Just how good is NDSU?

[scottsdaleping]

This team isn't as good (yet) as last years team was at this point of the season, they are pretty close to our 2012 team though.



I hear the "superbowl" reference a lot, really it wasn't though. If it were the team would have had a fall off after the KSU game. Don't get me wrong, it's a HUGE accomplishment beating any FBS team and they are certainly not going into these expecting to lose/get blown out so yes, they do pump themselves up for a big stage... but every player that I've talked with from the previous years teams (our QB, RB, CB, LT, etc...) have all said that beating KSU was just part of the piece of the puzzle on their ultimate goal of having a perfect season. The goal was winning a national title. This team feels they can play with anyone and beat most. That is the tradition of NDSU athletics, especially football. The coaches, players, fans, donors, state expect to win every game.

your quick start was early nerves and we fixed REAL quick.

 

[scottsdaleping]

No, they aren't that good. We dominated the first 17 minutes then just gave up. Guarantee you the only teams they would beat in the Big 12 are us and Kansas this year.

you didn't dominate, early game 1 nerves for a lot of our kids, got fixed fast then we stepped on your necks.

 

[scottsdaleping]

UNI looked like a national championship team after our game last year too. How did that work out?

heard your isu postgame show on an am channel in the 1500 range. the clown hosting said the uni team that beat you last year was better than the bison. hell, at 8-5 and a FBS win they never even made the playoffs ! I cant stand anything about uni but they did deserve to be in the 2013 playoffs. david johnson is the real deal and we play on the road this year. very difficult place to play, if we lose a game this year, it will be there, seems like he has been in MVC for 10 years !!

 

[scottsdaleping]

UNI had NDSU beat at Fargo last year but had injuries (David Johnson and Farley) in the second half and ran out of gas late in the game. UNI gave up a 13 point lead in the 4th quarter to lose by 1. NDSU last score was on a 90+ yard run with 3 minutes left in the game after UNI's defensive emotional leader went down with a devastating season ending injury. UNI went down hill fast without 2 of their best players injured and lost their next 3 in a row in OT and a total of 5 in a row before they could right the ship. UNI was not deep enough to sustain injuries to their best players. UNI was closer to NDSU then many would think.

you isu fans are making all my points, we wear EVERYONE down all the time. isu had players dropping and floppin all over the field all day, mostly cramps and it wasn't even hot. KSU game last year, now THAT was hot. another quarter in Manhattan and we win by double digits !!

 

[ruxCYtable]

Instead of jumping on the "Fire everybody" bandwagon, I ask: just how good is NDSU? Could they be an upper division Power 5 team? Would they be ranked? For 40 minutes today, they looked like it.

With all due respect to NDSU, no, I don't believe they would be an upper division Power 5 team. I also don't believe they would be ranked. Not even close.

Sagarin had NDSU at #17 last year and #35 and #37 in 2012 and 2011.

This kind of intrigues me. I'd be curious to know the methodology that was used to rank them that high. I can't believe one game (did they only play K-State last year?) against a I-A foe is enough of a sample size to rank them that high.

Sam wasn't great but his running was the only consistent bright spot in our offense. Once Farniok went down, we couldn't run the ball, which is inexcusable. One guy going down shouldn't destroy our offensive line, even if it is Farniok.

I may be the only person to think this, but I saw Sam's running Saturday as a negative. To me, he wasn't taking what they gave him, he was running for his life and was lucky to get away a few times. Just one man's opinion.

 

[tjamz]

scottsdaleping you are about as sore of a winner as I've come across on the internet. While some of what you say is factually accurate (with regard to nerves... and even the players walking off the field w/o shaking hands) but the rest is the blah blah blah "I told you so" attitude that opposing teams HATE. Even lakesbison is more humble in victory.... he smack talks ahead of time, but not after. What is there to gain afterwards?

 

[JayJ79]

Give NDSU a Big12 schedule and they win 12 games in the next 5 years tops. Its nice for FCS teams to play just one BCS school a year but things would not go well if they had to go through 12 games vs that kind of talent. Just look at TCU and WVU moving to the Big12, and they were actual Division I teams.

yeah, I could see them winning 12 games over five years of B12 schedules with their current situation (which is more than ISU has won during certain five year stretches). However, if they were given the extra 22 scholarships and a share of the conference TV money, I could see NDSU perenially being at least a mid-level B12 team. At least as far as football goes.

But I've always found these "what if" scenarios rather silly, since they never really account for all the factors.

 

[lakesbison]

Just like Texas A+M is just as good without Manzeil the more I think of it the more I think NDSU doesn't really miss their depareted players. The replacement players went up against them every day in practice, are playing next to guys who know nothing but national championships, and again like A+M the losses probably meant literally nothing the new guys are just as good. They likely could have gone into Manhattan and won with that team again. It was their superbowl. Meanwhile ISU thought the game was over


This sounds about right. NDSU sagarin ranking is #40 today and I'd venture to guess that #40-50 range is what NDSU is. Last year ndsu finished #17

 

[dmclone]

I was very impressed with the Bison fans and how well they represented. Better then any Big 12 school.

