Nadine asks Medved about hanging the 1997 banners and playing St. Thomas

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Holy Man said:
St. Thomas is not wealthy. Ask their low paid faculty. They are a tuition driven institution that frequently needs to adjust on the fly to manage cash flow. They are not at risk of going under like boatloads of small public and private colleges are, but they are hardly wealthy and don’t have great alumni support compared to similar schools.
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Only Denver has a larger endowment in the Summit League.
 

disco said:
Only Denver has a larger endowment in the Summit League.
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The Summit isn’t loaded with wealthy schools. If I recalled correctly, Denver is about half the enrollment of St. Thomas as well.
 

disco said:
Only Denver has a larger endowment in the Summit League.
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I mean, no offense to USD, SDSU, UND, NDSU, Omaha and Kansas City but...that is not exactly the Ivy League and Stanford.

And just to tell you how little that matters when the WCHA imploded well connected Denver fans I used to be friendly with honestly believed the program would be dead because their athletic department needed the Big Ten schools (along with the CC rivalry and UND) to even break even.

Endowment does not equal sporting interests.
 




disco said:
Had they been eligible, they were one game away from going to the dance this season.
How far are the Gophers?
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I know, we will see what happens next year.
 

disco said:
Denver - ~14,000
UST - ~ 9500
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Buddy of mine went there; small, private and spendy. You may be confusing it with UCD = University of Colorado @ Denver



University of Denver is a private institution that was founded in 1864. It has a total undergraduate enrollment of 6,412 (fall 2023), its setting is city, and the campus size is 125 acres. It utilizes a quarter-based academic calendar. University of Denver's ranking in the 2025 edition of Best Colleges is National Universities, #121. Its tuition and fees are $61,434.
 
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St Thomas is not the Little Sisters of the Poor. They were equal to the Gophers this year - maybe better - and they're getting better every year. It's said that they have aspirations of moving up to the Big East, and with a great coach and a new arena, and being the #2 program in a talent-rich state, they're well positioned. They're going to be whatever they want to be.

The Gophers are also headed for good times. I believe Niko is going to have them riding high in 3-4 years. It'll be like the Clem Haskins years, minus Jan Ganglehoff. Remember that, all you old-timers? Remember when the morning after a Gophers game, everybody was talking about the big win and our great players? I do.

This can be a really fun rivalry, and it can start now. I don't see any reason why the U should run for cover when St Thomas comes knocking.
 




Just Gopher It!! said:
Buddy of mine went there; small, private and spendy. You may be confusing it with UCD = University of Colorado @ Denver



University of Denver is a private institution that was founded in 1864. It has a total undergraduate enrollment of 6,412 (fall 2023), its setting is city, and the campus size is 125 acres. It utilizes a quarter-based academic calendar. University of Denver's ranking in the 2025 edition of Best Colleges is National Universities, #121. Its tuition and fees are $61,434.
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I was going with total enrollment.
Undergrad is almost the same for the two schools. Denver has twice the post grad students though. (which honestly surprises me since UST has so many grad programs.)
 

everybody knows my name said:
St Thomas is not the Little Sisters of the Poor. They were equal to the Gophers this year - maybe better - and they're getting better every year. It's said that they have aspirations of moving up to the Big East, and with a great coach and a new arena, and being the #2 program in a talent-rich state, they're well positioned.
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I question why the Big East would choose UST over say, Bradley, Drake, Dayton, Valpo or any number of longer established D1 hoops programs. I'm honestly surprised they took Creighton considering what a geographic outlier they are.
 


Three out of
BleedGopher said:
Please no. I am in the camp that neutral site games have hurt non-conference CBB.

Play a 2 for 1 over 4 years...two games at The Barn, 1 game at St. Thomas' new arena.

Keep CBB out of NBA arenas.

Go Gophers!!
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If we’re in for the UST rivalry experience—then let’s play the inaugural game at their new arena on the condition the U of M gets a 1000 seats along w/ band and cheerleaders.
 



disco said:
I was going with total enrollment.
Undergrad is almost the same for the two schools. Denver has twice the post grad students though. (which honestly surprises me since UST has so many grad programs.)
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👍

Most grad students don’t care about college sports in my experience - you’re there to study and incur more debt.
 

disco said:
I question why the Big East would choose UST over say, Bradley, Drake, Dayton, Valpo or any number of longer established D1 hoops programs. I'm honestly surprised they took Creighton considering what a geographic outlier they are.
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St. Thomas is in the 16th largest TV market in the country, home to Fortune 500 companies, a great airport that flies direct to almost every Big East city, and naturally bridges the league's footprint between Milwaukee/Chicago and Omaha. St. Thomas is also Catholic, like most of the teams in that conference.

