503Griz said:
Man. Imagine if NDSU wasn't unfortunately located in Fargo.
Ever been to Norman Oklahoma? South Bend Indiana? Tuscaloosa Alabama? Shitholes. Being located in the most beautiful parts of this country equate very little to having a successful football program.
You guys talk a lot of shit about Fargo, but an extraordinarily small number of you guys have actually been there . Metro area is close to 250k people and there are around 30k college students between the three major campuses located in the FM area. The economy in that area is diversified and booming and there is an excellent nightlife scene. It is a very nice community. No mountains. Ya I get that . Also is the reason I don't want to live there. For the majority of athletes though, I think geography is an extremely small part of their decision process when it comes to picking a school.
NDSU hardly recruits in states like Texas and California for a reason. They don't want to live in ND. Has that held them back? 12 total National Championships since 1965 and the highest winning percentage of any college football program since that time. They focus close to 100% of their recruiting attention on ND, SD, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Nebraska. Those kids don't grow up in warm weather cities, cities on the ocean or in the mountains and don't really seem to care. I could make the argument that being located in Fargo is exactly why NDSU has the program they have . Located 2.5 hours from the Twin Cities, one of the prime recruiting areas for NDSU. Only one D1 school in Minnesota and they suck. Nebraska and Wisconsin- one 1 D1 school in each state. The other FCS schools we primarily recruit against are located in complete absolute dumps . Brookings SD. Cedar Falls Iowa. Grand Forks ND. Vermillion SD. Pretty much any city in the Missouri Valley is a dump.
Montana has started recruiting MN these past few years. A lot of the big name guys we have gotten the last few years have had Montana offers. If being located in paradise was that important to these kids, you think Montana would have stolen some of these players. Not a single Montana offer, who also had an NDSU offer, during these past few years have picked Montana over NDSU.