New WBB Argus Article

[filbert]

Solari is back . . .

http://www.argusleader.com/apps/pbcs...502020333/1001

Excerpts . . .

Elite recruits attracted to women's Division I success

Some players waited to see how SDSU fared at new level

Chris Solari
csolari@argusleader.com

published: 02/2/05

Few people would have predicted last fall that South Dakota State University's women's basketball team, in its first year playing in the nation's top athletic division, would boast a winning record against some of the best-known colleges in the country.
. . .
The Jackrabbits' season has generated buzz, regionally and nationally. That success can't do much to solve the school's overall problem of not having an athletic conference in which to play. The wins do, however, make the school more attractive to potential recruits.
. . .
Carl Adamec, who has covered the University of Connecticut women's basketball team for 15 years for the Journal Inquirer in Manchester, Conn., watched the Huskies blossom into a national powerhouse and sees potential in the Jackrabbits.

"If they play a good schedule and show they can be competitive against better teams," he said, "the rest should take care of itself."
. . .
When he's not sporting Beresford's purple and white, Jerry Carda bleeds red and white. He and his wife, Heidi, both graduated from the University of South Dakota. However, his daughter, Natalie, chose to attend SDSU next fall on a basketball scholarship.

Jerry, who is the Watchdogs' girls basketball coach, has changed his attitude about SDSU's ascent to Division I, especially because of the way the women's team has performed.

"The more people I talk to and actually go to see the games, it's pretty exciting," he said. "To think of Oklahoma State and Purdue coming to Frost (Arena), I think a lot more people will be converting to SDSU fans."
. . .

Great article - Thanks, Chris S. and especially thanks, Lady Jacks!

[89rabbit]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

Great story.  Here is my favorite quote, and I and many others who no longer live in the region have known it was true for some time.

Johnston said: "More people are aware of what we're doing. I hate to say this, but in the reality of college athletics, now that we've been Division I a little bit, I'm starting to understand how few people pay attention to Division II."

Win a D-II National Championship (not knocking the accomplishment) and no one outside the region knows or cares.  Have a good first season in D-I and people from Connecticut are doing stories on you.  Enough said.

Go State, South Dakota's only D-I University!  ;D

[SDsportsFan]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

Great story.  Here is my favorite quote, and I and many others who no longer live in the region have known it was true for some time.

Johnston said: "More people are aware of what we're doing. I hate to say this, but in the reality of college athletics, now that we've been Division I a little bit, I'm starting to understand how few people pay attention to Division II."


Win a D-II National Championship (not knocking the accoplishment) and no one outside the region knows or cares.  Have a good first season in D-I and people from Connecticut are doing stories on you.  Enough said.

Go State, South Dakota's only D-I University!  ;D

Hopefully our students figure out that more people pay attention to DI, right now it seems as if they paid more attention to the team when we were DII. Hopefully that will change as our mens team improves.

[89rabbit]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

Although this is an thread about Women's basketball and they set a record for single game attendence this year, I think it is safe to say that the Men's attendence challenges have more to do with thier record then what classification they are.  If we were D-II this year we would still be rebuilding and would most likely still be struggling.  This is the yongest team that Coach Nagy has ever had and for most of the season they have played like it.  :

To take it one step further, let's look at football where Avg. game attendence for our first season in I-AA was dramatically up over our last season in D-II. In total attendence we out drew D-II USD with 2 fewer home games.

So overall I would have to say that our move to D-I has been a success from an attendence stand point. Do we have room for improvement? Sure, and that is great news. I think it would be hard to argue that our move has not brought us more notoriety and exposure. These are good things and I look forward to it getting better and better.

Go State!  ;D

[JACKGUYII]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

Right now out of the gate in DI our flagship team is our Women's Basketball team. The success they are having has generated more publicity than any DII successes we have had in any of our sports. The other sports will improve but the jump is much higher. I'm not worried about the Mens program as i'm confident we will see improvement next year and beyond. I think we have a real opportunity to make football something it's never been at SDSU.

[jackmd]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

The move to DI is not just a step its a journey. Making judgements either overly positive of unecessarily negative shows a degree of ignorance/niavety (is that a word?). There have been bumps in the road and there will be more. Its more about how we anticipate the bumps and then handle them then worrying about current or future problems.

[SDsportsFan]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

So overall I would have to say that our move to D-I has been a success from an attendence stand point.  Do we have room for improvement?  Sure, and that is great news.  I think it would be hard to argue that our move has not brought us more notoriety and exposure.  These are good things and I look forward to it getting better and better.

Go State!  ;D

You are probably right about attendance being a success so far. I guess I was just thrown off by the statistics. The men are averaging 1,639 fans per home game this year and they averaged 3,375 last year. Our women are averaging 1,604 fans per home game this year and they averaged 2,484 last year.
Looking at these statistics made me frustrated and made me think that there were fewer students coming out to support our basketball teams which was the point I was trying to make. But maybe that hasn't been the case. Thanks for setting me straight, I take that back about attendance being down at the basketball games this year. I am now convinced that our move has been a success from an attendance standpoint. I just can't allow myself to be so worried about the statistics.

[Rabbitlivinginverm]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

Winning and putting a good product on the field is the no. 1 key to good attendence. I've heard a number radio interviews (thanks Mike_H) with organizational heads stress how important winning is to putting butts in the stands. If our men's program had equal the success as our women's has had thus far, the student's would be there. Hopefully, that'll come back next year and it doesn't hurt some big name schools are coming to town.

[MilwaukeeJacksAlum]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

With next year's football schedule, it will be interesting to see how the attendence plays out. Can the attendence figures hold out with 2x the number of home games for SDan to attend? I hope so. The atmosphere at the NDSU game was incredible and goes a long way to creating a home field advantage.

