The Bobcat Nation

I thought you Bobcat fans might be interested in this thread from Bisonville. I won't go into the details, you can read it yourself if interested. It is one of the more interesting rumors out there.....

http://www.bisonville.com/cgi-bin/yabb/ ... 1090625424

It makes some sense from a scheduling standpoint I suppose. But the Big Sky has never seemed interested in non-football schools since Gonzaga left in the late 70's.

The Denver market is intruguing, but haven't we tried big markets with fairly mixed results? LA was a bust and Sacramento and Portland aren't exactly panning out at the ticket booth.

I would guess that even though they are from smaller states, more people care about NDSU and SDSU athletics than Denver or Northern Colorado. NDSU and SDSU will be near the top of the Big Sky in football and basketball attendance respectively right off the bat. I don't the DU or UNC will ever draw as well.

Despite their geography, the Dakota schools just look like a much better fit to me than anyone else.

BelgradeBobcat,

I agree whole heartedly (though I am a NDSU alumnist). I think the whole arguement of geography is out of contents though. NDSU and SDSU would come in as travel partners so actually it might help the Big Sky as the two schools are just 190 miles apart. I don't think any other travel partners are that close today. This is especially true of either S. Utah or Northern Colorado. What is an extra 10-20 minutes of flight time to Fargo or Sioux Falls (60 miles from Brookings)? No team that is looking to expand will be drivable by more then one other team anyway.

I will grant that a Denver/N. Colorado invite would also be good for the remaining Big Sky members travel-wise but what happens if just on team leaves for I-A or just leaves the Big Sky. You then have the problem of travel all over again for the non-football sports.

Bison_Kent wrote:BelgradeBobcat,

I agree whole heartedly (though I am a NDSU alumnist). I think the whole arguement of geography is out of contents though. NDSU and SDSU would come in as travel partners so actually it might help the Big Sky as the two schools are just 190 miles apart. I don't think any other travel partners are that close today. This is especially true of either S. Utah or Northern Colorado. What is an extra 10-20 minutes of flight time to Fargo or Sioux Falls (60 miles from Brookings)? No team that is looking to expand will be drivable by more then one other team anyway.

I will grant that a Denver/N. Colorado invite would also be good for the remaining Big Sky members travel-wise but what happens if just on team leaves for I-A or just leaves the Big Sky. You then have the problem of travel all over again for the non-football sports.

I also agree. NDSU/SDSU would both be the SMART choice to bring into the Big Sky. Attendance numbers would be very good in Football/Bball. I hope for sure this ends up happening. It seems like a NO BRAINER to me on this one? But maybe I'm missing something I guess.

I don't get impressed when I hear about "potential" big population markets. It's already been touched on in this discussion and closer to home.... With WSU and Idaho 1 hour south and Gonzaga building their new basketball arena, Eastern is somewhat of a poor stepchild in the Spokane market, and Spokane isn't exactly a huge population center.
From a purely selfish standpoint any of the Dakota schools would be a better trip for the Bobcats than NAU.

From mapquest.com, Bozman to Fargo is 750 miles. It is a tough drive but I have gone further for a Bison game. It is all interstate so assuming that everyone goes 75 miles/hour and just two 15 minute stops for gas, that is a 10 1/2 hour drive all on I-94/90.

Hell......when I was in Grad School at NDSU one of my friends (I am from Williston) that elected to go west to school (Montana State) instead of east (NDSU) got married. I had to make the trip from Fargo to Bozeman in a day. I made the trip drunk and it was one of the quickest trips I remember (although I probably forgot parts of it). .......And then there was this girl with big b**b$ from Billings that I met out there........

So, this distance stuff is all bullsh!t....