Gophers are in a good spot to make a good run

Ideally, it would have been nice to blow out the first four games and build on the big wins over Wisconsin and Georgia Tech last year, but I think the Gophers are still in a really good spot here. In each of the first four games, the Gophers have been tested down to the wire and had to fight hard down to the wire, sometimes in miraculous fashion. The pollsters and outsiders have all been thinking, "They aren't a very good team as they were lucky to win the games against mediocre opposition."

We are flying under the radar nationally and my guess is every team we will play the rest of the season feels they should beat us. And they very well could. This is a team that looked putrid vs. Illinois last year, cost DC Robb Smith his job and frankly looked like it would o-fer the rest of the season at that point. But it's also a team that went in and just destroyed a good Wisconsin team later that year. You have to wonder if the Gophers play at that level they could beat any team the rest of the way. Or - all of them.

This season has not seen that type of overall effort yet, but with the Gophers start, I don't think everyone is telling them how great they are. Instead they are hearing how lucky they are. They should never get overconfident or arrogant and there is no way they should think all they need to do is show up and they will get a win because with this team that is not going to happen. This team will need to work hard for everything they get and nothing less than a complete effort will work if they want to get a win.

What I like about this team is that it has not shown panic. QB Morgan is as poised as I have seen out of a college QB and just knows how to win. He is probably my favorite QB we have had here since Rickey Foggie was here in 1984 and he hopefully has a lot more magic left the next few years. At 8-2, he is off to a great start!
He is the perfect QB for this team because he comes in overlooked and under the radar, too.

But maybe the best part of all this is even though we have battled a lot of adversity and had to pull out these games out of the fire, they are 4-0. Somehow, they found a way to win. Hopefully they have been able to work on mistakes, learn from it and get better and it sure is nice to learn from your mistakes and not have to pay for it with a loss! So this team is very quietly 4-0, unappreciated and overlooked nationally. They have more offensive weapons than we have seen here in a very long time, maybe ever. I can't think of a team that had 4 RB's and 3 WR's of this caliber here. They have not played their best yet. I would say they are a very dangerous team and should not be overlooked!

People mostly look at the score, and see that we didn’t blow anyone out. The main difference between the Fresno, Purdue and GSU games of this season and the Purdue, Wisconsin and Georgia Tech games of last season is in those blowout wins last season, we didn’t have the untimely penalties and special teams blunders to let the other team either hang around or get back into it. The Purdue game should have been at least a 2-3 TD win, even considering Purdue’s 99 yard TD drive. The defense isn’t quite there yet either, but it’s mostly fundamentals (tackling in space), rather than scheme related.


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Excellent, well-reasoned analysis. I agree 100%.

Well at the very least, I think we’re in a great position to go at least 6-2 in the first eight games. Could easily go 7-1 or 8-0.

Where the season goes from there, will be an interesting ride!

PitinoFan said:

People mostly look at the score, and see that we didn’t blow anyone out. The main difference between the Fresno, Purdue and GSU games of this season and the Purdue, Wisconsin and Georgia Tech games of last season is in those blowout wins last season, we didn’t have the untimely penalties and special teams blunders to let the other team either hang around or get back into it. The Purdue game should have been at least a 2-3 TD win, even considering Purdue’s 99 yard TD drive. The defense isn’t quite there yet either, but it’s mostly fundamentals (tackling in space), rather than scheme related.


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I agree with you that the Purdue game wasn't as close as the score indicated. I was fine with the defense allowing the 99 yard drive as they didn't give up big chunks and kept the clock rolling, when your up 21 with less than a quarter left, trading 7 points for 6+minutes is a good deal. I can't understand why brohm didn't try to onside kick again. We had shown no problem moving the ball all day and he basically put it on our offense to get a few first downs to win the game which they did pretty easily.

PitinoFan said:

People mostly look at the score, and see that we didn’t blow anyone out. The main difference between the Fresno, Purdue and GSU games of this season and the Purdue, Wisconsin and Georgia Tech games of last season is in those blowout wins last season, we didn’t have the untimely penalties and special teams blunders to let the other team either hang around or get back into it. The Purdue game should have been at least a 2-3 TD win, even considering Purdue’s 99 yard TD drive. The defense isn’t quite there yet either, but it’s mostly fundamentals (tackling in space), rather than scheme related.


