Tag: Sports

More on the Blue Hawks in China

The Dickinson State basketball team poses with the Northwest A&F team, as well as numerous coaches and officials, including DSU President Dr. Richard McCallum.

Here’s a quick update on the Dickinson State men’s basketball team’s trip to China according to an e-mail from head coach Ty Orton.

On its second day, the team visited Tiananmen Square and ate “unique foods” in the alley food shops nearby. Needless to say, senior Nathan Lebsock and freshman Zach Edward didn’t enjoy their fish and brains combo meal.

Everywhere the players go, they have been asked to take numerous photos “This adds 15 to 20 minutes of extra time at every place we venture to. The people are impressed with the size of our guys and that they happen to play basketball,” Orton said.

On their third and fourth days, the Blue Hawks spent time at Northwest Agriculture and Forestry University in Yangling and played in two basketball games. “The tour was fun and very informative for the players and coaches,” Orton said.

The teams first game was played in front of 4,000 students who Orton said took off a national holiday to stay and watch the game. Orton said he was told the university turned away more than 8,000 students who wanted to watch the game in the packed facility. “The game was a great success and everyone involved enjoyed the experience,” he said.

Sophomore Matt Lee was named the game’s Most Valuable Player after scoring 15 points and grabbing 10 rebounds as the Blue Hawks won 82-67.

The team played in game with mixed teams on their fourth day.

On the fifth day, yesterday, Orton said the team was having trouble finding an Internet connection or cellphone reception.

View more team photos on their Flickr page.

The Dickinson State men's basketball team poses in front of the Forbidden City in Beijing.

Cash is king in all levels of college sports

Who has the best interests of the student-athletes in mind when it comes to college athletics?

If recent history tells us anything, it’s certainly not university administrators.

From the NCAA Division I level on down to the NAIA, cash has proven itself to be king.

Whatever path serves to make a school more money is the one that institution will undoubtedly veer toward, regardless of whether or not it is the correct path. In June, we watched as TV rights — and the millions of dollars that flow into universities from them — changed the landscape of college athletics.

Decades-long rivalries imploded, schools went off the beaten path and one of college athletics’ greatest conferences nearly imploded all for the sake of a few extra million bucks in the pockets of those who sit in the ivory box seats.

We watched Colorado and Utah leave geographically and competitively advantageous leagues for the Pac-10, a historically great conference that hasn’t been all that great lately. But who cares, because the Pac-10 is soon going to hook itself one heck of a TV deal, and who doesn’t want to be a part of that?

We watched Nebraska turn up its nose at longtime rivals in the Big 12 and join the Big Ten. Why? Because of the Big Ten Network, the dollars that come with it, as well as the perceived advantages that come with competing in a conference that hasn’t had a national champion in football since 2002.

Unfortunately, the money train doesn’t stop at Division I.

Even in the little NAIA, where the biggest TV deal comes in the form of a 30-second spot on the local news, things are beginning to fall apart because of the almighty dollar.

Recently, many schools who have had strong histories and success in the NAIA are jumping ship for the so-called greener grasses of NCAA Division II.

At the Division II level, expenses increase and, as from what we’ve seen just down the interstate in the past five years, the rewards diminish.

University administrators nationwide who have made the jump say one of the major reasons they do so is because there is a better knowledge of the NCAA brand name than the NAIA.

Translation: We make more money this way.

It’s believed that — much like those former Division II schools that went Division I — once school move under the NCAA flag, booster donations are sure to increase and a higher quality of student-athlete and additional non-athlete students will take notice, driving up enrollment in the process.

While it’s true that being in Division II brings better competition, there is also the matter of knowing one’s place in the world.

Black Hills State and South Dakota Mines are two schools who just don’t seem to know their place — and they’re not alone.

Sometime this month, possibly as early as this week, it’s expected that the NCAA will approve the two South Dakota schools, both members of the Dakota Athletic Conference, to begin making the transition out of the NAIA and into Division II.

I hate to be harsh to either athletic program, because they’ve both had their share of success.

Recently, Black Hills State has been strong in all of its revenue sports, plus it has a strong history of winning programs and a booster club that doesn’t mind giving them the cash to make it happen.

However, in the decade it has been a member of the DAC, South Dakota Mines has never won a regular-season conference championship.

It doesn’t matter where Mines goes in Division II, or even that it has a plan in place to raise millions of dollars for its athletic program. If it can’t win a title in the DAC, it doesn’t stand a chance in Division II.

For an example, I only need to three words: University of Mary.

