Hey gang, hope all is well- thought I would check in after I saw the field myself too.

Field looks bright now, but will dullen a bit once they put the black rubber infill in.  It will still be brighter, but not quite so much then.

I really think the helmet is lame.  It isn't unique and doesn't make a branding statement.  It's just a waste of the marquee space.

I would have liked to see a giant rat in the middle of the field.  Would have been impressive as a brand and would have made the field something to talk about. Visitors could chuckle about how silly it would look-- until the game starts and we're monkey stomping 5 minutes in.

The helmet just looks boring.

And we are going to have to live with it for 10 years.  Ugh.

Quote from: miac952 on August 04, 2020, 04:05:43 PM

Quote from: faunch on August 04, 2020, 02:46:56 PM
MSHSL just voted to move volleyball and football to March-May but allowing soccer to be played in fall.
Football in northern Minnesota in March on grass fields? NOPE 👎!
I might need to join a fall golf league or learn to hunt. I last shot a gun when I was about 12...I'm 51 now. Anybody want to teach me? 🦌, 🦆, 🐻

There doesn't seem to be much thought put into this plan. You can practice all you want, but not play in games in the fall? Somehow they believe the circumstances will change in the short window until March, making everything magically safer? There will be choices kids have to make between Jr Olympic volleyball vs HS Volleyball, Legion / Club Baseball vs Hs Baseball, club softball vs HS Softball. For kids with college aspirations the club route is the most likely choice. Injuries will be abundant with seasons literally on top of each other and two football seasons within a few months of each other. And as you said Faunch, there is no way football fields will be ready. Turf fields will be frozen and grass fields will be a mess and destroyed.

Not much the High School League does makes sense, but this one takes the cake. The High School Baseball Coaches Association instantly denounced it. An Athletic Director from a large west metro school that I know just told me it will not work logistically, and that they did not vet it with their members.

I have followed this pretty closely.  I listened to the Board meeting yesterday.

First off, the MSHSL backed themselves into a corner on this issue.   It really only started planning for the fall about two weeks ago, and the task force in charge did not make a recommendation to the board of directors even today. In many ways, the meeting yesterday was a $hit show-- tie votes, votes for reconsideration, last minute Title IX questions-- just not an organization that showed a ton of leadership. They did not seriously consider swapping seasons because they started far too late to do so. You cannot tell a whole state worth of baseball and softball coaches to get ready for a season starting in two weeks right now-- you have to line up umpires, transportation, and facilities on very short notice inside of a MDE pandemic restraint. It would have been a nightmare.  In fairness, you have a pandemic which is changing the situation weekly, but instead of being ahead of the game and having tons of contingency plans in place, they essentially were hoping the Governor would bail them out. 

Second, the interim season bought the MSHSL a chance to save football for the year.  There simply are too many safety considerations to consider in the two weeks until practice was supposed to start.  And starting the season for some three weeks into the schoolyear is not a realistic plan either-- when the inevitable outbreak happens-- and it will happen, as it did this summer at a number of schools-- once schools open, that would shut down the season for those sports pretty quickly because the number of athletes involved on a football team.  A spring season is a chance, but not a guarantee.

Third, it will not be a free-for-all come fall.  A number of northern schools advocated for the allowance of fall practices, which was intended to be a connection period for communities who have not been able to connect with their kids meaningfully since last February.  But there is certainly an equity component, as a number of schools won't be able to practice at all because of local COVID regulations, and other schools that may not sponsor soccer which would love to practice 5 days a week.  It was represented that the MSHSL eligibility committee would provide regulations on this, and I would expect them to limit those practices to maybe 6-8 over the two month period.  Keep in mind that track and baseball also have the ability to practice this fall, and the stated desire was to ensure kids did not have to choose which one to go to.

Club sports are a different model than the MSHSL.  The MSHSL's mission is educational in nature.  Club sports have different missions and they are often not charitable.  Kids will make their choices-- some are going to neighboring states already, for example.  But what is to stop clubs from playing through the traditional HS season as it is now? 

By the way, the MDE guidelines currently prohibit visitors into a school, so you won't see club volleyball/soccer using school facilities until that changes.  That will require a club to have its own facilities to continue operating-- if they do not, they will need to adjust also.

As to fields, I seem to remember a recent St. Patrick's Day where it was 80 degrees-- and another where it was a high of about 35.  Without fans in attendance you can play on a practice field-- and if you are only playing 2-3 games at home (depending on what the schedule looks like), the damage to the facility is minor.  We have played in Novembers where the field is frozen too, and it doesn't repair much in December and January, but April damage should be repaired by August when the next season rolls around (since the MSHSL also noted that the traditional summer waiver period be cut for football/volleyball).

