Happy Hour with John Gaskins

College basketball season tips off in only a couple of weeks, with all teams deep into their preseason practices and some already playing scrimmages.
 
This includes the South Dakota State men, who reportedly beat Gonzaga in a secret scrimmage over the weekend (Gonzaga did not play all its key players).
 
Last week, Happy Hour released our Summit League Basketball Media Day chats with Jackrabbits coach Bryan Petersen, USD men's coach Eric Peterson, SDSU women's coach Aaron Johnston, Coyote women's coach Carrie Eighmey, and Summit League commissioner Josh Fenton. You can watch these all back here or listen to them here.
 
For this episode, we are releasing three of the five other coaches' chats. Two of them are with the men who led North Dakota State to the regular season conference titles. The other is with a former Northern State and Black Hills State head coach who is fighting a good fight with the Fighting Hawks at UND.
 
All three of those men signed contract extensions, either near the end of last season or just after it ended. All three were ready to discuss issues beyond their current rosters, diving into the darker topics all mid-major coaches face—NIL, the transfer portal, and how to manage it all while still winning.
 
 
David Richman, NDSU men
The "dean" of Summit League men's coaches starts his 13th season in charge of his alma mater and 24th consecutive season on the Bison bench overall.
 
He has taken the NDSU to four NCAA Tournaments via Summit tourney titles and eight league championship games, including last year. That didn't stop several of his best players from transferring to other schools for more NIL money.
 
Richman candidly discusses his disgust (our word, not his) for the NIL/portal era and how he has changed his approach to dealing with it to his advantage. He also death stares into the camera when discussing NIL agents and his opinion of most of them.
 
Richman is also bitingly sharp and funny, like when he talks about his favorite Happy Hour beverages.
 

Jory Collins, NDSU women
It's been a long and arduous climb to the top of the Summit for the Kansas native who took over a once-proud-turned-rock-bottom Bison program in 2019.
 
Well, almost the top. While NDSU claimed the regular season title last season, SDSU—the perennial thorn-in-side of every Summit squad—beat the Bison in a heated tournament championship game for the NCAA Tournament bid.
 
The Bison are preseason Summit favorites due to Player of the Year Avery Koenen's return to Fargo for her senior year, along with several teammates. Collins walks through Koenen turning down more lucrative major conference offers to stay in her home state. 
 
That is, after we hear about his basketball upbringing in Kansas and his head coaching maiden voyage at Div. II Emporia State before NDSU called.
 
 
Paul Sather, UND men
One of the most affable coaches in the Summit League, Sather enjoyed discussing shoes, how coaching fashion has drifted from real suits to jump suits since Covid, and his favorite Happy Hour cocktail.
 
He also tackles the portal topic and how he assembles an almost entirely new roster every season.
 
Having spent 14 years coaching Div. II hoops in South Dakota before heading north for his first Div. I gig, Sather shares stories about those days.

It's been a long and arduous climb to the top of the Summit for the Kansas native who took over a once-proud-turned-rock-bottom Bison program in 2019.
 
Well, almost the top. While NDSU claimed the regular season title last season, SDSU—the perennial thorn-in-side of every Summit squad—beat the Bison in a heated tournament championship game for the NCAA Tournament bid.
 
The Bison are preseason Summit favorites due to Player of the Year Avery Koenen's return to Fargo for her senior year, along with several teammates. Collins walks through Koenen turning down more lucrative major conference offers to stay in her home state. 
 
That is, after we hear about his basketball upbringing in Kansas and his head coaching maiden voyage at Div. II Emporia State before NDSU called.

One of the most affable coaches in the Summit League, Sather enjoyed discussing shoes, how coaching fashion has drifted from real suits to jump suits since Covid, and his favorite Happy Hour cocktail.
 
He also tackles the portal topic and how he assembles an almost entirely new roster every season.
 
Having spent 14 years coaching Div. II hoops in South Dakota before heading north for his first Div. I gig, Sather shares stories about those days.

The "dean" of Summit League men's coaches starts his 13th season in charge of his alma mater and 24th consecutive season on the Bison bench overall.
 
He has taken the NDSU to four NCAA Tournaments via Summit tourney titles and eight league championship games, including last year. That didn't stop several of his best players from transferring to other schools for more NIL money.
 
