Happy Hour with John Gaskins

North Dakota State isn't ready to play in the FBS.   It's ready to win the Mountain West Conference. Right now.   That is at least the conclusion you could make if you go by Collin Wilson of Action Network HQ — a sports media company featuring news and analysis focused on sports betting —  a who pegs North Dakota State as one of the six FBS teams out of 139 projected to be favored in each of its 1...

North Dakota State isn't ready to play in the FBS.   It's ready to win the Mountain West Conference. Right now.   That is at least the conclusion you could make if you go by Collin Wilson of Action Network HQ — a sports media company featuring news and analysis focused on sports betting —  a who pegs North Dakota State as one of the six FBS teams out of 139 projected to be favored in each of its 1...

The original co-host and producer of the first daily sports talk show in South Dakota history, Mattick teamed with the Happy Hour host for seven of the 19 years the show was on the air until its cancellation two months into the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.   "Sports Talk with Craig & John" reunited for 50 minutes on Tuesday at Gibs Sports Bar, mainly to talk about the big picture of state tournament...

Here we go again.   The South Dakota State women's basketball team won its 13th Summit League Tournament championship in the 18 years of the event in Sioux Falls on Sunday, and this leaves some fans outside the state crying over spilled basketballs.   Those would be the four North Dakota State turnovers in the final two minutes that helped the Jackrabbits stave off the regular season champions dow...

Heidrick, who was on the call for Sunday's game, gives an astute basketball mind's view of how SDSU beat NDSU and how tourney MVP Brooklyn Meyer won the "game within the game" against Avery Koenen.   Heidrick weighs in on the "home court" topic and if the Summit League should consider hosting the tournament somewhere else. She also breaks down why the North Dakota State men won their sixth Summit...

Here we go again.   The South Dakota State women's basketball team won its 13th Summit League Tournament championship in the 18 years of the event in Sioux Falls on Sunday, and this leaves some fans outside the state crying over spilled basketballs.   Those would be the four North Dakota State turnovers in the final two minutes that helped the Jackrabbits stave off the regular season champions dow...

Champiomship Sunday became "Sunday the 13th" for the South Dakota State womem's basketball team.   The Jackrabbits won their 13th Summit League Tournament title and clinched their 14th NCAA Tournament berth in the 18 times the event has been held in Sioux Falls.   After the postgame confetti had fallen to the floor and the nearly 8,000 fans had filed out of the Denny Sanford PREMIER Center, the Ha...

The SDSU women are heading back to the Summit League Tournament title game after defeating the USD Coyotes in the semifinal. 

Summit Tourney Coyote Lounge: Women advance to face Jacks while men bow out

Jackrabbit Lounge from the SLT: Business as usual for women, same old 2026 tune for men

He had a jump shot out of a cannon that sparked the University of South Dakota's best two years in Division I hoops (2016-18), then Texas Tech's historic run into overtime of the national championship game (2019). Matt Mooney was a cold-blooded sharpshooting machine in those three years, and he is just as to-the-point and entertaining when he tells stories about them. In a one-hour sit down with H...

Good News: The Summit League Tournament — which found its footing once it moved to Sioux Falls in 2009 — undeniably provides one of the best and most "big-time" mid-major student-athlete and fan experiences in the nation, according to those who have experienced others.   Bad News: There are signs pointing to future unrest in the conference, with Denver leaving the league (for the West Coast Confer...

Good News: The Summit League Tournament — which found its footing once it moved to Sioux Falls in 2009 — undeniably provides one of the best and most "big-time" mid-major student-athlete and fan experiences in the nation, according to those who have experienced others.   Bad News: There are signs pointing to future unrest in the conference, with Denver leaving the league (for the West Coast Confer...

The 13-year voice of the Omaha Mavericks men's basketball team says there are valid concerns about the membership in the league and some potential efforts from multiple teams to leave in the coming few years. 

Are we there yet?   Summit League Tournament enthusiasts have the same eager restlessness of little kids on long road trips.   Just hours before the first SLT games tipped off — those 8 vs. 9 "first round games — Happy Hour did a special edition of "Thirsty Thursday" from just off the floor in the Denny Sanford PREMIER Center on Wednesday afternoon.   We'll call it "Pre-SLT last call!"   Who beyon...

In a re-release of a conversation from a Happy Hour last summer, the current Iowa State head coach looks back on his three-year tenure in Brookings that started rocky — a 1-6 record and a seat in the basement of the Summit League in his first season — and finished with two SLT championships and two regular season titles before he fled for the desert and UNLV, then to Iowa State, where he has pilot...

Are we there yet?   Summit League Tournament enthusiasts have the same eager restlessness of little kids on long road trips.   Just hours before the first SLT games tipped off — those 8 vs. 9 "first round games — Happy Hour did a special edition of "Thirsty Thursday" from just off the floor in the Denny Sanford PREMIER Center on Wednesday afternoon.   We'll call it "Pre-SLT last call!"   Who beyon...

All the Coyote women did this season was double Carrie Eighmey's first-year win total from 11 to 22 and give USD a shot at a No. 2 seed in the regular season finale.   Not bad for an almost entirely new roster. Eighmey brought in transfers from all over the country, including four seniors who had one last stop and one last chance at glory in their college careers.   That chance is in front of them...

Who is under more pressure to win the ol' SLT — the No. 1 seed and regular season champion North Dakota State women, looking to become the first Bison squad to ever hoist the hardware, or perennial and nearly-annual favorite No. 2 South Dakota State because of its home court advantage?   Who deserves Player of the Year — NDSU's Avery Koenen, the best player on the best team and the leading scorer...

It's Christmas in March in Sioux Falls.   The Summit League men's and women's basketball tournaments are back in town and the Denny Sanford PREMIER Center will turn into a hot cauldron of do-or-die, one-bid-league hoops.    Both the SDSU women and USD men are coming in hot thanks to "State vs U" rivalry wins on Saturday and some Midas touch coaching throughout February.   The Happy Hour host break...

It's Christmas in March in Sioux Falls.   The Summit League men's and women's basketball tournaments are back in town and the Denny Sanford PREMIER Center will turn into a hot cauldron of do-or-die, one-bid-league hoops.    Both the SDSU women and USD men are coming in hot thanks to "State vs U" rivalry wins on Saturday and some Midas touch coaching throughout February.   The Happy Hour host break...

In her fourth year as the analyst for several of the Summit tourney women's games — including the semifinals and final — the former Kansas State guard breaks down the recent hot play of the Jackrabbits and if SDSU, as a No. 2 seed, is still the favorite in the event it has dominated for so long. This, despite NDSU running through a 15-1 slate to take the regular season crown. Who will emerge in a...

Down by 17 late in the first half, the Coyotes ignited a comeback charge that led to a 75-70 regular season finale win to sweep the Jackrabbits. How? Why? And now what do we make of both teams' chances to advance once or twice in the Summit League Tournament?  Zach Borg and Trent Singer break it down.

It was a Jackrabbit jackhammering in Brookings on Saturday night as SDSU avenged its loss at USD a month ago with a resounding 82-49 blowout.  Sioux Falls Live's John Gaskins and Matt Zimmer break down the game and where both teams stand heading into the Summit League Tournament.

John Elway led  "The Drive."     Dwight Clark made  "The Catch."   And in South Dakota State's rich history at the Summit League Tournament in Sioux Falls, Michael Orris hit  "The Shot."   It is one of those iconic moments in sports (around here) that, if you mention Orris's name, the first thing that would come to mind for about 99.9% of people who know Jackrabbits or SLT history is "The Shot."  ...