It is a crappy situation all around, and the MSHSL didn't help itself here.  But there is method to its madness.

WIAC just canceled its football season.
https://wiacsports.com/news/2020/7/27/general-wiac-fall-statement-on-covid-19.aspx

Ugh.

https://m.startribune.com/miac-to-move-several-fall-sports-including-football-to-the-spring/571901432/

Quote from: Texas Ole on July 11, 2020, 03:10:27 PM
I am not surprised by the move by Carleton.  I think St. Olaf will likely follow Carleton in cancelling off campus sports.  I have heard several on campus activities are cancelled, but nothing official from anyone.  Talking with friends in Northfield they made it sound like the town was trying to insulate itself from an outbreak.

I am playing softball along with umpiring youth baseball right now.  We haven't had any issues yet, but we receive constant reminders of masks and other precautions.  I am starting to see warnings about high school football in Texas.  A few schools have already had to shut down summer workouts for 2 weeks due to positive tests.

I am starting to have some concerns regarding the testing.  I feel like there is a large percentage of false positives with the testing.  Not sure that is the worst situation, but it definitely does add to the questions.

Spent the afternoon in Northfield today.

Lots of masks, even outdoors, and there is a ton of signage reminding people to wear masks ("Protect the herd, wear a mask" for cows, colleges and contentment).

With the factories and proximity to Faribault there is a legitimate concern that things could blow up quickly if not kept a close eye on.

I think most MIAC schools other than Carleton and Macalester would be pretty reluctant to cancel fall sports quite yet, however.  Other than Carleton and MAC, most others rely on student-athletes to show up for tuition revenues, and shutting the doors on a football season alone would likely cause a number of students to take a gap year or get credits closer to home for far cheaper. So I would be surprised if we see much movement quite yet-- but could see them doing it in September.  Still, they may make a general plan among the conference schools this week, however.

VOJ reporting the same.

Interesting-- likely to mean lots more nonconference games. There would be no need for a championship game if you were just playing all 9 conference teams otherwise.  How do you split the 10?  I assume they aren't "even" in strength, or the championship will be the same 2-3 teams every year.

My guess is there will be a lot of trips up and down I-94 between Collegeville and WIAC schools.

Starting in 2021-22, @SJUFootball's divisional opponents within the MIAC will be Carleton, Gustavus, St. Scholastica & St. Olaf #d3fb #gojohnnies

No idea as to whether this has any veracity to it, but wow if true.  From Norman Seawright of WCCO...

QuoteToday in
@MIACathletics
:
@CSSsaints
joins conference as full member in 2021.
@MACathletics
football returns to MIAC in 2021. MIAC Football adopts 10-team, 2-division format in 2021; top teams in each division to play at season's end for NCAA Playoffs auto-qualifier. #wcco

Quote from: TheChucker on December 12, 2019, 12:51:44 PM

Quote from: johnnie_esq on December 12, 2019, 12:49:09 PM

Quote from: AO on December 12, 2019, 12:35:24 PM
Women's soccer is at least a sport that is played in Minnesota high schools.  Rowing is the obvious Title IX addition.  They have to recruit by walking around campus looking for reasonably athletic girls with free time.  The other big equalizer that schools use is creating giant women's track and cross country teams.  There are many running events that don't limit the number of athletes you can have compete.

Curiously, SCSU adding men's soccer is interesting because they are the only D1 or D2 men's soccer in the upper midwest other than Upper Iowa.  They didn't add a sport just to increase travel costs substantially.

Presumably, SCSU will play nonscholarship men's soccer against MIAC opponents-- maybe replacing UST?-- and just serve as a D2 independent.

I thought the same. Men's soccer is a weird add.

It does make sense demographically in this context-- you need to add a fall men's sport to remain a  part of the NCAA, and you could add soccer or cross country.   Cross country would be easy but add little to what you already have; meanwhile, the MN United have a very diverse demographic compared to football, and Central Minnesota, from Willmar to Lake George in St. Cloud, has a fast-growing increase in that same demographic.  If SCSU can harness that into an enrollment boost, more power to them.

That's what I mean about canaries in coal mines. 

Quote from: AO on December 12, 2019, 12:35:24 PM
Women's soccer is at least a sport that is played in Minnesota high schools.  Rowing is the obvious Title IX addition.  They have to recruit by walking around campus looking for reasonably athletic girls with free time.  The other big equalizer that schools use is creating giant women's track and cross country teams.  There are many running events that don't limit the number of athletes you can have compete.

Curiously, SCSU adding men's soccer is interesting because they are the only D1 or D2 men's soccer in the upper midwest other than Upper Iowa.  They didn't add a sport just to increase travel costs substantially.

Presumably, SCSU will play nonscholarship men's soccer against MIAC opponents-- maybe replacing UST?-- and just serve as a D2 independent.

