"Why not State and the U"

[NightHawk78]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

The SDSU-USD rivalry had a great run, but by the time it went dormant, it had lost a lot of its luster and people often took the rivalry for granted. The evidence to back it up:

Exhibit 1: The last SDSU-USD football game in Brookings (2002 - while SDSU was studying a move up to D-I) drew 5023 fans. SDSU has had 12 home games (including the game against UC-Davis in Sioux Falls) with higher attendance numbers in the last three years since moving up to Division I.

Exhibit 2: The last SDSU-USD football game in Vermillion (2003 - when people knew that the rivalry was likely to go on hiatus) managed to draw 8681 attendees. That's a ways off from the DakotaDome attendance record (10,999 during its playoff run in 1986) or even its stated capacity of 10,000. USD and SDSU could get crowds in the neighborhood of 15,000 during the peak of the rivalry (as Grizzled_Jack referred to).

Exhibit 3: The tales of how poorly SDSU fans were treated by USD backers leave a bitter taste. Those with Brookings County plates probably felt their cars were safer in the rough neighborhoods of Omaha than in the parking lots surrounding the DakotaDome.

Exhibit 4: The final SDSU-USD basketball doubleheader in Vermillion (for reasons mentioned earlier on this board) was simply an atrocity in the eyes of many members of Jackrabbit Nation.

Exhibit 5: USD's insistence that it remain to be treated as an equal when it came to scheduling potential games after SDSU moved up to D-I.

In addition, the potential for future matchups will be hampered by the facility limitations that USD faces. The DakotaDome is a poor basketball facility and is probably too small for the anticipated revival of a football rivalry. Having games in Sioux Falls is not very feasible for football since Howard Wood is also too small. A basketball game at the Arena would be preferable to one in Vermillion, however, as part of a hypothetical agreement.

That said, I think SDSU and USD will play again in the future, but that it will likely not occur until USD has completed its transition to D-I and some of the later incidents have faded from memory. If done properly, the rivalry will be resurrected and this hiatus will have been seen as a positive break in which South Dakotans were able to develop other collegiate rivalries and not just take "State-U" for granted.

[Grizzled_Jack]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

Let's assume it's 2020. In 2014, the GWFC picks up CSU-Bakersfield and the two Washington schools. With full membership it becomes automatically eligible in an expanded field. SDSU got first round placement in the Gateway in 2016, and won a playoff game in 2017. After winning in the first round in 2019, South Dakota makes a run for the national championship in 2020. They wind up in a championsip game against McNeese State.

Forty years ago, the state would have pulled together over pride in South Dakota. I would guess that given the scenario above, the vast majority of posters here would cheer for McNeese. Same thing would occur with USD fans if the shoe were on the other foot. Ditto for NDSU/UND.

People outside the Dakotas don't understand that, but it's a permanent reality in life.

That's a good reason to end competition in any sport.

[NightHawk78]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

Well, I'm only 29 and didn't arrive in Brookings until five years ago, so I missed out on the glory days of the SDSU-USD rivalry. From what I have gathered and witnessed, the rivalry had regressed into one that was based upon disrepsect and pure hatred. It simply was not much fun anymore.

Many members of Jackrabbit Nation simply do not want to have anything to do with a program and its fans who act without class and respect. You are right, Grzzled_Jack: many SDSU fans would cheer against USD in that scenario for the reason I mentioned. That's why it's mostly a good thing for SDSU to not be playing USD anymore.

I doubt that SDSU will be eager to vote USD into either of its conferences anytime soon (which will be a subtle hint to the other schools NOT to invite USD), but circumstances (probably unforseen today) will likely resurrect the SDSU-USD rivalry sometime in the intermediate future. Iowa's example is probably as good of an indicator as any...

[SDHoops]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

Oh great! When I asked this question, I got grilled in the frying pan...now that someone else does, they get more professional well-thought replies.

[Grizzled_Jack]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

Having lived in Missouri for the past 31 years, I still don't understand USD-SDSU but I accept it.

The KU-Missouri rivalry is based on actual deaths--this was the Lawrence Massacre, not to be confused with the earlier "Sack of Lawrence". Remember being with various Mizzou grads in the seventies who when they got a few drinks in 'em wanted to go back and burn it down for the third time:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Massacre

Missourians certainly hate Kansans and vice versa, but they still want to play 'em.

" Left behind were between 185 and 200 dead men and boys. By 9 a.m., they were on their way out of town, evading the few units that came in pursuit.

The Lawrence Massacre was one of the bloodiest events in the whole history of Kansas. A day after the attack, the surviving citizens of Lawrence lynched a member of Quantrill's Raiders caught in the town. On August 25, General Ewing authorized General Order No. 11 (not to be confused with Grant's less famous General Order of the same name) evicting thousands of Missourians in four counties from their homes near the Kansas border. Virtually everything in these counties was then systematically burned to the ground.

