A Closer Look: North Dakota

#1 posting 1.23.2006

With North Dakota State's Men winning at Wisconsin on Saturday, and the University of North Dakota women's team undefeated at 21-0, North Dakota has been at the center of basketball news this past weekend. Now let us take a tour of ND, the schools, and trends

First there are two classes in ND: A--big schools, divided into two conferences; and B--small schools, divided into 16 districts.
A schools provided over half the players in D1 & D2 with 12 players rostered last year. They had six starters, with only one AC player-Carissa Jahner at UND. The Eastern Dakota Conference sent 7 of these players on; the Western Dakota Association had five. So which conference performs better. The WDA had a C/HS ratio of .423, while the EDC was at .335. The interesting factor here is that Mandan of the WDA and a perennial power in the A level in ND had zero players playing D1 or D2 in the 2004-05 season. Bismarck Century provided three players for the most from the WDA, Fargo North had four to lead the EDC and the state. The 2007 (2003 HS) class had the most rostered and most starters last year with 8 and 4. 2006 (2002 HS) was shut out.
B had 11 players rostered, but the breakdown was shifted east. The four eastern border districts provided half of the B players rostered. If we look at the eastern 8 districts the number goes to nine. So Western ND only sent two players to D1 or D2. The B C/HS ratio was .440 which is higher than either of the A levels. The Bs were mainly an older group with 05s and 06s providing all the starters.
The learning curve for 08s start off with a .256 ratio (.291 A, .245 B) to 05s .431 ratio. So if you are looking at a B player averaging 20 ppg in HS you can expect about 4.9 as a first year player, and 8.6 as a senior on average.

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