It was a non-conference men’s basketball game against Utah Valley University, so the practice of starting a senior to honor his last home game was not a major deal. But the question was addressed to me: what if this were a Summit League game that had seeding or regular season title implications? Would Saul Phillips had started Nate Zastrow at guard?

It’s an interesting discussion point. The Bison started slow defensively with freshman Kory Brown on the bench. UVU’s Holton Hunsaker was a load to handle in the first 10 minutes getting a quick 11 points until the defensive stopper Brown got into the game and finallygot a handle on the Wolverine guard. NDSU’s rotation, with Taylor Braun back after missing 10 games, looked generally disjointed for a while.

It was the right thing to do starting Zastrow, who by the way made a significant impact on the game and generally rescued the Bison backcourt after Lawrence Alexander picked up his fourth foul just several minutes into the second half. But if this were NDSU vs. SDSU for the Summit title, I’m not sure it would have been the intelligent thing to do.

Dom “The FCS Schedule King” Izzo will chime in later on possible replacements for Montana State in next year’s schedule. I woke up this morning, saw my story and still had some disbelief in the Bobcats pulling out. A couple comments on it:

• If indeed Montana State is buying out for a game at SMU, I can’t imagine SMU paying more than $350,000, maybe $400,000. So do the math. MSU has already invested $100,000 in the NDSU buyout. A charter plane to Dallas is probably $100,000 plus other travel expenses like hotel and food. So after it’s all said and done, the trip plus NDSU buyout is say $225,000. If the SMU deal is $400,000, that’s a net of $175,000, probably at the top end. Is that worth it? Plus, I was told NDSU considered giving MSU a cash incentive to keep the game. Moreover, MSU has a Division II game on its schedule with probably less of a buyout, so you have to wonder why the Cats administration didn’t try to buy that game out. Maybe it did. UPDATE: as comment to blog said, these figures don’t take into account MSU travel to Fargo.
• There could be long-term implications, especially pulling out in February for a September game on the heels of this happening a few years ago. If I’m NDSU, I no longer schedule Montana State. The Bobcats have lost the benefit of the doubt. It’s unfortunate because they are two alike, border-state universities who should play from time to time.
• NDSU has no bargaining power for a replacement game. Teams can practically name their price tag knowing the Bison absolutely need a game and have a $100,000 from Montana State. Wouldn’t surprise me to see this game go for $250,000 to $300,000.
• Integrity in FCS scheduling is spotty. NDSU goes to Georgia Southern in 2005, then GSU pulls out of return game to Fargo. It’s legal, I get that, but that doesn’t make it right. I can’t imagine the Montana State decision was solely that of the athletic director. There has to be higher forces at work here.
• Was the decision purely financial? Recruiting in Texas decision? A strength of schedule problem with NDSU having everybody back from back-to-back national championships? Something else? What’s the basis here? We’ll try to find these answers on Monday.
• It’s unfortunate this decision wasn’t made last month. NDSU could have kept Sept. 21 vacant and opened the door for a UND matchup. With Montana State off the schedule, the NDSU nonconference formula of a FBS game, a good FCS game and a winnable FCS game would have been back in play.

It wasn’t the best of years in the Bison soccer program, although the best way to cure that is to get some better players. The first recruiting class under head coach Mark Cook brought the program’s first player ranked in the top 150 players in the country in Lauren Miller from St. Louis Park. She was also a member of the U.S. under-14 and under-15 national teams and a participant in the Olympic Development Program. Sounds like a star.

Cook also used to coach her at the Minnesota Thunder Academy. “When I was her coach, there were 60 or 70 programs watching her every game,” he said. “And about five or six would talk to me each time.”

Miller had 75 career goals and 49 assists in her six-year varsity career. Among the “loop of schools” recruiting her were Iowa and Minnesota. “She just felt Fargo is a good place for her,” Cook said. “Her parents used to live in Fargo.”

The recruiting class is also the first time NDSU soccer got two players who played in the U.S. national program, Cook said, Did his experience with the Thunder Academy help? Of the nine recruits, six are Thunder alumni.

Also of interest to football historians: forward-midfielder Autumn Muckenhirn from Naperville, Ill., is the daughter of former Bison player Ken Muckenhirn. and NDSU softball player Jenny Soderberg.

The irony was cruel, really. On a day when South Dakota State head coach Scott Nagy honored Samaritan’s Feet by coaching barefoot, a tribute the NDSU coaches backed up by wearing tennis shoes (is that what they’re still called? Sneakers?), the Bison suffered another apparent foot injury.

With 1:16 left in the 69-53 loss to the Jackrabbits, forward TrayVonn Wright was in the process of taking off for a dunk when he pulled up lame. He was sitting on a training table after the game next to the Frost Arena court, and the word was given he was to have Xrays when he got back to Fargo.

This, on top of the broken foot to leading scorer Taylor Braun.

It’s not looking promising in the Bison camp on this night.

For advice on how to get through injuries, perhaps nobody has more expertise in Summit League basketball than SDSU head coach Scott Nagy, who went through a series of setbacks a few years ago.

“I could write a book,” Nagy said, “just all the things that happened to us for a stretch, They were some very, very odd things. You get through it by being good defensively. That’s how you get through it. They lose Braun and win the next game by almost 40 (IUPUI), because they’re good defensively. That’ what you get back to and they will. Defensively they are tough. They have an anchor in their center (Marshall Bjorklund), so they don’t have get out of position to guard a post like we do. And they’re leading the league in defensive field goal percentage.”

Without Braun, an NCAA tournament is still doable. If you add TrayVonn to that list, doable turns to uphill battle.

On another note, I asked readers on Twitter the following question regarding NDSU being 7 of 10 from the free throw line the last two games and SDSU and Western Illinois 37 of 56. It’s quite the disparity. Was it not being aggressive on offense, poor defense or questionable officiating? My take, and one reader hit it straight on, without Braun, the Bison don’t have that slasher to get to the basket and draw fouls. It didn’t look to me the SDSU game was what people call a homer job, the Jacks took it to the hole with more authority and were clearly the better team in the second half. Freshman Kory Brown fouled out, and about three of those were freshman fouls and a few others were late in the game in catchup mode. But I also got the feeling in post-game that head coach Saul Phillips wanted to say something, but didn’t.

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