The Bismarck school appears to be doing just as well financially at the Division II level as it did at the NAIA.

It even inked a bigger radio deal and a weekly television show with the move. (Sound familiar?)

But, it appears its days of winning national championships and being at the top of its conference in every sport are over, or at least dormant.

I don’t know if Black Hills State wants that, but it’s probably not going to make a big difference to South Dakota Mines.

Monke is the Sports Editor of The Dickinson Press. E-mail him at dmonke@thedickinsonpress.com and read his blog at http://www.areavoices.com/monke.

 

AT A CROSSROAD: DSU begins weighing its options, looking toward its athletic future

Dickinson State athletics may soon come to a fork in the road.

It is likely that over the next year, the university will face a decision about what direction to take its athletic programs.

Minot State’s acceptance into NCAA Division II, coupled with Black Hills State and South Dakota Mines exploring the same move, has DSU officials worried the time is fast approaching when it will need to decide whether to stay on the road it has traveled for more than 50 years and remain a member of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) or head down a path that would lead it toward NCAA membership.

“All of this comes down to choices,” DSU athletic director Roger Ternes said. “Where do you think you best fit?”

Since January, DSU has held meetings to discuss its options in the event Black Hills and Mines submit applications and are accepted for membership by the NCAA. The deadline for D-II application is June 1. The NCAA Membership Committee reviews the applications in early July at its annual convention and shortly thereafter announces which schools it has selected to begin a two-year membership process.

Minot State was one of eight teams chosen last year and Dakota Athletic Conference commissioner Lavern Jessen said the league has plans in place to move forward without the Beavers.

Jessen said if Black Hills and Mines leave, the DAC’s future is uncertain.

“Whether or not we’re going to see a Dakota Athletic Conference down the road, one of the key things is what Black Hills and South Dakota Mines do,” Jessen said. “If they decide they’re moving on, we have a very serious problem.”

The exodus of the two South Dakota schools would leave DSU on what amounts to an island with its closest NAIA competition 200 miles away and in a conference with five teams and no automatic postseason bid.

Essentially, it would be a death sentence to the school’s proud and successful athletic programs.

“In that situation, with that framework, we think we have three options,” Ternes said. Three options

If DSU’s worst-case scenario plays out, Ternes believes there will still be opportunities for the school to remain in the NAIA.

Two options involve looking elsewhere for conference affiliation.

DSU’s best bets would be the Frontier Conference to its west and the Great Plains Athletic Conference to the south. There are several pros and cons for each conference, Ternes said.

For example, DSU is nearly 300 miles away from its nearest competition in each conference and more than 600 miles from several others, meaning its travel budget would undoubtedly have to increase.

DSU is more familiar with the Frontier since its basketball teams schedule its schools during the nonconference portion of its season. DSU coaches also recruit in many of the same areas as the Frontier.

Still, outside of basketball and occasional football games, DSU rarely faces the Frontier. That stems from the conference only offering affiliation for eight of DSU’s 13 sports: football, volleyball, men’s and women’s basketball, men’s and women’s cross country and men’s and women’s golf. If DSU would be put in a position where the Frontier is its best option for conference affiliation, such traditionally strong sports such as baseball, softball, men’s and women’s track and field and wrestling would be left without a conference.

While the GPAC offers conference affiliation for every DSU sport, the conference would have to change its constitution for the Blue Hawks to join.

Currently, the GPAC is set up as a league for only faithbased institutions. It will also have 12 schools in the 2011-12 school year as the University of Sioux Falls (S.D.) has also been accepted into the D-II ranks.

DSU is also several hundred miles from every GPAC school, meaning that if the DAC were to dissolve and the GPAC was interested in expansion, it members might be more enticed to pursue other DAC schools that would be without a home — Jamestown College, Mayville State, Valley City State and Dakota State — instead of DSU.

“We have to look at the pros and cons of all of those (options) and weigh those if we’re going to remain an NAIA institution,” Ternes said.

Should DSU choose to move to the NCAA level, Ternes said the school would only do so if it was able to gain entry into a conference.

Ternes said, in that hypothetical situation, the best option would be to form a new D-II league made up of the regional schools who would either be without conference affiliation or may be searching for a conference that better suits their athletic budgets and geography.

“Are we better off getting in a league that includes those institutions? Then we’re on the same playing field,” Ternes said. “It gets us back playing those schools we’ve played traditionally for 50 years.”

Budget concerns

Though DSU’s athletic history, facilities and ability to raise money may make being accepted into D-II relatively easy, Ternes said the biggest deterrent at this point is money.

