When North Dakota State University successfully made the upgrade to Division I athletics, the football rivalry with Division II University of North Dakota got sidetracked. Sidetracked, we thought, not scuttled.
But as UND completes its transition to Division I in football and other sports (ice hockey has been D-I for a long time), both schools seem to be throwing up hurdles to a revival of the football rivalry.
The intransigence might be justified in the minds of the schools' athletic directors, but fans and alumni won't buy it.
NDSU AD Gene Taylor argues a game every year won't fit NDSU's long-term scheduling priorities. UND AD Brian Faison wants a game played every season, as it was for decades before the D-I transition interruption.
If fans, tradition and plain ol' statewide excitement are the criteria - as they should be - Faison has the better argument. No matter what other teams are on NDSU's schedule, no team generates more fan and nonfan interest among Bison fans than UND. Taylor argues a yearly clash with the Sioux would eliminate football games with Montana State, Montana or Georgia Southern because of the conference priorities and scheduling. He told The Forum an every-other-year game with UND would better fit NDSU game schedules. Maybe so.
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But the question has to be asked: Would North Dakotans rather see a game between Georgia Southern and NDSU or the Sioux and the Bison? We suggest the overwhelming preference is the latter. It is a guarantee that an NDSU-UND clash every year, alternating in Fargo and Grand Forks, would stuff the Fargodome and Alerus Center to beyond capacity. The statewide buzz, every year, would be deafening. The renewed game would generate immediate positive PR for both schools.
The ADs seem at loggerheads. Reluctance of campus presidents to get involved is understandable. Presidents routinely designate athletic matters to athletic directors. But the prospect of reviving the yearly football game between UND and NDSU is not routine. It's more than an expectation. It's a promise made early on in the schools' sports transitions to D-I that has evolved into a mandate.
Find a way, fellas. North Dakotans - whether football fans
or not - demand no less.
Forum editorials represent the opinion of Forum management and the newspaper's Editorial Board.