[89rabbit]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

You are probably right about attendance being a success so far. I guess I was just thrown off by the statistics. The men are averaging 1,639 fans per home game this year and they averaged 3,375 last year. Our women are averaging 1,604 fans per home game this year and they averaged 2,484 last year.
Looking at these statistics made me frustrated and made me think that there were fewer students coming out to support our basketball teams which was the point I was trying to make.  But maybe that hasn't been the case.  Thanks for setting me straight, I take that back about attendance being down at the basketball games this year. I am now convinced that our move has been a success from an attendance standpoint. I just can't allow myself to be so worried about the statistics.

All right SDsportFan,

I have already conceded in my previous post that our Men's programs rebuilding efforts, and lack of on court success, has had a negative effected on this years attendance.  I guess I should have gone into detail and explained how in years past the Women's program "piggybacked" attendance and how this year it (for the most part) is a stand alone attendance figure with paying customers, but I didn't.  My bad.  

This leads me to a simple question.  What is your point?  Chris Solari writes a nice piece about how the Women's D-I success has gotten South Dakota State National attention.  Some poster (myself included) throw in our two cents.  Then you come in and post that our attendance is down.  Nowhere in the article or the posts in this thread did anyone talk about attendance before your post.  

So again I ask what is your point?  Is it that our attendance would be better this year if we were D-II?  Is it that by being D-I our attendance has dropped (a subtle difference, I know)?  Are you trying to say something about the long term effects of bieng D-I?  Or did you just want to find something negative to say in what was an otherwise positive article and thread?  Maybe I am missing something, perhaps you are trying to express something entirely different, if so, please enlighten me.  It is stuff like this that makes me wonder if you are what you say you are.  :

Go State!  ;D

[JACKGUYII]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

I've said before SDsportsFan is one of these people who comes on this board and always has the glass is 1/2 empty mentality. I doubt he truly is who he portrays to be but even if he is a Jacks fan I can't understand people who constantly blame any issue on the move to DI. FACE IT WE WOULD HAVE BEEN A BAD MENS BASKETBALL TEAM NO MATTER WHAT LEVEL WE PLAYED AT THIS YEAR. SDsportsFan if it's so difficult to find anything positive about what's happening at SDSU maybe its time you consider following one of the DII teams in South Dakota.

[SDsportsFan]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

All right SDsportFan,

I have already conceded in my previous post that our Men's programs rebuilding efforts, and lack of on court success, has had a negatively effected on this years attendance.  I guess I should have gone into detail and explained how in years past the Women's program "piggybacked" attendance and how this year it (for the most part) is a stand alone attendance figure with paying customers, but I didn't.  My bad.  

This leads me to a simple question.  What is your point?  Chris Solari writes a nice piece about how the Women's D-I success has gotten South Dakota State National attention.  Some poster (myself included) throw in our two cents.  Then you come in and post that our attendance is down.  Nowhere in the article or the posts in this thread did anyone talk about attendance before your post.  

So again I ask what is your point?  Is it that our attendance would be better this year if we were D-II?  Is it that by being D-I our attendance has dropped (a subtle difference, I know)?  Are you trying to say something about the long term effects of bieng D-I?  Or did you just want to find something negative to say in what was an otherwise positive article and thread?  Maybe I am missing something, perhaps you are trying to express something entirely different, if so, please enlighten me.  It is stuff like this that makes me wonder if you are what you say you are.  :

Go State!  ;D

My point was just that I wish there would be more support from the students. It sounds like everyone else is taking notice of what we are doing, I don't know why the students can't as well. I'm sorry to be frustrated by that, obviously it doesn't bother you and maybe I shouldn't let it bother me. I just don't want to see the students to stop coming, for whatever their reason may be. I'm not trying to be negative about the article, I thought it was a really good article. Hopefully our students will read it and more of them will want to come out and check out a game. Thats all I care about. I want big crowds in Frost arena again.
What do you mean by you don't know if I'm who I say I am? Are you saying that because I'm disappointed in our crowds being down this year I'm not a true state fan? If thats the case I have a lot of friends that I went to school with who aren't true State fans as well.

[SDsportsFan]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

I've said before SDsportsFan is one of these people who comes on this board and always has the glass is 1/2 empty mentality. I doubt he truly is who he portrays to be but even if he is a Jacks fan I can't understand people who constantly blame any issue on the move to DI. FACE IT WE WOULD HAVE BEEN A BAD MENS BASKETBALL TEAM NO MATTER WHAT LEVEL WE PLAYED AT THIS YEAR. SDsportsFan if it's so difficult to find anything positive about what's happening at SDSU maybe its time you consider following one of the DII teams in South Dakota.  

All I did was make a comment that I wish we had more students come out to the games.
And believe me, I have been following some DII teams. I'm not a supporter of any DII team, but I still do enjoy following the NCC. In fact I saw a great game in Mankato just the other night. I'm happy to report that I was part of a record crowd that saw Andy M. hit two big 3's at the end of the game to beat the Coyotes. I hope being at that game doesn't get my State fan privileges revoked.

[89rabbit]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

Look, sdman posted about student attendence (or lack thereof) on another thread almost three hours before you posted about it on this thread.  I would like to see more students at the games.  Heck I drive 6 hrs for "home" games and I bought season tickets.  I can understand the frustration.

However, I get frustrated when you interject nagative posts, that don't seem to be related to the topic at hand, into what up to that point had been positive threads.

http://diaafootball.com/cgi-bin/yabb...num=1107348186

Go State!  ;D

[filbert]

Re: New WBB Argus Article

Yeah, that Solari. Wrote a pretty good article, didn't he? ;D