SIOUX FALLS, S.D. ( on the Godforsaken prarie) — Morningside college announced it will leave the North Central Conference after the 2001-2002 school year.
Apparently, no one cares.
Word on the street in Sioux Falls early Thursday was that no one had attended a Morningside game since the infamous riots on nickel Schmidts night in October of 1973.
It also will not field a football team for the 2001 season, according to the NCC office. Officials from schools like South Dakota State and St. Cloud State were disappointed at giving up a free football win every season, but said the understood.
“I mean, come on. How long were they going to continue getting waffle stomped by podunk colleges like us,” John Stiegelmeyer, coach of the SDSU Fighting Jackrabbits probably didn’t say.
The college’s board of directors decided recently to move from NCAA Division II to Division III. The other nine NCC schools are Division II members, except for the University of South Dakota Coyotes, who are just plain crappy.
Morningside will continue to sponsor teams in all NCC sports except football in the next school year.
“For reasons of safety, Morningside College will not field a football team for the 2001-2002 academic year,” said the school’s athletic director, Beth Sibenaller. “That, and we just suck,” she might have muttered under her breath.
The team might make a comeback, perhaps playing 9-man football in the Dakota Valley Conference. There they would face stiff challenges from the likes of Oldham-Ramona-Rutland and the Drunken Farmers of Miller, SD.
The remaining NCC member schools will decide whether to find a replacement for Morningside, one of the charter members of the NCC when it formed in 1921.
Potential colleges to replace Morningside include the Huron University Dirty Elvis’ and the Lake Benton middle-school football program. A group of middle-age men drinking Wild-Turkey and water at the Back Door setup saloon in Arlington, South Dakota, also expressed interest in fielding a team.
Hometown Hero gives shout-outs to anyone who recognized any of the towns and teams in this article. He’ll meet you all at Skinner’s for some talls and foos next Wednesday. Make reservations at [email protected]