Fifteen possibilities remain for the University of North Dakota's new nickname, the one that will supplant the long-discarded Fighting Sioux label, which went down with a fight in 2012 under pressure from the NCAA.
The committee in charge of coming up with the new nickname, one not considered insensitive to American Indians, has now gone from 1,172 possibilities submitted to the public, then to 63 and now down to this Final 15:
Blaze, Cavalry, Explorers, Fighting Green, Fighting Hawks, Force, Green Hawks, Nodaks, North Dakota, North Stars, Pride, Roughriders, Spirit, Sundogs and Thunder Hawks.
Among those ousted by the panel in the most recent cutdown: Arctic Force, Aviators, Flickertails, Warhawks and Prairie Hawks.
The next step is for the committee is to rate each possibility and open the process up for discussion at a public meeting that has yet to be scheduled.
Until UND settles on a new nickname, it continues to go without one, relying heavily on its initials, sans any American Indian logo.
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