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Jan. 20—SIOUX FALLS — It's shaping up to be a fun winter in Fargo, where the Bison basketball teams are both in first place in the Summit League, after both won battles of unbeaten teams last week.
NDSU's men defeated St. Thomas on Saturday to move to 6-0 in conference play and 16-5 overall, completing a 2-0 week that also included a home win over SDSU.
But the biggest win of the week was the Bison women's defeat of South Dakota State on Saturday in Brookings.
The Jackrabbits had won 67 consecutive Summit League regular season games dating back to 2020, and while the streak was bound to end eventually, for the Bison to do it in front of a packed First Bank & Trust Arena is especially eye-opening.
This wasn't just the Jacks having a bad night or the Bison going crazy and making 20 3-pointers. They just came into Brookings and straight up outplayed the Jacks.
To be clear, this says more about the Bison than it does about SDSU. The Jacks are fine. They will continue to be fine. But NDSU is legit.
"They're very good," Jacks coach Aaron Johnston said of NDSU. "They're more experienced now, too, and when you put those two things together — talent and experience — there's some momentum going into this year. They have the recipe to go on one of those runs. There's no question we think they're a really good team. And we're a really good team, too."
The streak had to end eventually, and it had honestly reached a point where it was bad for the Summit League and maybe even bad for the Jacks themselves. The conference's lack of other women's contenders has only hurt SDSU's postseason resume in recent years.
As for NDSU, a win in Brookings makes clear that Jory Collins has finally completed the long rebuild Bison women's basketball has been waiting more than two decades for.
Like the Jacks, NDSU was a Division II powerhouse, winning five national championships between 1991-96 and continuing that dominance into the early 21st century. But while SDSU made a seamless transition to Division I, counting 13 NCAA tournament appearances, the Bison haven't made it to the Big Dance even once. Now is clearly their best shot.
"I liked our team coming in (to the season)," Collins said. "I liked who we had coming back. We had high expectations. When we played Nebraska really tough in November and competed with them down to the last minute I think that it gave us some confidence and we've just been playing well since."
But scaling the mountain won't be easy. The Jacks and Bison meet again in Fargo on Feb. 26 (a Thursday night), and even if the Bison win that one to sweep the season series and capture the regular season conference title, they'd still potentially have to beat SDSU in the conference tournament in Sioux Falls, which is an entirely different animal.
USD (4-1 in league play so far) could have a say in it, too. The Coyotes have shown promise, but they haven't played SDSU or NDSU yet.
"There's some really good teams," said Coyotes coach Carrie Eighmey. "I think with SDSU losing after a 67-game winning streak maybe there's a little more parity at the top. NDSU is really good. I don't know where we land in that, obviously we'll have a better idea after we play everyone. But I like where we're at, and we're gonna learn a lot about ourselves in the next couple weeks."
Could the Summit be a two-bid league again? Possibly, and after five years of complete and utter dominance by the Jacks, it's nice to be having that conversation again.
"You can have a lot of good teams in your league," Johnston said. "If the league is better that's better for all of us."
As for the men's race, the Bison are sitting atop the league at 6-0, though they have played four of those six at home. They still have to face all three Dakota schools on the road, as well as 4-1 St. Thomas.
Will the Bison come back to the pack? We'll see. They're the No. 1 defensive team in the league and rely on a balanced offensive attack, two hallmarks of Coach Dave Richman's tenure that have served him well before. They're built for consistency.
St. Thomas has the 1-2 punch of Nolan Minessale and Nick Janowski, two of the league's top five scorers.
SDSU has as talented a starting five as anyone in the Summit. It's too early to bail on reigning champion Omaha.
There's parity, and that should make for not just a fun conference tournament in Sioux Falls, but a fun month of February leading up to it.
"There's been some really close games," said Jacks coach Bryan Petersen, whose team visits St. Thomas on Thursday. "The standings are what they are. NDSU has obviously handled business, they're 6-0. But it took them double-overtime to beat Oral Roberts who doesn't have a (league) win yet, so it's still hard to judge. You have to give credit to NDSU and St. Thomas — they're both off to a tremendous start, and I think a lot of us are still trying to figure some things out along the way. The league's gonna be fun as we go through this thing."
Notable remaining games in the Summit League
Men
SDSU at St. Thomas, Jan. 22
NDSU at USD, Jan. 31 (DH)
St. Thomas at SDSU, Feb. 4
USD at SDSU, Feb. 7
UND at USD, Feb. 11
NDSU at SDSU, Feb. 18
SDSU at USD, Feb. 28
UND at NDSU, Feb. 28
Women
USD at NDSU, Jan. 24
SDSU at USD, Jan. 31 (DH)
SDSU at ORU, Feb. 19
NDSU at USD, Feb. 21
SDSU at NDSU, Feb. 26
USD at SDSU, Feb. 28
Continue reading...