According to the U.S. Department of Education’s Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act (EADA), the average D-II athletic department with football costs an average of 50 percent more to operate than in the NAIA.

However, the EADA also shows that DSU’s total athletic budget for 2008 was on par with several regional D-II schools that have football, including Chadron State, Minnesota-Crookston and Northern State.

Nonetheless, Ternes said school officials have watched the transition periods of several former NAIA institutions to NCAA closely and are in agreement that maintaining competitive programs at the D-II level boils down to one component — money.

“The issue with the NCAA, or at least one of them, is there’s considerably increased cost of operation. You have to certainly take that into consideration,” Ternes said.

“I think you wouldn’t be exaggerating — from all the information we’ve had and various studies — that it would be at a minimum of around $1 million annually in increase in operation. Keep in mind, that doesn’t include scholarships and those type of things, it’s operation. I don’t know of any institution that’s our size that has a spare million lying around that they want to divert toward athletics.”

One of the major changes of joining the NCAA is staff. DSU would have to create three full-time positions — compliance coordinator, sports information director and women’s sports administrator — not required under the NAIA banner. Other positions, like additional assistant coaches and training staff, would also likely need to be added.

Finding money to do that would become difficult, Ternes said, since DSU’s enrollment would likely take a hit because changes to student-athlete aid would force teams to cut back on the number of members.

While scholarships limits of NCAA schools are relatively similar to the NAIA, student aid is figured differently. NCAA schools must count any aid given to a student-athlete toward its athletic aid budget.

That, Ternes said, would devastate DSU’s numbers.

“This year, we have around 460 student-athletes,” Ternes said. “… We would probably, under an NCAA umbrella, reduce that number of students in athletics by about 150.”

The scariest part of moving to Division II, however, is the possibility of reduced success.

Since the DAC was formed in 2000, DSU has won four NAIA national championships — three in men’s track and field and one in volleyball — and has had numerous high finishes in men’s track and field, softball and wrestling. The Blue Hawks have also reached the national tournament in every sport in that time period.

It is unlikely DSU would be able to maintain that level of success in D-II.

Jessen points to an NAIA study of the 128 of its former members that joined D-II in the past 15 years. The study showed that 51 percent of the institutions have never made a postseason appearance in one of the eight most commonly sponsored sports, or sports that drive revenue.

“Some of them have had success, but for the most part, they go into Division II and are basically never heard from again,” Jessen said.

Most DSU coaches say they don’t even need to look at a study to see the effects of moving from the NAIA to D-II.

Watching the University of Mary, DSU’s former conference rival and one of the NAIA’s premier institutions in its day, play — for the most part — a middling role in DII’s powerful Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference is all the proof they need.

“I think there’s a lot of teams in Division II that many schools in our area could compete with,” DSU football coach Hank Biesiot said. “It’s just that they’re not in our area.”

As university officials prepare and plan for different scenarios and wait patiently for the South Dakota schools to make a decision, DSU President Dr. Richard McCallum holds onto hope that no further moves will need to be made.

“We’re very much committed to the NAIA and the DAC conference,” McCallum said. “I’m very optimistic about the future of the DAC conference. That’s where our commitment and our energy is focused.”

Still, Ternes said it does not hurt to be prepared for any scenario.

“We’re just going to find out what niche is best for us,” Ternes said. “In the next couple years, we’re going to work hard on that and keep our options open.”

Bud Grant Greets Fans

Nick Guse hasn’t been a Minnesota Vikings fan his entire life. He said it’s been about seven years.

But the 41-year-old Fargo man said he wasn’t going to pass up a chance at meeting legendary former Vikings coach Bud Grant and have him autograph a miniature Vikings helmet.

“That’ll finish the helmet,” said Guse after Grant signed the replica that was already sealed with the names of several former Vikings players who played during the 18 seasons Grant coached the team.

“It’s always fun to finish something up,” Guse said.

The 78-year-old retired coach, who led the Vikings to four trips to the Super Bowl in the 1960s and 1970s, signed autographs and met several fans at the Link Recreational boat liquidation sale Saturday at the Fargo Civic Center Centennial Hall.

Always willing to stay in touch with fans, Grant has been working hard advocating the construction of a new Vikings stadium in Blaine, Minn.

“Our fans are putting up with an inferior stadium,” Grant said. “If we are going to compete in this generation, it’s a necessity.”

When asked what the latest stadium news was, Grant responded candidly.

“I don’t know, I haven’t listened to the radio in the last hour,” he said.