Peoria, Des Moines, Valparaiso - not so much.
 

howeda7 said:
Not really. It would have a minimum of 3 or 4 power 5 games on it, depending on what tournament you play in. This year we had one. Last year we had two. And replacing two sub 300 games with SDSU/NDSU and St. Thomas helps a lot too.
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The Non-Conference Tournament they played in 2022 (San Juan Capistrano, CA) the Gophers didn't play any Power 5 teams. The event they scheduled for this fall in Palm Springs, last year only had 2 and 1 finished last in the Big 10.

I think it's possible it will be downgrade from Wake Forest/Wichita St who they played last year. Could improve it. Don't know.

As far as doing anything beyond marginally improving the out of Conference schedule, what you laid out including the 4 other cupcakes seems like too big of an assumption to move the needle. Beyond 2 cupcakes, I think there needs to be a couple of teams higher up (A10, Mountain West, New PAC-Whatever or something of that ilk).
 


Ope3 said:
The Non-Conference Tournament they played in 2022 (San Juan Capistrano, CA) the Gophers didn't play any Power 5 teams. The event they scheduled for this fall in Palm Springs, last year only had 2 and 1 finished last in the Big 10.

I think it's possible it will be downgrade from Wake Forest/Wichita St who they played last year. Could improve it. Don't know.

As far as doing anything beyond marginally improving the out of Conference schedule, what you laid out including the 4 other cupcakes seems like too big of an assumption to move the needle. Beyond 2 cupcakes, I think there needs to be a couple of teams higher up (A10, Mountain West, New PAC-Whatever or something of that ilk).
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I'm not saying you can't upgrade it more, but realistically, with 20 B1G games, I don't see any coach playing more than half their non-conference games against Power 5/Quasi-Power 5 teams as you suggest. Pitino did it once and it sort of bit him. 3-4 is reasonable to me. Anything less than that is uacceptable.
 




Play St Thomas and the loser hangs the banner post game. Unless the Gophers lose, then the winner hangs the banner.
 

MissouriGopher said:
You think a team that struggles to fill up a <2,000 seat arena will outdraw the gophers who have a built in advantage with season tickets? Get real.
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Did you see the crowd St Thomas drew at the X playing against the Gophers in hockey this fall? A basketball game would be a sellout with lots of Tommie fans.
 


Dave H said:
Right...a heated rival that goes back decades and is played every year. Not exactly the same thing.

Their stadiums are small for a reason.

I am not against playing St. Thomas, but lets not pretend they have a huge Q rating in the Twin Cities. I would bet the average person doesn't even know where St. Thomas is.
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There are 250,000 alumni in the greater Twin Cities area. I think you’re underestimating just how big the school is (which is why they were asked to leave the MIAC)
 

TruthSeeker said:
Play the local cupcake instead of a far away cupcake.

Let's hope they do beat us once or twice. That will build interest in future years.

Let's grow the matchup and have fun.

You guys who don't want to play them are crazy.
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Never, in a million years, will I hope St Thomas beats the U. What demonic host caused you to type such an abomination? 🤔😳🥶
 


I’m indifferent to playing UST. I’d rather have a a Q1 game in UST place but I get it.

We really should hang the banner for 97’. There’s no difference using Gangelhoff to write a paper or using ChatGPT.
 

disco said:
I question why the Big East would choose UST over say, Bradley, Drake, Dayton, Valpo or any number of longer established D1 hoops programs. I'm honestly surprised they took Creighton considering what a geographic outlier they are.
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Geography hasn’t meant anything in nearly a decade. The only thing attractive to Big East in St. Thomas is top 20 TV market. I have my doubts but I thought wiser heads would prevail in the D1 decision and I was wrong.
 

disco said:
I question why the Big East would choose UST over say, Bradley, Drake, Dayton, Valpo or any number of longer established D1 hoops programs. I'm honestly surprised they took Creighton considering what a geographic outlier they are.
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Good sized, well funded Catholic school in a metro of a million plus with a solid corporate community. While not all Big East schools are Catholic, 9 of 11 are. Bradley is private but not religious affiliated. Drake is Catholic I believe. A little smaller school and smaller metro. Not a lot of difference on paper, it appears. Dayton is Catholic and would seem to have been a good fit. Valpo is loosely affiliated with a couple of Lutheran denominations. Valpo, Indiana isn't very big but its not far from Chicago.

In a different age, the 9 Catholic Big East schools could break off, add UST, Dayton and Drake and have a decent conference of similarly situated schools in decent markets.
 

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