NDSU's men defeated St. Thomas on Saturday to move to 6-0 in conference play and 16-5 overall, completing a 2-0 week that also included a home win over SDSU.
But the biggest win of the week was the Bison women's defeat of South Dakota State on Saturday in Brookings.
The Jackrabbits had won 67 consecutive Summit League regular season games dating back to 2020, and while the streak was bound to end eventually, for the Bison to do it in front of a packed First Bank & Trust Arena is especially eye-opening.
This wasn't just the Jacks having a bad night or the Bison going crazy and making 20 3-pointers. They just came into Brookings and straight up outplayed the Jacks.
To be clear, this says more about the Bison than it does about SDSU. The Jacks are fine. They will continue to be fine. But NDSU is legit.
"They're very good," Jacks coach Aaron Johnston said of NDSU. "They're more experienced now, too, and when you put those two things together — talent and experience — there's some momentum going into this year. They have the recipe to go on one of those runs. There's no question we think they're a really good team. And we're a really good team, too."
The streak had to end eventually, and it had honestly reached a point where it was bad for the Summit League and maybe even bad for the Jacks themselves. The conference's lack of other women's contenders has only hurt SDSU's postseason resume in recent years.
As for NDSU, a win in Brookings makes clear that Jory Collins has finally completed the long rebuild Bison women's basketball has been waiting more than two decades for.
Like the Jacks, NDSU was a Division II powerhouse, winning five national championships between 1991-96 and continuing that dominance into the early 21st century. But while SDSU made a seamless transition to Division I, counting 13 NCAA tournament appearances, the Bison haven't made it to the Big Dance even once. Now is clearly their best shot.
"I liked our team coming in (to the season)," Collins said. "I liked who we had coming back. We had high expectations. When we played Nebraska really tough in November and competed with them down to the last minute I think that it gave us some confidence and we've just been playing well since."
But scaling the mountain won't be easy. The Jacks and Bison meet again in Fargo on Feb. 26 (a Thursday night), and even if the Bison win that one to sweep the season series and capture the regular season conference title, they'd still potentially have to beat SDSU in the conference tournament in Sioux Falls, which is an entirely different animal.
USD (4-1 in league play so far) could have a say in it, too. The Coyotes have shown promise, but they haven't played SDSU or NDSU yet.
"There's some really good teams," said Coyotes coach Carrie Eighmey. "I think with SDSU losing after a 67-game winning streak maybe there's a little more parity at the top. NDSU is really good. I don't know where we land in that, obviously we'll have a better idea after we play everyone. But I like where we're at, and we're gonna learn a lot about ourselves in the next couple weeks."
Could the Summit be a two-bid league again? Possibly, and after five years of complete and utter dominance by the Jacks, it's nice to be having that conversation again.
"You can have a lot of good teams in your league," Johnston said. "If the league is better that's better for all of us."
As for the men's race, the Bison are sitting atop the league at 6-0, though they have played four of those six at home. They still have to face all three Dakota schools on the road, as well as 4-1 St. Thomas.
Will the Bison come back to the pack? We'll see. They're the No. 1 defensive team in the league and rely on a balanced offensive attack, two hallmarks of Coach Dave Richman's tenure that have served him well before. They're built for consistency.
St. Thomas has the 1-2 punch of Nolan Minessale and Nick Janowski, two of the league's top five scorers.
SDSU has as talented a starting five as anyone in the Summit. It's too early to bail on reigning champion Omaha.
There's parity, and that should make for not just a fun conference tournament in Sioux Falls, but a fun month of February leading up to it.
"There's been some really close games," said Jacks coach Bryan Petersen, whose team visits St. Thomas on Thursday. "The standings are what they are. NDSU has obviously handled business, they're 6-0. But it took them double-overtime to beat Oral Roberts who doesn't have a (league) win yet, so it's still hard to judge. You have to give credit to NDSU and St. Thomas — they're both off to a tremendous start, and I think a lot of us are still trying to figure some things out along the way. The league's gonna be fun as we go through this thing."
Notable remaining games in the Summit League
Men
SDSU at St. Thomas, Jan. 22
NDSU at USD, Jan. 31 (DH)
St. Thomas at SDSU, Feb. 4
USD at SDSU, Feb. 7
UND at USD, Feb. 11
NDSU at SDSU, Feb. 18
SDSU at USD, Feb. 28
UND at NDSU, Feb. 28
Women
USD at NDSU, Jan. 24
SDSU at USD, Jan. 31 (DH)
SDSU at ORU, Feb. 19
NDSU at USD, Feb. 21
SDSU at NDSU, Feb. 26
USD at SDSU, Feb. 28
Continue reading...
