait for those days to return!

See, for those guys complaining (IrishSiouxFan) that the Alerus is not an acceptable venue, you probably never saw it at its best. It is essentially a smaller FargoDome but with beer! I don't see where you can really complain about it that much. I understand that you want this huge stadium at Memorial, but why would the school/city invest into that? Why do you think UND is going FBS? Have they given you any indication whatsoever that they Alerus is not a fairly long-term solution for UND football?

[darell1976]

There were games in the Alerus that were so loud and crazy I could feel my skin vibrate (like when the Sioux came back from 11 pts. down against Grand Valley State in the playoffs), and I thought the roof was going to come down. I can't wait for those days to return!

I would say the same thing about the 2001 playoffs against UC Davis. That place was rockin!!!!

[IrishSiouxFan]

See, for those guys complaining (IrishSiouxFan) that the Alerus is not an acceptable venue, you probably never saw it at its best. It is essentially a smaller FargoDome but with beer! I don't see where you can really complain about it that much. I understand that you want this huge stadium at Memorial, but why would the school/city invest into that? Why do you think UND is going FBS? Have they given you any indication whatsoever that they Alerus is not a fairly long-term solution for UND football?

You're right JohnBoy lets continue to keep the status quo and our expectations low. Lets dream about big game days with 13,500 people getting loud in a poorly designed concrete box off of the interstate. That may have been fine 10 years ago at the D2 level but that dog won't hunt at the D1 FCS and FBS level. I can't believe it's this difficult to sell the idea of better facilities to the fans of a flag ship institution. Come on guys where's your school spirit at?

[UND Fan]

I agree, I think the majority of us who want a new facility are really only asking does UND have a long term plan and what are they doing to make it a reality. They haven't done a particularly great job in communicating with us what the over-arching goal is. Sure we've seen these amazing conceptual renderings from several years ago, but not one mention of them in quite a while. I really hope a state of the art IPF comes to fruition within the next year or two, it would be huge in terms of recruitment but that seems to be a pipe dream. I think the main reason that fans like myself are in the "hurry up and build it" mindset is that a lot of things are changing in the landscape of college football and their will soon be a huge and seemingly permanent divide between the haves and have nots. As a loyal UND supporter I would rather see my institution I would rather see my school on the short list when the realignment Armageddon begins and with several schools in the Big 12 threatening to seek litigation on A&M and the SEC we have been granted a short stay of execution, we have to spend this time wisely rebuilding if we want our football program to remain relevant in the 21st century. I think we can all agree on that.

I appreciate your passion! Unquestionably, you "think big" which is normally quite commendable. However, much of what you continue to talk about requires huge amounts of cash. Where do you expect UND to find that kind of money? It would be great if another Ralph & Betty came along but that is highly unlikely. UND has its hands full financially just making the transition: more scholarships to fund, higher salaries, adding more employees, escalating tuition affecting the cost of scholarships, major travel expenses in all sports just to compete at the DI level, major recruiting expense due to the expansion of our recruiting footprint (not many kids are driving to GF to see what UND has to offer), etc.

I need to ask the question: as a "loyal UND supporter", have you made a financial commitment to assist the athletic department meet these expenses and plan for the future? I don't remember if you are a student or not. If so, then you probably don't have the means to do much yet. I would hope that you do (or will) write as large of a check as possible every year to help UND athletics prosper. If you are not doing so or don't intend to do so, you may want to be a little less vocal and do a little less second-guessing about UND's desire to move forward. I do realize that "writing as large of a check as possible" represents a full spectrum of dollar amounts. Some folks certainly can afford much more than others but the smaller amounts are also extremely important!

I do think we will hear more about the IPF quite soon - that will be a much-needed addition to UND's athletic facilities. However, complaining that there is no long term plan for a new stadium just doesn't make sense. UND leadership has too much to do to keep their arms around all that is happening today to spend a great of time planning for a stadium that will cost milllions of $. That isn't going to materialize anytime soon unless someone comes along willing to write a check for the vast majority of its cost. On that point - I assume that you do know UND has people out making contacts with any and all UND alumni and supporters looking for every dollar they can get to assist our athletic efforts.

Sorry for the lecture - again, I appreciate your passion for Sioux sports!

[JohnboyND7]

You're right JohnBoy lets continue to keep the status quo and our expectations low. Lets dream about big game days with 13,500 people getting loud in a poorly designed concrete box off of the interstate. That may have been fine 10 years ago at the D2 level but that dog won't hunt at the D1 FCS and FBS level. I can't believe it's this difficult to sell the idea of better facilities to the fans of a flag ship institution. Come on guys where's your school spirit at?

My school spirit is here in North Fargo. NDSU guy here. I think its great to dream big and everything, but lets be relatively reasonable here. North Dakota just isn't a bigtime FBS state. Is there anything wrong with that? Absolutely not. Not everyone can be FBS or at the very least be relevant in FBS. Do I think NDSU/UND could be good enough for the MAC? Absolutely. But do you want the highlight of your season to be the Meineke.com bowl after an 8-4 season against a 7-5 team from the Sun Belt? UND, nor NDSU for that matter, have ever given any reason to think that they can be a top 25 team in the FBS. Can either of our schools beat the worst SEC teams? No. Can they beat a mediocre Big 10 or 12 team? Perhaps. NDSU nearly beat a so-so Minnesota team and beat a terrible one. Beat a pretty bad Kansas team as well.

