Letter to the Editor: Why did NDSU Football Move Conferences?

NDSU's move to the Mountain West Conference has dominated headlines all of 2026. You can't read the Fargo Forum without finding an article about it; you can't scroll social media without seeing information about it; and you can't talk to anyone from NDSU without hearing about it. Needless to say, it's been a huge change for NDSU. Now, we're supposed to have more evenly-matched competition, better game attendance and the national media will cover the games.

But I'd say we were doing pretty okay before all that happened. I remember the 2010s when NDSU was winning a championship every year. NDSU had quarterbacks like Brock Jensen, Carson Wentz, Easton Stick and Trey Lance, all of whom went on to play professional football. Do you remember when Carson Wentz and Trey Lance were some of the first picks of the NFL draft? Talk about a great moment for NDSU! Or, how about the days when getting a ticket to a Bison game was as hard as finding the golden ticket in a Wonka chocolate?

Is this conference change making NDSU football better and more enjoyable? Let's look at what the conference change has done, starting with more evenly-matched competition. Simply put, our first two games in the conference were blowouts. As for better attendance at games, I know for a fact that you could still buy seats at kick-off at both matches. Sure, they weren't in the front row, but there were still enough left for a few groups of people to all sit by each other.

And national media coverage? I'm so happy that people in Maryland or Wichita or Queens, NY can watch a game for a team they don't really care about, but might as well see what happens since they own the service. Meanwhile, people who live in Fargo have to buy a new streaming service every week just to watch their home team win. It’s not like NDSU football is Alabama, where even if you don’t live there, you know about it.

I’ve been a fan of NDSU football my whole life. Some of my earliest memories involve watching NDSU play on a fall afternoon or stopping everything to watch them play at the national championship. I think it's fun to have something outside of our jobs, our family and our school to care about. Something that, at the end of the day, is just a game. So no, I don’t hate NDSU football in the least.

But now, NDSU football has become less about community and making our hometown proud and more about money. NDSU wants more attendance, more enrollment and more viewers. Why? So they can have more money. And what will they do with this money? Will they lower tuition or remodel buildings? Maybe lower parking pass prices? Who knows? I guess that it will go to the football program, especially its staff and athletes. Tim Polasek’s million-dollar salary needs a source somehow. So while students have to deal with buildings that need remodeling and high parking rates, football players get to fly to Hawaii and Tim Polasek gets a second home.

Greed doesn’t pay. The more money you fight to have, the less happy you become. Everyone was happy when NDSU played at a lower level, but tried their hardest. Now, not so much, and who pays for it? In this case, it’s at the expense of the citizens of North Dakota, the students at NDSU and the people who love having a hometown team to cheer on. Without these three, NDSU football might as well become a ballet.