The city seal of Lawrence commemorates Quantrill's attack with its depiction of a Phoenix rising from the ashes of the burnt city."

Attending grad. school at Oklahoma in the sixties, I saw what the OU/Texas and OU/Nebraska rivalries were like. They played Notre Dame that year and everyone wore POTFI t-shirts, and that wasn't even a major rivalry.

All of these, along with OSU/Michigan, Alabama/Auburn, and Florida/FSU/Miami have had every bit as much boorish fan behavior as described above.

Putting things into historical perspective, I remember being in a bar outside of Deadwood (Days of Seventy Six) in 1964 when three way beer bottle and beer can hurling fights broke out between USD/SDSU and Wyoming fans if you can believe that. The fights moved to downtown Deadwood where the Rapid City Police arrived and began to sweep the area with police dogs. Made the rivalry better, IMHO.

I don't understand what's happening now, but believe it's real. I also believe that if a couple of teams drop from the Summit that UND and USD will be blocked and Utah Valley, SIUE or Texas Pan-Am given the slots. I'm just a dinosaur I guess--I've spent half my 62 years in Missouri and realize that's a long long time to be gone. Lets just say that things have mellowed considerably in SD and elsewhere since the time of my youth.

[Grizzled_Jack]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

KU-MU, MSNBC has three more stories like it--this is considered a good healthy rivalry. Crap like this happens every year in football and basketball. I still don't understand what USD did that was so far out of the norm either geographically or historically

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6814879/

Fanfare
Kansas has one of the most renown college fight songs — “Rock Chalk Jayhawk” — plus cheerleaders, a pep band and a large, loyal alumni following that accompanies the team on its annual March cross-country jaunts.

Missouri has a group of fanatic students known as “The Antlers,” They wear wigs and makeup, cheer with gusto — and then some — and especially like to harass Kansas players. Sometimes it’s over the top — spitting and throwing things. Sometimes it's outrageous fun — holding up huge banners with the home phone numbers of the KU players displayed for the national TV audience.

Kansas fans don’t always have the most tact, either. In 2003, when Missouri guard Ricky Clemons was accused of beating a female acquaintance, a Kansas coed showed up at a game donning a black eye and a T-shirt that read “Ricky’s Girlfriend.”

In the end, the players also get in on the act.

“We always want to beat Missouri,” Kansas forward Nick Collison said. “We hate them and they hate us. I would love to beat them 100-0, but that just isn’t going to happen. It is really fun to beat them.”

Or how about UNC-Duke:

Fanfare

“They hate us,” former North Carolina guard Joseph Forte once said. “Just like we hate them.”

No wonder the famed Cameron Crazies will break into chants of “Go to hell, Carolina, go to hell,” at any time. The Crazies are at their best when the Tar Heels are in the house. Among their most “creative” works: Waving tongue depressors to taunt Michael Jordan; holding signs that called Mike O’Koren, who had a skin problem, “OXY-1000 Poster Child;” wearing makeshift halos and chanting “We beg to differ,” instead of the usual two-syllable expletive, whenever they disagreed with a call. They had been asked to clean up their act for Carolina after throwing panties and condoms the week before at a Maryland player who had been accused of a sex crime.

Carolina fans are known more for being cocky and arrogant — especially during the glory years of Dean Smith — than for being boisterous or clever."

Is SDSU going to get this fired up for Centenary or IUPUI?

[Jacks-D1]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

Very good points, Grizzled Jack. Very good points. Also, although SDSU fans may want to believe that "SDSU people" never did anything disrepectful during State-U games and that it was only those "USD people", you would be wrong. I attended many SDSU-USD games and both sides had the same behavior, both good and bad.

[Grizzled_Jack]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

The MSNBC list I posted wasn't worst rivalries, it was BEST rivalries. Including dressing up like the assault victim, posting personal cell numbers on national TV, spitting and waving Oxy1000 posters at a pimple challenged player. I wouldn't do it, but I'm 62. When I was 22 and an a-hole, sure, why not? It provided me with fond memories of my youth. So why are both North and South Dakotans suddenly so thin skinned. Hell I remember stories about a school bus load of UND football players bringing up the end of a Hobo Day parade and pissing out the back of the bus. (remember it as NDSU, but think that UND and USD alternated Hobo Day in those days, maybe it was just a bus of Bison driving through traffic to get to the game).

Be that as it may, I just read a post on Bisonville that there's no way that they'd ever let UND and USD into the Summit, so bring on Edwardsville and Texas Pan Am.

