The Bison Files

[Bisonguy]

Quarter page ad in today's The Forum about an upcoming three-part feature:

The Bison Files
A three-part series, beginning Sunday, April 6

Forum staff writer Mike Nowatzki spent most of the past month examining previously unreported documents and conducting interviews for a fascinating behind the scenes account of how Craig Bohl became NDSU's new head football coach.

Forum staff writer Jeff Kolplack, using documents obtained through Open Records requests, reports on NDSU's struggle to find a league where Bohl and the Bison can compete next year, the teams's first year in Division I-AA.

[Bisonguy]

Three stories in Sunday The Forum:
I'm providing them as links, because they are too long to show up in one post. Register if prompted-it's free and painless.
New Info on Coach Search

More Candidates than Previously Revealed

The Craig Bohl Philosophy

Some highlights in the above articles:

Craig Bohl was considering an assistant position at a prestigious West Coast DI school the same day he was offered the NDSU spot.

Craig Bohl says that it's his job to bring a national championship to NDSU- (Every coach should aspire to do this, but it's small things like this that seemed to be missing from Babich. I have been very impressed with Bohl so far. Bohl always seems to have a look of focus and intensity in pictures. Babich looked like a deer staring in headlights.)

Gene Taylor "I just really liked the [glb]Ohio State[/glb] team this year and the way they won with defense." (Me too, Gene. Me too.) ;D ;D
* * *

[WYOBISONMAN]

Reading these stories I am left with the thought that the search for a new conference is getting pretty dicey and we may be in trouble here. If not the Big Sky there is really no other palatable option. It will be interesting to see what develops.

[Bisonguy]

Monday's installment of The Bison Files will include the identity of the "secret candidate" revealed; Craig Bohl is offered West Coast job.

Tuesday's installment will focus on "Gene Taylor's Quest for a Conference".

I don't think this was on the in-forum site: The Forum relied substantially on information obtained from North Dakota Open Records requests to report "The Bison Files". Normally Gene Taylor deletes his emails and does not keep copies of them. The Forum requested copies of emails from NDSU's tape backup system for a two week period in February. They also asked for Taylor's university-related expense reports from his trips to Minneapolis and Arizona, as well as salary info for the new FB coach.


WYOBISONMAN-

I think NDSU will end up in the orphan conference even if the Big Sky wants NDSU in. NDSU would be a "junior" Big Sky member until playoff eligible. The Big Sky would fill out non-conf. needs for NDSU until that time. The rest of the schedule would be filled with the orphan conference.

[Bison_Kent]

Bisonguy,

I agree with your assessment. I also think this Cal-North Central Conference would be most likely be a temporary conference and then when members are full I-AA members would look for other conferences. That is my thought on this. I don't think this conference will be long term, if it happens. It is just to get together a conference since these teams will be playing each other anyway. Also, for the new I-AA schools, it will give an opportunity to compete for something right away in I-AA in getting a conference championship.

[JBB]

I agree Bisonguy, even if the orphan conference remains informal we are going to see a lot of orphan teams and several BSC teams on the schedule. *I think we have home/homes with both the Montanas now and Davis is on the schedule. *The 2004 schedule is going to be interesting.

NDSU will have no trouble as an independent. *We can participate in all sports with some of the orphans and a few BSC schools. *That will take care of the bulk of our schedule for a lot of years.

I would like to see the orphan conference establish a full sports membership and football only. *This conference would be wonderfully situated to benefit from changes that may come in the future. *

Either way, I think NDSU will do just fine.

[Bisonguy]

Today's exciting episosde:

The search for a coach

The mystery candidate wasn't very suprisisng. He had been mentioned on the boards.

[JBB]

Hedberg has shown he is a good coach, but he didnt have the DI experience.

Mentioning Dale Lennon as one of the models for an NDSU coach and then the nice words from Tayler was a nice tip of the hat yesterday.

I liked what Bohl said the other day when he reported that they had viewed the films from Babich but basically they have just thrown everything out.

It doesnt look like the Babich staff left the cupboards bare of talent anyway. I like the looks of things so far. With a good passing attack I would hope the defense will get a lot of practice at pass defense. It will help prepare them for teams like Montana, Cal Davis and St. Cloud even.

[BisonInTexas]

This series is extremely interesting, and has probably taught Taylor to print off and delete all emails as soon as he gets them! ;D

What strikes me most when I read these articles is that we have a good man in the AD spot. He truly kept an open mind in the interview process and chose the best man for the job, regardless of any personal connections he had to the applicant (as evidenced by him rejecting former Navy coaches that he had long relationships with).

Can you imagine that Entzion would have worked this hard to find a coach? Now THAT would be an interesting comparison - do an open record search on the Babich hiring and find out just how hard Entzion beat the bushes before he settled on Babich (who was basically hand delivered to him by then assistant AD Don Morton, if I remember correctly).

If the search for the coach is any indication, NDSU failing to land a bid into the Big Sky will not be for lack of effort, that's for sure. As an aside, I agree with others that NDSU will begin DIAA in the "Land of misfit toys" football conference (that would be a good poll - What should the conference be called?) and then move to a more established conference after they have proved their worth at the DI level. This is much better than going as an independent, as it gives the players a chance to win a conference championship in the probationary period. I wonder, though, if this will hinder any acceptance into a non-football conference such as the Horizon during the interim, as there would be the fear that if the Big Sky came calling, NDSU would bolt.

Craig

[Bisonguy]

This wasn't on the website, but it was in The Forum print copy:

Coach Salaries

Bohl- $113,000
Enos- $64,000
Burrows- $55,000
Bradley - $55,000
Malone- $30,000
Perles- $50,000
McInerney- $45,000

It looks like Bradley was taken care of financially.