I love the FargoDome. I love when it gets to 18,000 fans. It gets loud in there and it really makes for a good time. The Alerus, while a good bit smaller, offers something at least relatively similar. Maybe a bit more fairweather fans than NDSU just because hockey is king up North but you get the picture. If UND is good, the Alerus is a solid football venue. Plus it has beer. Which is awesome for you guys, we are very envious of that. I can see why you might want a bigger stadium because you want a bigger, better atmosphere. But I have followed what you said on this thread for awhile. You want an extremely expensive retractable roof stadium holding if I remember right, in the neighborhood of 25-35,000 people. That just isn't going to happen. I am sorry. Down the road, could UND potentially move back to Memorial and get it to hold 20,000? Yes, but once the cold hits not as many people are going to go watch. I'm not trying to be a hater here bro but c'mon. We can probably both agree, that regardless of which team is better, generally speaking, NDSU has more football fan interest, I think attendence figures have shown that. I have heard pretty well no one claim that NDSU needs a new football stadium. Would it be awesome if we had the fan interest to hold 30,000 people outdoors? Hell yeah, I'd love that. But that simply isn't going to happen.

Tell you what, if UND starts selling out every game, for multiple years, and is winning Big Sky titles left and right, maybe even a championship, and the fans are demanding that the Alerus be replaced, I say go for it in that case. I don't anticipate that happening, but it wouldn't be the first time or the last time that I was wrong. I hope you can at least see where I am coming from. Overall, UND has very good facilities. The REA is a beautiful building. The Betty is nice too. The Alerus, while it isn't a flawless building, is a fine place to play football. A new building can only increase fan attendence for a year or two, if the product on the field doesn't improve, fans again quit coming. If UND became an average hockey team (they have had those years before), the Ralph isn't going to sell-out. If the football team had a 30,000 seat OUTDOOR stadium, and the team isn't good, you will go right back to 8-10,000 attendence.

Not trying to knock you bro, I think people need to aim high, but sometimes, people aim a tad too high.

[Cratter]

I do think we will hear more about the IPF quite soon - that will be a much-needed addition to UND's athletic facilities.

Faison on the radio today made it sound like we shouldn't be holding our breathe.

A caller asked about the IPF. Faison said something like "If you got $21 Million we would be ready to go. The money is not there. We have put out a couple requests to big donors but haven't gotten anything back yet."

[IrishSiouxFan]

I appreciate your passion! Unquestionably, you "think big" which is normally quite commendable. However, much of what you continue to talk about requires huge amounts of cash. Where do you expect UND to find that kind of money? It would be great if another Ralph & Betty came along but that is highly unlikely. UND has its hands full financially just making the transition: more scholarships to fund, higher salaries, adding more employees, escalating tuition affecting the cost of scholarships, major travel expenses in all sports just to compete at the DI level, major recruiting expense due to the expansion of our recruiting footprint (not many kids are driving to GF to see what UND has to offer), etc.

I need to ask the question: as a "loyal UND supporter", have you made a financial commitment to assist the athletic department meet these expenses and plan for the future? I don't remember if you are a student or not. If so, then you probably don't have the means to do much yet. I would hope that you do (or will) write as large of a check as possible every year to help UND athletics prosper. If you are not doing so or don't intend to do so, you may want to be a little less vocal and do a little less second-guessing about UND's desire to move forward. I do realize that "writing as large of a check as possible" represents a full spectrum of dollar amounts. Some folks certainly can afford much more than others but the smaller amounts are also extremely important!

I do think we will hear more about the IPF quite soon - that will be a much-needed addition to UND's athletic facilities. However, complaining that there is no long term plan for a new stadium just doesn't make sense. UND leadership has too much to do to keep their arms around all that is happening today to spend a great of time planning for a stadium that will cost milllions of $. That isn't going to materialize anytime soon unless someone comes along willing to write a check for the vast majority of its cost. On that point - I assume that you do know UND has people out making contacts with any and all UND alumni and supporters looking for every dollar they can get to assist our athletic efforts.

Sorry for the lecture - again, I appreciate your passion for Sioux sports!

For starters, I am a student (Doctoral), I attend just about every sporting event on campus, and I donate roughly $1,000 per year towards athletics (would like to do more but a man can only give what he has). I can tell that I'm out gunned here and that everybody but me is fine with the Alerus as the permanent home of UND football, I guess I should be grateful that at least we have hockey and we are definitely king of the mountain of that.

[JohnboyND7]

For starters, I am a student (Doctoral), I attend just about every sporting event on campus, and I donate roughly $1,000 per year towards athletics (would like to do more but a man can only give what he has). I can tell that I'm out gunned here and that everybody but me is fine with the Alerus as the permanent home of UND football, I guess I should be grateful that at least we have hockey and we are definitely king of the mountain of that.

I'd say $1,000 is pretty damn solid for a student to be giving.

[GeauxSioux]

For starters, I am a student (Doctoral), I attend just about every sporting event on campus, and I donate roughly $1,000 per year towards athletics (would like to do more but a man can only give what he has). I can tell that I'm out gunned here and that everybody but me is fine with the Alerus as the permanent home of UND football, I guess I should be grateful that at least we have hockey and we are definitely king of the mountain of that.

If UND was fine with the Alerus as the long term football facility, they wouldn't have done an athletics master plan facilities that didn't include the Alerus Sica's post. Sure it will take a lot of money and years to come to fruition, but there are some forward thinking folks involved. Some of us, were and are hoping that things happen a little quicker, but with the delays that we have seen with the indoor practice facility, it may take a lot longer than I hoped.

[bisonh8er]

Again, I don't think anyone is saying lets just wake up in the mourning and put shovels in the ground. My point is that if the school hasn't already started to put money aside for one it is an absolute shame. Fact of the matter is that 95% of the recruits that we need to be national contenders have never even heard of Grand Forks and have no interest in coming up to North Dakota. You have to give them a reason to want to come here. It doesn't matter if the Alerus is better then Memorial. If you have a car that doesn't run, you can buy an 85 pinto that does. Ya you upgraded, but you still drive a piece of crap.