Grand Forks Herald: UND nickname committee faces time crunch

Here's the latest from the nickname issue. Not really anything new, we probably going to end up with some nickname recommendations by May. One of the options is going to be no nickname. I included the part of the article that jumped out the most to me. Obviously, we know that Fighting Sioux isn't an option.

Grand Forks Herald -- But by December, Kelley was more clear and said going back to playing under the Fighting Sioux flag wasn't a possibility because of NCAA rules. He told the Herald he had been looking at how to address the issue as far back as the end of the special legislative session in November 2011 that repealed a law requiring the use of the Fighting Sioux name.

"We were put in a holding pattern, and as time moved along we got to a point where we could move out of that holding pattern, and that's where we are now," Kelley said in a December interview.

After gathering input from more than 7,600 people through a survey and town hall meetings, the task force ultimately recommended a plan with the caveat of keeping "UND/North Dakota" as an option for a permanent name, which the school has been playing as anyway since the Fighting Sioux's retirement.

The new committee, which will meet for the first time Tuesday, is the result of that plan.

But the task force did have to extend its original December 2014 deadline by a month, and university officials Susan Walton and Peter Johnson said the details of how this new committee will operate, gather information and ultimately narrow down possible nicknames will be decided once the group meets.

"We know it will be a public process and we will announce more details about that soon ... but it will be important for the committee to meet first and see how they'd like that process to work," Walton, the university's vice president for university and public affairs, said.