[filbert]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

The MSNBC list I posted wasn't worst rivalries, it was BEST rivalries. Including dressing up like the assault victim, posting personal cell numbers on national TV, spitting and waving Oxy1000 posters at a pimple challenged player. I wouldn't do it, but I'm 62. When I was 22 and an a-hole, sure, why not? It provided me with fond memories of my youth. So why are both North and South Dakotans suddenly so thin skinned. Hell I remember stories about a school bus load of UND football players bringing up the end of a Hobo Day parade and pissing out the back of the bus. (remember it as NDSU, but think that UND and USD alternated Hobo Day in those days, maybe it was just a bus of Bison driving through traffic to get to the game).

Be that as it may, I just read a post on Bisonville that there's no way that they'd ever let UND and USD into the Summit, so bring on Edwardsville and Texas Pan Am.

Now you know you can't believe everything you read on a message board . . .

[NightHawk78]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

Thank you, Grizzled_Jack, for the reference to the KU-Mizzou rivalry. Other than the Chiefs in the fall, there isn't much for sports (sorry, but the Royals and UMKC don't count) in the Kansas City metro area other than the KU-Mizzou rivalry to capture the public attention. Sioux Falls, on the other hand, is a lot smaller and has a pleothera of minor league teams plus Augie and USF that have drawn a lot of the area's media coverage and reduced the focus on the SDSU-USD rivalry.

Yeah, both sides conducted disrespectful actions over the years, but the USD fan shirt (and the lax USD response) three and a half years ago was probably the final straw in a period which included USD bashing SDSU's move to D-I, USD's insistence that a D-I school play at a D-II school, and the move by most NCC teams to not play SDSU and NDSU in any future matchups.

As for adding USD and UND into the Summit, the simple truth is expansion isn't likely to happen. If too many more teams leave, the conference would simply dissolve because it would lose its auto-bid to the Big Dance. At this point, Utah Valley would be more viable than USD in order to give Southern Utah a more appropriate traveling partner. Besides, SDSU and NDSU are still at a point in which they owe the favor to the other conference members (especially with Sioux Falls getting to host the conference tourney) so they likely wouldn't be in a position to say who can and can not join the conference.

[Grizzled_Jack]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

Now you know you can't believe everything you read on a message board . . .

Didn't see the leaking Bison/Sioux but did hear about it from several students. Maybe it was a rural myth. In the eighties, I repeated the story to someone in an elevator at a conference (well actually party time after the conference) with a NDSU faculty badge. I was fairly oblivious to the reaction I was causing at the time but according to the guy with me I really pissed her off. I guess the Dakotas got civilized sometime during the seventies.

[Nidaros]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

As for adding USD and UND into the Summit, the simple truth is expansion isn't likely to happen. If too many more teams leave, the conference would simply dissolve because it would lose its auto-bid to the Big Dance. At this point, Utah Valley would be more viable than USD in order to give Southern Utah a more appropriate traveling partner. Besides, SDSU and NDSU are still at a point in which they owe the favor to the other conference members (especially with Sioux Falls getting to host the conference tourney) so they likely wouldn't be in a position to say who can and can not join the conference.

I could not agree more with this comment. The Argus sports department excluding Terry seem to think the Summit admission is a shoo in. Not by anymeans. The world is much bigger than South Dakota. Some of us just don't get that kind of thinking.

BTW Grizz you need to cool it at those conference socials. LOL LOL.

[joeboo22]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

I am going to try to hit this the best I can
SDSU-USD should play in basketball. I would play twice one would be on a 1 year contract bases to be played at Frost. it would be a Friday night women, Saturday night men. (a possiblity for a home and home would remain open after USD gets to a point where they can hold a home game. The other game would be a double header at the Arena. This game would be on one of 3 dates (Thanksgiving weekend, Christmas break, last week of the season) (possibly get a high school game or a USF game for the afternoon with SDSU/USD playing a 6 and 8 double header that night)

As far as football goes. I think they are a lot further away, USD needs to first become a counter and second of all they need to accept that the game would have to be played in Brookings, (if SDSU can get 12,000 for the beef bowl against Central Arkansas and 15,000 against UC Davis USD would probally draw close to those amounts and CAS is the only Football Stadium in the state that can hold that many)

I compare SDSU/USD to Duke/UNC (you hate each other all year round, as a fan your favorite team is your school and who is ever playing the other teams school.

I think for this to work though USD is going to have to take the first steps, quit going to the media saying stuff like (Summit League will accept us and the Gateway wants us) and come out and say we will play you at your house until we are capable of holding the game at are house.
I compare SDSU/NDSU more to a UNC/Kentucky- there is respect from both schools but they hate each other on the day that they play.

[Jack4Life]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

I have said it before and will say it again. Till they are in a conference and considered a counter, don't even think of playing them. When we do, it will be too soon!

[OKC_Poke]

Re: "Why not State and the U"

LOL I take it SDSU fans aren't very fond of their old rival, USD?

Reminds me of Oklahoma-Okie State. If Okie State had never joined the Big 8 in 1960, I guarantee you OU would hardly ever play them today.