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University of North Dakota teams risk forfeiting any postseason games if their teams, cheerleaders or band wear or display the school’s Fighting Sioux nickname and American Indian head logo, an NCAA official said Wednesday.
Bernard Franklin, an NCAA executive vice president, said in a letter to university provost Paul LeBel that the university “must forfeit competition” if “it has not adhered to this requirement” in any postseason games that UND teams have been invited to play in.
The NCAA has long said the nickname and logo are “hostile and abusive” to American Indians and that the Grand Forks school’s teams may not wear uniforms that have the nickname or logo during post-season contests. But the Franklin letter’s mention of forfeiting games is a new development.
Talking Points applauds the NCAA for its show of high morality and hopes that it holds other universities with similar nicknames to the same principled standards like, for instance, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish.