UCA seniors exit with home game against Fighting Sioux

Several side issues surround the University of Central Arkansas’ season finale against the University of North Dakota today.

• The Bears, because of a season-opening trip to Hawaii, are the only NCAA Football Championship Subdivision team that is able to play 12 games this season.

• UCA officials scheduled the home game, and nicknamed it “The Transition Bowl” because it matches two teams in transition from NCAA Division II to NCAA Division I FCS and are ineligible for the playoffs that begin today. UCA coach Clint Conque wanted his young players to get a feel about playing football in late November. The Bears are in their final year of transition; the Fighting Sioux are in their second season.

• The contest marks a rare early afternoon game at First Security Field at Estes Stadium, set up to make travel arrangements easier for the North Dakota team.

• It could be one of the last games that North Dakota plays under the nickname “Fighting Sioux,” which has been challenged because of its political incorrectness. Teams face NCAA penalties if they use a Native American nicknames and mascots without permission from local tribes. Currently, any change in the nickname is blocked by a court order and the situation appears far from settled.

• The Bears are trying to snap a four-game losing streak (by a combined 13 points), one of the worst of the 10-year Clint Conque era.

Most of all, today is about 23 UCA seniors who will be honored before the game. Twenty-two have played this season. Fullback Nick Cowger of Vilonia sustained a season-ending injury in preseason.

It’s one of the largest and most productive senior classes in recent UCA history. The seniors have compiled a 39-16 record during their careers. They posted an 8-3 mark during the first year of NCAA transition and were 10-2 last season and claimed an unofficial Southland Conference championship with a 6-1 mark. The fifth-year seniors have two rings, one for a Gulf South championship in Division II and for the first-place finish in the SLC last year.

“These seniors have been staples of our program for a long time,” Conque said. “That has meant a lot of top-25 rankings and a lot of wins. We haven’t had the season we had wanted to have but it is what in is with that. We hope to send them out with a feel-good situation in their final game.”

The Bears are 5-6 (all six losses by five points or fewer) and are playing for a .500 season. The Fighting Sioux, who were taken out of Great West title contention a couple of weeks ago by UC Davis, are 5-5 and will be fighting for a winning season.

Both teams have had success in Division II, North Dakota winning the national title in 2001.

“North Dakota has a tremendous national pedigree as a Division II power,” Conque said. “They are very, very big and very physical. They play very hard.”

The 23 seniors and their families will be introduced in a pregame ceremony. Conque said he and his family entertained them at the annual senior dinner last week, and the reflections got emotional.

“We hope to send them out better prepared today than when they arrived on campus, two, three or four years ago,” Conque said. “It’s been a pioneer group because they helped begin the NCAA Division I transition and have led us through it with no prospect of postseason play. Our program, the university and our community owe a lot to this group.”