The Vikings keep an office for Grant at their Winter Park Training Facility in Eden Prairie, Minn.

Although he believes the team has taken the right steps lately, Grant is still very neutral when asked about new head coach Brad Childress. But he’s quick to offer owner Zygi Wilf some words of advice.

“He’s working hard on the stadium and he’s working hard to sign free agents,” Grant said of Wilf. “But you’re limited. You’ve got to work within certain parameters that don’t apply to business. They can’t run a football team like they run a business.”

Two fans, Ruse Crume and his daughter Lily, received an autograph from Grant and came back later and spoke face-to-face with the former coach for about five minutes.

“It was fun to see him and get a chance to chat with him,” said Crume, who bought his daughter a football to have Grant sign.

Aside from signing autographs, Grant also sold prints of nature paintings he had originally sketched.

He joked that he isn’t much of a painter and collaborates with friends who bring out color in his sketches through shadows and perspective.

“Otherwise, it’d look like a hatchet job,” Grant said.

Rock Gullickson Fulfills Dream With Packers

Rock Gullickson knew he needed to look for a new job.

He didn’t know he’d be fulfilling a boyhood dream when he found it.

The Green Bay Packers have named the Moorhead native and life-long Packers fan to be the team’s new strength and conditioning coach.

Gullickson, who graduated from Moorhead High School and Moorhead State University, spent the past six years in the same position with the New Orleans Saints.

But, a call from Green Bay’s new head coach, Mike McCarthy, and a visit to the team’s facilities was all Gullickson needed to make his decision.

“As I was walking through the hall of their facility, I saw all my boyhood heroes on the walls,” said the 50-year-old Gullickson. “I broke down. I was so emotional.”

Gullickson said McCarthy was instrumental in tapping him to replace Barry Rubin as the team’s strength coach.

McCarthy was the Saints’ offensive coordinator from 2000-2004 and coached with Gullickson for five years before taking the offensive coordinator position with the San Francisco 49ers prior to this season.

Gullickson said he and McCarthy developed a strong work relationship in their time with the Saints.

“He’s the best person for this job, and I consider this position as important as any on my staff,” McCarthy said in a Packers press release.

“I’ve seen first hand what he can do with professional athletes. Our players will be impressed.”

Gullickson said he plans to implement a new conditioning program in an attempt to avoid another season filled with injuries.

The Packers placed several starters – Javon Walker, Ahman Green, Bubba Franks and Robert Ferguson – on the injuredreserved list this season.

“They had a number of injuries very early in the season that got them down,” Gullickson said. “One of the things we’re trying to improve upon is the offseason program. A lot of those injuries are fatigue related.”

Although Gullickson was an undersized offensive guard (6-foot, 240 pounds his senior season) when he played for Moorhead State, he made up for his size with strength and work ethic.

“He was one of our integral parts of our team,” said former Moorhead State offensive line coach Ron Masanz. “He was a pretty gung-ho kid.”

As a senior in 1977, Gullickson earned Associated Press Little All-America first-team honors. The Little All-America team is comprised of the best players from NCAA Division II, Division III and NAIA.

Gullickson went to New Orleans after stops at the University of Texas and the University of Louisville.

Things were going well for Gullickson in New Orleans until this season.

When Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast in late August, it forced the Saints to relocate to San Antonio.

“We had to put up a temporary weight room in a tent,” Gullickson said.

The tent, in a parking lot adjacent to the high school baseball field where the Saints practiced, was far from ideal for a professional football team.

The team’s workout troubles were complicated by an often changing schedule.

“These guys would thrive off knowing the schedule, knowing what to expect,” Gullickson said. “That threw a wrench into everything.”

Despite the Saints’ hopes that they’ll be able to play their home games in the Superdome next season, Gullickson was guarded as to whether he wanted to return, even though they offered him a two-year contract extension.

“There’s a lot of sadness in the city,” said Gullickson, as he and his wife, Terry, packed up their home in Destrahan, La., a suburb southwest of the New Orleans metro area. “There’s a lot of work being done. You can’t comprehend what work is being done.”

The house escaped extensive harm from Hurricane Katrina, suffering only easily repairable wind damage and no water damage. On Friday, the Gullickson’s received an offer on the house.

“There’s a lot of people who are looking for homes,” Gullickson said. “A lot of people are just coming back to the city.”

Gullickson believes he’s found his new home in Green Bay.

“It’s taken a while to sink in,” Gullickson said. “It still doesn’t seem real. They (the Packers) assured me it is.”