Oral Roberts: Over and Out?

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Well the constant conference shakeup has finally directly affected NDSU, thanks to this report out of the Tulsa World tonight: http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=298&articleid=20110929_298_0_OralRo588207

So what do we take out of this? Well with Southern Utah on the way out after this season, the league will have teams in Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, North Dakota, South Dakota, Missouri and Oklahoma. Does anything seem out of place to you? Sure it makes sense for ORU to look at the Southland all the teams in that league play in Arkansas, Texas and Louisiana. But how much does this impact the Summit League? For the casual college basketball fan, they’ve heard of Oral Roberts. That’s how I knew before I moved to Fargo the league NDSU was moving into, when it was known as the Mid-Con, that’s the league with Oral Roberts. Think nationally, that’s how the league is known, despite NDSU and Oakland’s recent success, the Golden Eagles dominated this league, 3 straight NCAA trips, 6 appearances in the Bracket Buster series. That’s a lot of national publicity. For the schools remaining, it may mean an easier trip to the NCAA tournament that doesn’t go thru ORU. The article implied that ORU was getting unhappy with NDSU and SDSU’s recent success (evidenced by the basketball tourneys in Sioux Falls; Bison won title in 2009 and the Jacks have never lost in SF and record-setting attendance each of the last 3 years); those 3 straight trips to the NCAA tourney for the Eagles, all of those trips occured when the tourney was in Tulsa. The basketball tourneys are staying in Sioux Falls thru 2014, and when that’s done it’s expected that Omaha will get into the bidding and with the facilities they have to offer, it’s a strong bet that the league will look at staying in the northern Midwest. Apparently that’s enough for Oral Roberts to look elsewhere. So with that being said, who does the Summit League look to fill? Do they have to worry about Oakland leaving? Northern Kentucky just approved this week moving forward with Division 1, that’s not far from Indianapolis, where IUPUI is located. What about Eastern Illinois out of the Ohio Valley? EIU is located in Charleston, which is 3.5 hours from Macomb, but that’s a bus-trip and double those schools together.

Safe to say this discussion is just getting started, but best be prepared that Oral Roberts probably will no longer be a member of the Summit League.

 

40 thoughts on “Oral Roberts: Over and Out?”

  1. That kind of sucks. Negative we lose a good draw and credibility with a big name. Who is a legit replacement? How many do we need for an auto bid?

    The good. If we were to lose ORU and ultimately Oakland, it would be a regular occurance to get into the Big Dance but reruiting will suffer.

    How about the no brainer idea of adding these schools to the Missouri Valley?
    NDSU
    SDSU
    USD
    WIU

  2. There is no other way to spin it but the fact is this is major kick in the stomach to the Summit. I had a feeling this could happen but I crossing my fingers that it wouldn’t. We better not lose Oakland.

  3. Oral Roberts was tired of seeing our immediate success in the Summit and is taking the easy way out. Wouldn’t shock me if Oakland does the same thing. Than we get a trip to the NCAA’s every year because our conference will be terrible. I’m sure SDSU is happy, they’ll be a top half program if all that happens.

    • Bison get a trip to the NCAA’s every year? Hahahaha. You just made my day. I didn’t realize you guys were such a powerhouse.

      • The Bison have been to the Big Dance more times than the Gophers have in the last 5 years. Some Big Ten teams have never made the tournament and we did it in year #1

  4. ORU will be picked to win the MBB, WBB, and Baseball titles this year. I doubt they are running away from anybody in the Summit. Look at the footprints of the two leagues and ask yourself which makes more sense for a school located in Tulsa, OK. Also a move to a more southern league will help with recruiting (lot easier for parents to drive to TX, AR, and LA schools in the winter months than the Dakotas).

    The league has been good for ORU and ORU has been good for the league…it may just be time to move on.

    • Where did you get that somebody is claiming that “ORU is running away” from?

      Only thing that remotely sounds like that is that the suggestion that they might be miffed that the BB tourney continues to be in South Dakota.

    • Yes. New rules passed in January require 7 active members to keep an autobid. All the language about core members and continuity of membership was removed. NDSU, SDSU, IUPUI, IPFW, WIU, & UMKC make 6. Even if ORU was to leave, USD will be an active member next year. That means 7 no matter what ORU & Oakland decide to do. UNO will start counting when they become playoff eligible in 2016.

      • Yes, that is correct and the reason was all the major shakeup wi.th the major conferences. Funny when something affects the major schools how quickly the rules change.

  6. no worries, I saw a WAC assoc commissioner last night. Time for NDSU to blow this chocolate factory & start up those talks. Maybe that was what the president was alluding to in his speech the other day??? or not….. *sigh*

    NDSU,UNI, MONTANA & Montana st to wac as travel partners??

  7. LAS Darlene Bailey. ask tyler roehl, he ran into us at said restaurant. Anyways, as a land grant, isnt the WAC full of peer institutions? Our football & basketball team.would be top 3!

    I hope ORU stays, but those guys dont like being #2 or #3

  8. I don’t think ORU is leaving because they fear us or anyone else. We have only won the league once on the men’s side and the women have never won. The move makes sense for them geographically. I don’t see us making any moves without SDSU and USD. I could maybe see a new conference (with Football included) of 1-Illinois State, 2-Western Illinois, 3-Southern Illinois, 4-Northern Iowa, 5-Montana, 6-Montana State, 7-SDSU, 8-USD, 9-NDSU and the 10th team could be Missouri State, Indiana State, Youngstown State or God I hate to say this but UND??? You could even call it the North Central Conference? Go Bison!

