North Dakota State University

Tailback Rock O'Connor ran for a career-high 74 yards while quarterback Liam Zarka scored twice.

During week two, it's going to be a step up as North Dakota State comes to town.

But Air Force started off with a solid win to get their season on the right track.

Next, we're gonna go to the Coast Guard Bears.

That game is on ESPNU.

Navy is favorite in that one.

Air Force is an underdog hosting North Dakota State.

North Dakota State has been a Division II powerhouse for many years, and they're moving up to Division I now.

We are joined, uh, here for the next while by John Stibbe.

Uh, NDSU grad, uh, works or worked for First Western Bank, uh, but he's here today in his context as a friend of Bob Rasmussen, uh, an SAE fraternity brother of his who, who passed away at the World Trade Center.

Uh, John, welcome to News and Views.

Thank you.

Um, so we're second cousins.

His dad was in my parents' wedding.

Um, and Bob was a year older than me, so we played football together, ran track together, and then end up, ended up at NDSU at the same time.

Uh, we were both in the NDSU Concert Choir and, uh, both ended up joining the SAE fraternity.

[laughs] Yeah.

And, and that's, that's where, you know, the, the univers- uh, or, uh, was it North Dakota State University? Uh, they did a trial on this phosphate solubilizing, uh, bacteria that they're using as inoculant.

It's gonna solve your, your phosphate prob- or no, sorry, it's nitrogen.

It was a free-living nitrogen fixer that they're inoculating the wheat, and they're getting mixed results on it.

And, you know, the steps that we were already taking.

And we did it at the Alumni Center at NDSU.

And there was a great crowd there.

And you could just feel the unity that we had as North Dakotans and as Americans that we were going to, you know, we were gonna fight back on this thing and do everything we could, not only to prevent another attack, but to hold those who had attacked us accountable.

Then I get to bring in – I remember and appreciate and love as two of my favorite students in Trey Drake and Avery Conad.

You might know them as the backup quarterback for NDSU football and the star women's basketball player.

After that, I get to bring in the Fargo Park District.

Our executive director, Susan Faust, will be here.

You know, I think, you know, we're blessed to be as close to Fargo as what we are, right? There's a lot of opportunities in Fargo for kids, no matter what.

what program they're involved in.

And we're blessed that we got parents that are willing to, you know, get their kids involved in those programs, whether it's a Stanford power or a athletic Republic or, or specialized training with, with certain coaches or certain position people, you know, at the college level, you know, like I coach wrestling, we've got, a bunch of guys in at NDSU right now already for like fall workouts and, and stuff like that, that, you know, that coach Nick McGee's putting on and just being able to have that is, is awesome.

And, you know, I think when, when I took over as AD, we, we kind of met as a, as a collective group of head coaches.

with the players and the coaches and the team.

So go ahead and talk to us a little bit about the Frontier League and how that is different than what Valley City State was used to when all the schools outside NDSU and UND and the state were all in the same conference together.

Yeah.

And, you know, ideally those days were the best days.

I know one of them's in.

So then he writes, and I should have looked into this before I picked NDSU, is NDSU eligible for the playoff in year one? I remember JMU was not.

When we go to 2014 playoff, do you think coaching legacies talk will switch from natties to Final Four semis like in basketball? I think it will over time.

I think it will over time.

Either

UND or NDSU, one of the two are at home.

Yeah.

No, and most golf tournaments around here, not all, but most of them are during the week.