Quote from: AO on December 12, 2019, 11:48:16 AM

Quote from: Baldini on December 12, 2019, 11:28:54 AM
It still feels like part of this story is missing. Before the current cutting of football and men's and women's golf, there were 11 different women's sports teams and 7 different men's sports teams at St. Cloud State. Is it based on volume of athletes or number of sports offered? Because if it is volume of athletes I don't see how anyone with a football team anywhere can be in compliance with the rule.     

Volume of athletes, quality of the locker rooms and fields, etc.   Number of sports offered is irrelevant except that if you're continually adding women's sports you can show your progress towards compliance.

I wouldn't call it "irrelevant" but it isn't necessarily a primary criteria.  It is about equivalent opportunities between genders, and the number of sports could affect those opportunities.  In D1, because football has 85 scholarships, schools need to have 85 women's scholarships to compensate.  That's why UMN has women's rowing and women's soccer-- they both add scholarships for women to offset the huge number allocated to men.

This all got out of whack back between 2011-2015 at SCSU.  Now they have to figure out what to do about it.

Quote from: MiacMan on December 11, 2019, 04:40:30 PM

Quote from: DuffMan on December 11, 2019, 09:36:42 AM

Quote from: MiacMan on December 11, 2019, 09:34:47 AM
If they have anybody worth offering, it sounds like an area UST/Caruso could pounce on?

I'm honestly wondering how their recruiting is going now with the uncertainty of the program.  D3?  D2?  D1 non-scholarship?  D1 scholarship?  That has to make it a tough sell, I would think.

Interesting, I was thinking the opposite. They have D1 to hang in front of a prospect's face. Obviously, UST won't be able to compete with the true scholarship programs until things are finalized, but they will be able to talk to the borderline kid (D1/D2) and assure the kid they will be playing D1 at some level. They may even be able to talk scholarship after 1 year or 2 in the program? I would think this would make it a nightmare for the programs in D3 recruiting the same difference maker type athlete (ie. Jackson Erdmanns of the world) I would think UST would have a huge advantage landing those kids right now. Assuming the kid still wants to compete at the highest level of their ability?

I totally agree with you as well, but the SCSU and UMC news will allow competitors for recruits to ask whether UST will even keep a football team after the move.  I can tell you that NDSU was hot to trot all over some of the SCSU players immediately once the news was announced yesterday.

Sure it is hogwash, but welcome to recruiting in college athletics.

Quote from: D O.C. on December 11, 2019, 02:57:18 PM
Seriously, the posing contest (yes) was better than St. Cloud something or other. Of course, real bickering and bantering about Saturday's game is what we crave.

FYI, one of my students talked about transferring to a school in the Pacific Northwest.  Should I suggest Linfield is not interested in a potential D-2 transfer?

Quote from: AO on December 11, 2019, 02:29:08 PM

Quote from: johnnie_esq on December 11, 2019, 01:29:13 PM

Quote from: AO on December 11, 2019, 11:49:31 AM

Any comment on this?

Quote"Donald Chance Mark Jr., the lawyer who represented 10 recent St. Cloud State women athletes who won that lawsuit, took issue with that assertion. He called the decision to eliminate football "deplorable" and said it would be "absolutely ridiculous'' to suggest that football is being cut because of the August court decision.
During the federal trial a year ago, Mark said an expert testified that SCSU could achieve Title IX compliance by adding one women's sport."

Does the lawsuit give a specific numeric goal SCSU had to meet?  The pretty easy response to Donald is that with an existing deficit, they couldn't add a single dollar to the budget, but I'm curious how many scholarships and female athletes they would have had to add if they had the money to do it.

I can tell you that Title IX is quite complicated in SCSU's situation.  Softball's facility (Selke field, which has no bathrooms or dressing areas and is maintained by the coaches) is putrid, compared to baseball, which uses minor-league quality MAC complete with modern amenities and luxury boxes-- but softball also uses the dome for a number of games too.  So how do you compare whether those are commensurate in line with what Title IX requires?  It isn't a simple calculation.

Football is not the cause of their issues there, but, as a revenue sport which is not bringing in revenue, is not providing the solution.  In 2011 the student body increased the student fee so that football would not be cut back then, but the school was unable to find a structural solution to make football self-sufficient, much less a revenue-gainer.  The numbers I was told was that football cutting will save around $1M per year for SCSU; considering the school is down $5M next year, this would make big progress into filling that hole, and together with an academic arrangement (already controversial), is around halfway to making that work.

The broader point here is the future of football.  If D-2 schools cannot sustain themselves in supposedly good economic times, what is to become of us in bad times?  How will that impact D-3 football?

