Bismarck native Joe Karlgaard knew what career avenue he wanted to pursue at a young age.

His intent was to follow in his dad's footsteps and be an athletic director. Karlgaard's dad, Dick, was a longtime athletic director for the Bismarck Public Schools.

The younger Karlgaard is the athletic director at Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio, which is near Cleveland. Oberlin is an NCAA Division III school.

The younger Karlgaard dreamed early of following in his dad's footsteps. His mom found one of his school projects from the second grade where the teacher asked the students what they wanted to be when they grew up.

"I wrote that I wanted to be an athletic director," the 1992 graduate of Bismarck said. "It was something I wanted to do for a very long time."

Karlgaard arrived in Oberlin in 2003 and served as the assistant director of athletics for external affairs and media relations under Vin Lananna. Lananna also coached Karlgaard in track and field at Stanford.

Lananna left for the University of Oregon and Karlgaard served as the athletic director on an interim basis from August of 2005 to April of 2006 before being chosen for the job.

"Igrew up a huge Demon fan," Karlgaard said. "That was the frame of reference I had until I went to Stanford. I got swept up in that. I knew college administration was what I wanted to do."

While Karlgaard learned a lot from his dad, the biggest virtue he applies to his current job is patience.

"He made it a point to hire very good people to be coaches at Bismarck and Century,"Karlgaard said, "and then he gave them room to grow. It's continuing with Jim Haussler. The coaches enjoyed their jobs and they enjoyed working for him."

No Gilchrist

The Bismarck State men's and women's basketball teams planned to be in action at home this weekend for the Frank Gilchrist Classic.

This weekend's events were canceled when Turtle Mountain Community College pulled out of the tournament.

BSC tried to find replacement teams, but was unsuccessful on short notice.

"It left us in a bind,"BSC men's coach Buster Gilliss said. "We weren't able to find anybody so we had to pull the pin on it."

In addition to the two games lost this weekend, BSC was scheduled to play Turtle Mountain later in the year. The Mystics will lose that game as well.

Minot State-Bottineau will lose two games this weekend. The Lumberjacks were scheduled to play Turtle Mountain twice, which means they will lose four games in the regular season.

Gilliss is hoping to find schools that are looking for games to make up for the lost ones.

"We can still try to add games," Gilliss said. "We can try to make some adjustments later on."

The men's team travels to St. Cloud Technical College on Dec. 13 and the Minneapolis Community College tournament Dec. 14-15.

The women play at College of St. Benedict (St. Joseph, Minn.) on Dec. 13. They play in the Anoka-Ramsey Community College tournament Dec. 14-15.

Short shots

3 Former St. Mary's boys basketball star Tom VerDouw lifted Augustana to a 79-77 nonconference victory over Missouri Southern State on Saturday.

VerDouw's fade away putback at the buzzer was the game-winner. VerDouw finished with 14 points.

3 Concordia-St. Paul won the national NCAA Division II volleyball tournament. The Golden Bears defeated Western Washington 3-1. C-SP is a member of the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference.

3 Missouri Western edged Wayne State 20-13 in the Mineral Water Bowl in NCAA Division II football.

3 The Dickinson State wrestling team is ranked No. 6 in the latest NAIA national poll. The Blue Hawks have five individuals ranked in the top eight of their respective weight divisions. Defending national champ Justin Schlecht is No. 1 at 197 pounds.

Schlecht recently set DSU's school record for pins in a career on his way to the championship at the Concordia Cobber Open. He surpassed the record of 56, previously held by DSU coach Thadd O'Donnell. With nine pins this season, Schlecht has pushed his pin total to 60. With a career record of 116-14, Schlecht is within reach of a DSU career record for wins of 130, held by Trevor Wilson.

Jamestown is ranked 15th in the poll with three rated individuals.