 

[awd4cy]

We are definitely a more athletic and talented team, IMO, yesterday and probably most days they are a better team. They don't have anywhere near Big 12 talent but they are disciplined, confident, hard-working, and ridiculously fundamentally sound. Any team that has all those things makes up for talent deficiencies, especially when the opponent they are facing isn't ridiculously talented and has players playing out of position and with poor fundamentals.

I personally think NDSU would be a bowl eligible team in the Big 12 this season and each of the last three seasons. Maybe not win anymore than 6 or 7 games, but that's a lot better than some are giving them credit for.

How do you honestly believe that?

 

[1100011CS]

heard your isu postgame show on an am channel in the 1500 range. the clown hosting said the uni team that beat you last year was better than the bison. hell, at 8-5 and a FBS win they never even made the playoffs ! I cant stand anything about uni but they did deserve to be in the 2013 playoffs. david johnson is the real deal and we play on the road this year. very difficult place to play, if we lose a game this year, it will be there, seems like he has been in MVC for 10 years !!

LOL, you mean the clown that runs this website? Banned in 3...2...1...

 

[KMAC_ATTACK]

Yeah, I don't think they would finish better than 8th or 9th in the Big 12.

Thing is, they don't do anything difficult to defend at all. Most decent teams would stuff their run, and then when forced to throw, they would be in trouble.

We just could never force them to throw. Even though we knew exactly what was coming. That is just imposing your will on someone folks and it isn't pretty.

Actually i beg to differ on the simplicity…..watch this and then tell me if you feel the same way.

http://www.sbnation.com/college-foo...g-north-dakota-state-football-offense-defense

One of the best written articles with corresponding evidence of the scheme i've ever read. The difficulty of the system is to outexecute you, not fool you with 200 different formations. Only way you truly stop them is to defensively out execute them and with our linebacking corp that was not going to happen. All day long saw our linebackers jumping the wrong gaps and over running plays. Thats easy easy easy for a RB to cut off of and thats exactly what he did. That plus our offense only having the ball 5 times in the second half for 9 mins and change and they ran a total of 24 plays - in essence they had (3) 3 and outs which is when NDSU blew it open.

Hats off to them - they did what we hoped our team would do, they out executed us and played better!!!!

 

[UNIGuy4Cy]

This is what I feared losing to NDSU. Winning against us will be all they talk about until they play UNI, I now hope they win that, but when you play in a meaningless conference or are 1AA these games against FBS are the season highlight. Super Bowl is way overused on this site, but it was just that for NDSU. Never anything to gain in these games for us but hey our AD has a 10 year contract with UNI now so that should be fun.

 

[BigLame]

They are pretty darn good. There running backs are big and strong, and their QB played a very good game, had several very nice throws, including a very long pass downfield that was perfect. The NDSU defense was pretty impressive, tough and disciplined. Not really happy with the way the defense all fell down a couple times, or that the ISU offense took 3/4 off, but NDSU is still a pretty solid team, and very well coached.

You mean the duck he threw to the WR that should have been defended by a safety that wasn't there in time but was hauled in and the WR was tackled just shy of the endzone? Yeah, perfect pass.

 

[awd4cy]

you isu fans are making all my points, we wear EVERYONE down all the time. isu had players dropping and floppin all over the field all day, mostly cramps and it wasn't even hot. KSU game last year, now THAT was hot. another quarter in Manhattan and we win by double digits !!

I love how you guys think you can compete against the likes of Alabama and Oregon after you beat a lousy Iowa State team. I would love to see you guys give that a try.

 

[1100011CS]

You mean the duck he threw to the WR that should have been defended by a safety that wasn't there in time but was hauled in and the WR was tackled just shy of the endzone? Yeah, perfect pass.

No kidding. I yelled 'duck' as soon as I saw it go up and assumed we'd pick it off. Just terrible d backs.

 

[CycloneWanderer]

Does the Bison always chop block that much? It seemed like almost every play our guys were getting hit in the legs. That would certainly wear on a defense over the course of the game if the players aren't quick enough to avoid it. Put that kind of blocking against a mid- to top-tier team in the power 5 and it will get owned as their players are able to avoid the cuts.

 

[Wesley]

This is what I feared losing to NDSU. Winning against us will be all they talk about until they play UNI, I now hope they win that, but when you play in a meaningless conference or are 1AA these games against FBS are the season highlight. Super Bowl is way overused on this site, but it was just that for NDSU. Never anything to gain in these games for us but hey our AD has a 10 year contract with UNI now so that should be fun.

Lakes will be talking about this game until 2016 when they play Iowa. He will spend all summer on HN.

 

[1UNI2ISU]

NDSU has the feel of a 10-2 FCS team and either a quarter final or semi final.

They'll lose in Cedar Falls and 1 other.

I get that ISU will always schedule an FCS game, but why are you scheduling good programs when there are others like Western Illinois, Missouri State, Southern Illinois, and others that are just as close and cost less, but literally have no chance of winning in Ames

 

[HFCS]

Has any MAC team won 4 straight vs power 5 conf teams recently? I'd say they're comperable to a typical MAC champion team. Which is to say better than ISU, flirting with top 25 occasionally, but likely exposed if they were elivated
near top ten the same way an unbeaten MAC team typically is. To any ndsu trolls still lurking I mean that as a huge compliment given the scholarship differential.