If it's not a simple calculation, does the judge even attempt to make the complex calculation?  They bring in an expert for the trial but no one seems to have a clear answer about the "progress" SCSU had to make towards the Title IX goal.  So they eliminate 75-80 male athlete opportunities and hope that's enough for now?

I don't know how you fix the softball/baseball disparities.  I guess previous athletic directors just needed to resist the urge to move the baseball team to Faber and make sure their field looked as dumpy as the softball field.

I can tell you that for a Title IX compliance check, each sport has an 11 page worksheet covering everything from facilities to resources to recruiting budgets to accommodations of athletes to access to trainers to how many administrative assistants are provided in the sport offices.  The Court does look at all of those.

SCSU had 19 sports at the time.  That is 200 pages minimum of the data being furnished.

Like I said, baseball and softball illustrate the difficult conundrum-- softball gets a dump for a home field they play on for maybe 4-5 games per year, but play 20-30 in the dome on the football field.  Baseball gets a gem of a field to play on for 7-10 games per year but otherwise plays on the road.  It is hard to compare whether or not athletes are given equitable opportunities accordingly.  If they built Husky Stadium right and demolished the football portion of Selke, why didn't they add a few hundred thousand more and do softball at Selke correct then?

Football's problem was revenue.  It is declining despite the administration investing in it-- building a new facility in 2004 and re instituting traditions around homecoming, investing in marketing efforts and asking the students to raise their fees just for football-- that is a lot of legislative and political neck being exposed in the name of trying to grow the revenue base.  And they were not unsuccessful over the past 10 years (unlike UM- Crookston, who has struggled seemingly forever).   All donors to athletic programs--- limited in the St. Cloud area--- were pushed instead toward D-1 hockey.  Yes, there are 97 roster spots, but it is the 20 scholarships, the cost of paying coaches, and the cost of team travel- even by bus-- that makes it so expensive.  As MIAC schools know, big rosters equals more enrollment. 

The broader problem is there is a shifting demographic and emphasis away from football nationwide.  College and pro attendance is down nationally, participation is down at high schools.  I view SCSU as a canary in the coal mine, per se-- a proud, moderately successful program which cannot continue the economics to make football sustainable in a modern athletics program.

Quote from: AO on December 11, 2019, 11:49:31 AM

Any comment on this?

Quote"Donald Chance Mark Jr., the lawyer who represented 10 recent St. Cloud State women athletes who won that lawsuit, took issue with that assertion. He called the decision to eliminate football "deplorable" and said it would be "absolutely ridiculous'' to suggest that football is being cut because of the August court decision.
During the federal trial a year ago, Mark said an expert testified that SCSU could achieve Title IX compliance by adding one women's sport."

Does the lawsuit give a specific numeric goal SCSU had to meet?  The pretty easy response to Donald is that with an existing deficit, they couldn't add a single dollar to the budget, but I'm curious how many scholarships and female athletes they would have had to add if they had the money to do it.

I can tell you that Title IX is quite complicated in SCSU's situation.  Softball's facility (Selke field, which has no bathrooms or dressing areas and is maintained by the coaches) is putrid, compared to baseball, which uses minor-league quality MAC complete with modern amenities and luxury boxes-- but softball also uses the dome for a number of games too.  So how do you compare whether those are commensurate in line with what Title IX requires?  It isn't a simple calculation.

Football is not the cause of their issues there, but, as a revenue sport which is not bringing in revenue, is not providing the solution.  In 2011 the student body increased the student fee so that football would not be cut back then, but the school was unable to find a structural solution to make football self-sufficient, much less a revenue-gainer.  The numbers I was told was that football cutting will save around $1M per year for SCSU; considering the school is down $5M next year, this would make big progress into filling that hole, and together with an academic arrangement (already controversial), is around halfway to making that work.

The broader point here is the future of football.  If D-2 schools cannot sustain themselves in supposedly good economic times, what is to become of us in bad times?  How will that impact D-3 football?

Quote from: sjusection105 on December 11, 2019, 08:22:28 AM

Quote from: johnnie_esq on December 11, 2019, 12:26:24 AM
Just finished teaching a course at SCSU this evening;

What's the drive time from New Prague?

Too long.  Though the drive to Collegeville feels shorter, in all honesty!

It was a sports law class, so it is right up my alley, and was quite timely in examining the Title IX issues that hit way too close to home yesterday afternoon.  The biggest concern, and I agree with this, was that the word had already been leaked to people in higher positions, but it left the coaches and student-athletes completely without notice-- that was pretty rough to hammer them like this.  If there was advanced notice that this could be occurring it would have softened the blow and potentially appeal for something to save it.  But with an average home attendance of around 1200 and only 58 season ticket holders, that was a tall tale-- notwithstanding their serious Title IX compliance issues.