The notion of Augustana competing as a member of the Summit League has been a foregone conclusion for most who follow sports in South Dakota since the day the school announced its intention to transition from Div. II to Div. I athletics in December.
And if you heard KWSN’s interview with fervant Augustana booster and Sanford Health CEO Kelby Krabbenhoft several months before that, you were likely convinced the money and influence was there to make a Summit League invitiation happen.
After all, the Summit League’s geographic footprint has moved west to mostly the I-29 corridor (spanning from Grand Forks to Tulsa) — with five of Augustana’s former North Central Conference rivals joining since 2007 (North Dakota State, South Dakota State, South Dakota, North Dakota, Omaha).
The league office is now in Sioux Falls, where Augie resides and where the league’s largest and most lucrative event, the Summit League men’s and women’s basketball tournament, has been staged for a decade.
The latter two events have sprung from the relationship of Summit League commissioner Tom Douple and Krabbenhoft, who considers Douple a “close, personal friend.”
And then, there’s money from Sanford Health — Augustana’s largest corporate athletic sponsor — which owns the land those Summit Leauge league offices will soon sit and is the lead corporate sponsor for the hoops tourney, which is played in the Denny Sanford Premier Center.
This season, Augustana’s home basketball games will move into the Sanford Pentagon at the Sanford Sports Complex, down the street from the league offices.
And today, we learned from the Argus Leader that Sanford will donate $250,000 to every school in the Summit League to established endowed scholarships.
And yet, the Vikings are not a slam dunk to join the Summit. Not even close, if you ask University of South Dakota athletics director David Herbster, something KWSN did during Wednesday’s “Sports Talk with Craig and John.”
As of now, Augie has made public its intention to compete in Div. I athletics, which requires an invitation from a Div. I conference. The invitation must come from the league, via a vote by the presidents of the nine member schools.
And if Summit League presidents voted today to invite Augie to join?
“Everybody would probably say ‘no,’” Herbster said. “The only reason I say that is right now, I might know enough about Augustana, but probably other members in the league right now don’t know anything about Augustana — the athletic department, their profile, even the university. So, as part of that process, whether it is a campus visit or different things like that, when Augustana gets to the point where they feel like they can start to have those conversations, then they reach out.
“And then, really, it’s the exploratory portion of all the other (schools). Denver needs to be informed, and Oral Roberts, and Western Illinois, and schools that don’t know anything about Augie really need a chance to have a visit and find out more about them. As athletic directors, we have a lot of say in it, but ulitmately, it’s the presidents’ decision of what happens.”
Asked of USD president Sheila Gestring would vote “yes” on inviting Augustana, Herbster said:
“Honestly, I don’t know. You kind of look at it now, it’s interesting. The conversations I have had with the folks at Augie — and I have a good relationship with Josh (Morton, Augustana’s athletics director) and their staff there — I know they have an uphill battle to climb just to get to the point where they can even put themselves in a position to seek membership. And, so, they’ve got a lot of work to do on their side.
“For me, I’m non-committal. For me to give an answer would be an uninformed answer.”
Expect the possible shifting of non-committal around Nov. 4, when the league’s presidents, who decide on admitting new members, are schedule to meet in Sioux Falls for what North Dakota State president Dean Bresciani called a “very important Summit meeting” in an email to Matt Larsen, NDSU’s athletics director, obtained by the Argus Leader.
A plausible inference to draw from that event would be a tour of the Augustana campus by Summit League presidents.
Asked if he thought it would be “cool” to have back in the leauge Augustana — a USD and SDSU rival in the Div. II North Central Conference for decades, which resides about an hour from both schools — Herbster said:
“I don’t think it would be cool. I don’t think it would be good. I don’t think it would be bad from that perspective, I guess. USD and SDSU are so prevalent throughout the state that adding one more to the mix— It would be interesting to see (if) the state of South Dakota, with (over) 800,000 people be able to support three Division One schools. And really, most of that population is on the eastern half of the state, and so you might shrink that down even more. Will they and can they support it? You know what? I don’t know.
“All you can do is, if that’s their prerogative, and we’ll all see what happens.”
Does Herbster worry that Augustana would steal away any Coyote fans in Sioux Falls?
“No, I think if you’re a fan, you’re a fan,” Herbster said. “If anything, if you have somebody that is in close proximity from a drive standpoint, you look at that from another member, does it make more sense to have a member who is two hours away or one that’s 800 miles away? I mean, you lose one, you gain one, I mean, what does that really mean?”
Not exactly an enthusiastic embracing of bringing the Yotes’ old rival back into the fold, but an acknowledgement of the financial help of having such a close league opponent compared to Fort Wayne, which became the fifth Summit League school to drop out of the conference since SDSU and NDSU joined in 2007 and the league basketball tourney was moved to Sioux Falls in 2009.
Herbster’s response may surprise some, but it was a factual one of where things are, not where they are going.
The Argus Leader article revealing Summit’s support of all Summit League schools suggests that it may be difficult for those presidents to vote ‘no’ on Augustana joining, with Sanford support fueling Augie, too.
Stay tuned.