  9. Lakes, I am not saying that we shouldn’t go FBS, or that we couldn’t compete, but I wonder if we could afford it?? What is our current athletic budget and what would it have to grow to for us to move up? I do like your idea of getting the Montana schools in a conference with us! Go Bison!

  10. Dom great article! I think the Sioux Falls November election where they are deciding on a new events center will decide if the Summit League Basketball Tourney stays in Sioux Falls. If they build it, I think they keep it. If not I agree it will move to Omaha. I prefer SF, it is a much shorter trip for NDSU fans to make. Especially in late February or early March. I couldn’t believe all the Bison fans that made it down in 2009 during a blizzard! NDSU might not be Ohio State or Michigan but the Bison do travel well! Go Bison!

  11. Paul , the WAC is WEST, not east. It would just be travel partner thing. Do all you bison fans not understand, fcs has about 8-10 solid, good programs. If NDSU marketed the minnesota market and BISMARCK/western ND aggressively you could easily have a 350,000-400,000 population fan.base that is comparable with boise state.
    Heck think of all the twin cities fans NDSU would pick up with a WAC move? You are.selling this town and area short, time to grab a pitchfork and start a revolution in this town, cmon NDSU this is our time to truly make a name for ourselves on top of the big dance & FBS fb wins, etc.

    • Hey lakes, look at a map. All the WAC schools are south and west of Montana. Geez, get a clue before you start spouting your nonsense.

    • Western NoDak ( I live in the Minot area) would be on board only if it is done with the Montana schools and UND. Trust me, the fan base is more 50/50 out here than people in Fargo care to believe. When you get further west into the state you will see more Griz and Cat fans and the recruiting areas will begin to collide. Folks in western Nodak could care less what the South Dakota schools do. One of your own pregame shows last year during the playoffs interviewed folks from Killdeer (I believe) who said the game against Montana State was the first one they really cared about since the move to D1 was made and the Bison stopped playing UND.

      So basically if NDSU/UND and Montana and Montana state ended up in the same conference, it would be a huge deal out west and you would see a lot of traffic from the western half of the state to games because the teams will be more identifiable to them.

      • Hate to say it but if someone only care about “one game” whether its against UND or Montana State or SDSU, I don’t believe your opinion really holds any weight.

        Every game no, matter the conference or level of football, is not going to be against a university within 400 miles of the fans home. Those types of fans should follow schools like Valley City State who play schools from a small geographic footprint as they get more excited about “knowing the opponent” than watching quality competition.

  12. Lakes why do you want NDSU to go to the WAC, after all you ripped UND for accepting the Big Sky confernece invite. I see no reason to go to the WAC.

  13. Kevin, they would only travel “east” once, relax.
    KTF the big fluffy is perfect for those chumps.
    Whickety Wac is where its at!

  14. I have to take some side with ole lakes on this. The conference shakeups and teams moving in a lot of cases, is those teams getting tired of mid level schools jumping up etc. Look at MVC and Summit. It looks like the NCC of years ago, with a few different faces. The shift of the major conferences are because they do not want to have happen to schools, what happened around here and elsewhere. Smaller schools join and then try and nip at the heals of the bigger schools to bring scholarships down so they can compete. A lot of Division 2 is now D-1 with FCS football. NDSU should continue on with the full jets and become D-1 across the board. It will take a lot, but it would be neat to see.
    Just some thought from ole Larry.
    LCG

  15. It think NDSU did make a mistake in the 80′s by not moving to D1AA when UNI and the Montana schools. If a number of the big 1AA schools start to move to some of the lower 1A conferences, I think we will either need to join them or we’ll be back competiting with the old NCC schools and fighting with NW Missouri and Pittsburg St. in playoff games.

  16. people are clammoring for NDSU homecoming tickets. people are begging on craigslist and some paying $50/ticket on a $20 face.
    I do believe that NDSU has turned the corner and everyone wants on the wagon, so why not at least talk to WAC or MAC?

  17. WAC is a joke unless you can get the Montana schools to move up. I would be hard pressed to call it a real FBS conference since most of the teams bolted for the Mountain West.The best thing the Bison could do is if Crieghton would jump to an non-football Big East is to get into the Missouri Valley Conference. MVC is usually a multi-bid conference. With actual respect and a really good RPI. Bison would have to figure out how to get 5,000 – 6,000 average attendance at basketball games to be in the middle of the pack in the Missouri Valley Conference.

    • Ken is right, the Fargodome is not big enough to become an FBS school. I agree that if the Montana schools move up that maybe the Bison need to look at it as well. If other prominent teams in FCS leave for FBS you will see lesser teams move in and that is when these teams start voting to reduce scholarships. That happened in Division II and I would be worried if the cream of FCS schools move up that it could happen again. Go Bison!

      • Doesnt ndsu have a pretty good engineering dept? you’re telling me we cant figure out a way to get the fargodome to 25,000+ by filling in the corners, or busting up the west side and adding a deck to make it 35,000 seats?

        its 7:30 am and the line of tailgaters is impressive, should be a great day!

        • It doesn’t mean the stadium or any addition or renovation will be designed for free. In case you haven’t noticed this economy sucks and the engineering companies are doing all they can to survive. This is not an economy to give away work for free.

  19. Does UND stand for “Under No Direction” as the administration at that schools when it comes to athletics appears to have either a follow the pack mentality or if an offer exists grab it attitude rather than working things through and finding the best long term solution. If the nickname issue would have been resolved 2 years ago, I have no doubt UND would have invites to both the MVFC and the Summit and would be playing their regional rivals.