Higher Education Board President Says Notre Dame Joined Hockey East Because of the Sioux Name

Someone wake Grant up and tell him that it was about the TV deal.




This guy gives buffoons a bag name.

In addition to the risk of losing affiliation with the Big Sky and potential scheduling and recruitment problems, Shaft said he believes that Notre Dame’s recent decision to affiliate with Hockey East — and not the new National Collegiate Hockey Conference that includes UND — was due in part to UND's being on sanctions because of the " ongoing nickname fight. It doesn't take an MBA degree to realize this decision has more to do with business than public opinion."

Actually Grant it was the TV deal that our new division wouldn't work with them on.

College Hockey News: Notre Dame had a preference for the NCHC because of its Western footprint, but the NCHC ultimately decided it didn't want to accept Notre Dame with its TV deal in tow.

You really have to be arrogant or stupid to interject the Sioux nickname controversy into the Notre Dame decision. But then that's what we get from the higher education in this state. They don't care what the public thinks. All we are is a flock of sheep for them to fleece to benefit those that work for the University system.

On a related topic, UND President Kelley urged the legislature to let the drop the nickname in it's upcoming session. Considering the fact that the Big Sky Conference said they'd blackball us if we kept the name that's not an unreasonable position. However in his speech it seems that he failed to acknowledge our friends and neighbors of the Spirit Lake Tribe that want us to keep the name.

That really irks me that Kelley sitting in his ivory tower clearly has contempt for the opinions of those on the reservation. As far as I can tell he's refused every offer to meet with actual Indians that are supposedly to be saved by the anti Indian rules of the NCAA. Certainly he failed to invite them as he flew down to Bismarck on the University's luxury plane to testify against the name. He also seems to have not insisted that members of the Tribe be brought along to the meeting with the NCAA.

Kelley and Shaft, drop your superiority complexes and actually listen to the people of the Tribe. You might actually learn something.

This was cross posted from my home on SayAnythingBlog.com.

This guy gives buffoons a bag name.

Related articles

• Hockey East Weekly: 11/21/11 (insidehockey.com)

UND Fighting Sioux nickname petition to go before Tribal Council

This could be good news for the Fighting Sioux Nickname. I also think that is a good first step in keeping the Fighting Sioux nickname.

A petition seeking to put UND’s Fighting Sioux nickname on the ballot at the Standing Rock Sioux reservation is up before the Tribal Council today, according to a nickname supporter.

Archie Fool Bear, one of several supporters who gathered 1,004 signatures for the petition, said he believes the council reaction will be “pretty positive.” With that many signatures, he said, he wouldn’t think the council would deny voters their say.

In the last tribal election in September, voter turnout was about 1,900.

The tribe’s approval is necessary if UND is to keep the nickname as a condition of a settlement with the NCAA, which considers American Indian nicknames offensive. The other North Dakota Sioux tribe, the Spirit Lake Dakotah Nation, has approved the nickname after a 67 percent “yes” vote last year.

Nickname opponents there are seeking another vote to undo the approval.

At Standing Rock, nickname opponents are arguing the nickname isn’t worth the cost of a special election. No general election is scheduled this year.

Fool Bear said the tribe has money for a special election, and he feels the issue is important to voters.

The nickname is a topic of discussion for another government body this week, the State Board of Higher Education, which is meeting Thursday at Mayville State University. Board members have indicated they would’ve wanted to retire the nickname much earlier because UND wants to apply to join the Summit League athletic conference as soon as possible to enhance its Division I transition.

The league refuses to accept a membership application until the nickname issue is resolved.

The board took the position it did last fall because there had been no move at Standing Rock. But board members held off on a decision because of a lawsuit by nickname supporters at Spirit Lake, which went to the Supreme Court late last month. The court hasn’t issued an opinion yet.
[FARGO FISH WRAPPER]

Fighting Sioux Nickname Issue Remains Unsettled

I found this article perusing the Ithaca Journal, what I found interesting was this article even made the New York Times. The more I read into the article the more I think Tom Douple, comments that the university would not be considered for admission until it found a solution that made the N.C.A.A. happy. I interpret these comments to mean that the solution that makes the NCAA happy is UND no longer being called the Fighting Sioux.

FARGO, N.D. (AP) — Some University of North Dakota officials were hoping that a long-running dispute over the university’s Fighting Sioux nickname would be settled this week. Now it appears it could continue for several months.

A state judge ruled last month that the North Dakota Board of Higher Education has the power to drop the Fighting Sioux nickname before a November deadline set as part of a settlement with the N.C.A.A. The board scheduled a meeting this week to officially retire the moniker. But Patrick Morley, the lawyer for a Spirit Lake Sioux group that sued to keep the nickname, filed an appeal late Friday to the state Supreme Court.

North Dakota officials are hoping to get their teams into the Summit League, but the conference president, Tom Douple, said the university would not be considered for admission until it found a solution that made the N.C.A.A. happy.

The nickname issue has been debated since the 1990s. Nearly five years ago, North Dakota was placed on a list of universities the N.C.A.A. deemed to have “hostile or abusive” American Indian nicknames or logos. North Dakota is the only college on that list that has not changed the name or logo or been granted a waiver to keep them.

The Spirit Lake group and other nickname supporters hope a delay will give North Dakota a chance to get approval from the state’s two namesake tribes. A referendum last April on the Spirit Lake Sioux reservation gave overwhelming support for the nickname, but the Standing Rock Sioux tribal council has opposed it, and the tribe has not scheduled a referendum.