Richman candidly discusses his disgust (our word, not his) for the NIL/portal era and how he has changed his approach to dealing with it to his advantage. He also death stares into the camera when discussing NIL agents and his opinion of most of them.
 
Richman is also bitingly sharp and funny, like when he talks about his favorite Happy Hour beverages.

We're a little protective of our fellow South Dakotan Kalen DeBoer in these parts.
 
The Milbank native, a former national championship receiver and three-time national championship head coach at the University of Sioux Falls knew what he signed up for when he agreed to step into Nick Saban's gargantuan shoes at Alabama in January 2024.
 
Since then, DeBoer has posted a 25-9 overall record and 15-5 mark in the snake pit of the SEC, plus a 7-3 record against Top 10 teams, including two Top 5 wins over this era's other SEC 800 lb. gorilla, Georgia. There's also the trip to the CFB Playoff and the one win over Oklahoma in that event just last year. 
 
And, DeBoer has done all this in the NIL era, which CFB experts universally agree has made the sport far more parity-stricken than during Saban's run of six national titles in 12 seasons (2009-20). 
 
After all, Saban didn't win a "Natty" in his final three seasons after NIL kicked in on July 1, 2021.
 
So, DeBoer's done pretty well, right? 
 
Well, yeah, but not good enough to win over many Alabama fans (fans: short for fanatics) who pine for titles. 
 
And, who pine for the laser-eyed death staring, forehead vein-popping, headset-slamming, ass-chewing temper tantrums Saban was famous for when he couldn't stand his players not living up to his standards — nor the refs — right there, in clear national television view.
 
DeBoer's been depicted as too nice and his teams — particularly up front and in the run game — as too soft, fair or not, during his first couple of seasons.
 
But his third campaign has been a different story. The Crimson Tide have a game-wrecking defensive line (that has hurried quarterbacks into a nation-best four interceptions for touchdowns) and a road-grading offensive line to lead a salty ground attack that has helped Heisman candidate quarterback Keelon Russell operate with otherworldly athleticism and highlight-making plays.
 
That got some of DeBoer's detractors closer to his side. But it is what happened on Saturday night in a home loss (always a cardinal sin under Saban) to Georgia that all of a sudden has Tide fans turning:
 
DeBoer went full throttle Saban nuclear in the fourth quarter of Saturday night's ABC-televised showdown. Twice.
 
Once at the officials when they failed to call a blatantly obvious pass interference on a Russell throw to the end zone, which resulted a play later in Russell being sacked out of field goal range, keeping Alabama at a 20-17 deficit.
 
Then, once at one of his own players — cornerback Dijon Lee, Jr., who is making roughly $500,000 in NIL money — for his after-play personal foul push on a Georgia player that gifted the Bulldogs a first down and sealed Bama's loss.
 
In other words, DeBoer may have scored more points with Tide fans in his ninth loss than he ever did in his 25 wins because it has fully squashed the "nice" and "soft" narratives.
 
DeBoer's best friend is Sioux Falls resident and local college and prep TV football analyst Kurtiss Riggs, who also caught 234 passes from quarterback Riggs during their time together at the University of Sioux Falls, including the 1996 national championship team. 
 
Riggs also coached quarterbacks co-called offensive plays with DeBoer when the latter was USF's head coach from 2005-09 and went 67-3 and won three national titles in his final four seasons.
 
Few know DeBoer better than Riggs, who frequently texts and calls DeBoer and occasionally visits DeBoer in Tuscaloosa. 
 
So, has there always been this much fire burning inside of the usually mild-mannered DeBoer?
 
Hear what Riggs had to say in his latest weekly appearance on Happy Hour, a show that also includes these topics:
 
* New opening segment: "What are you DOING?" Riggs picks apart bumbling quarterback and head coaching errors from the NFL over the weekend
 
* Nebraska's latest spotlight loss, this time to Indiana
 
* Saturday's SDSU vs UND tilt
 
* Reaction to SDSU coach Dan Jackson telling Happy Hour on Monday he feels the Jackrabbits would compete "at the top" of the Mountain West conference
 
* Some recent Metro prep observations
 
* Trick plays gone wrong, and what goes into calling them. Is there a right time and wrong time?