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Even though the tackling was ugly toward the end of the Purdue game, I am happy that they seem to have solved the explosive play issue from last year with Rossi. Keeping teams like Illinois from scoring long touchdowns will make an upset much less likely.

LakerFan said:

I agree with you that the Purdue game wasn't as close as the score indicated. I was fine with the defense allowing the 99 yard drive as they didn't give up big chunks and kept the clock rolling, when you're up 21 with less than a quarter left, trading 7 points for 6+minutes is a good deal. I can't understand why brohm didn't try to onside kick again. We had shown no problem moving the ball all day and he basically put it on our offense to get a few first downs to win the game which they did pretty easily.

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Yes. And yes.

I'd guess that the sports media talkers are probably saying the game was too close, Purdue could have won, Gophers were lucky, Purdue stinks, Minnesota hasn't beaten anybody, they'll be lucky to win 7 games, etc.

That's fine. Let them continue to take the Gophers lightly.

LakerFan said:

I agree with you that the Purdue game wasn't as close as the score indicated. I was fine with the defense allowing the 99 yard drive as they didn't give up big chunks and kept the clock rolling, when your up 21 with less than a quarter left, trading 7 points for 6+minutes is a good deal. I can't understand why brohm didn't try to onside kick again. We had shown no problem moving the ball all day and he basically put it on our offense to get a few first downs to win the game which they did pretty easily.

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Especially considering how much our defense was in the field. The offense was scoring so quickly that the defense never really got to rest. By the end of that game they must have been wiped!

Watching GSU go into two overtimes against South Alabama last night was a reminder that this Gopher squad is going to have to improve greatly to stretch the record out beyond 8-4 by season's end. I was predicting 8-4 in June and I am still predicting it now. Interestingly, each individual game has not gone the way I would have anticipated but overall the destination seems to be the same.

Not sure being under the radar really helps.

Bama and Clemson have a target on their back every game and they're not dropping games because of that

Either way yeah they have potential... except that Iowa and Wisc look like freight trains this year.

Schnauzer said:

Watching GSU go into two overtimes against South Alabama last night was a reminder that this Gopher squad is going to have to improve greatly to stretch the record out beyond 8-4 by season's end. I was predicting 8-4 in June and I am still predicting it now. Interestingly, each individual game has not gone the way I would have anticipated but overall the destination seems to be the same.

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My original prediction went like this:

Non-con: 3-0
@Rutgers, Maryland, Illinois: 3-0
@Purdue, Nebraska, Wisconsin: 1-2
Penn St, @Iowa, @NW: 0-3

Non-con, we all know what happened and have dissected it enough. End of the day, we survived 3-0.


Then you look at the nine Big Ten games:

Rutgers - stinks, like we assumed they would - was thinking W, still thinking W
Maryland - had an early "top 25" upset over Syracuse, but then lost @Temple and got crushed at home by Penn St, so I'm not sure what to think on this, other than we get them at home - was thinking W, still tentatively thinking W
Illinois - figured that Lovie wouldn't survive, and they desperately need a win, but for our homecoming I think we take this one any way we need to - was thinking W, still thinking W

@Purdue - definitely have not been as good so far as I thought, helps that they lost their starting QB and star WR - got the W
Nebraska - also have not looked as good as people were thinking, was thinking L, now thinking W
Wisconsin - this is maybe the team that has looked much better than people were thinking/hoping coming off last season, but it's a rivalry - I was actually hoping this would be the one W from this group, still hoping we get the W

Penn St - figured they'd be good, and so far they look good, not Ohio St good, but good, they get Purdue tomorrow and go to Iowa City next week - was thinking L, still not sure but probably L
@Iowa - this is the other team that has looked fairly better than what I was thinking/hoping, and it's on the road - was thinking L, still thinking L
@NW - I will admit, I was wrong. Figured this team would be the team to beat in the West, and they have not looked the part so far. They still have some nice pieces. They go to Lincoln tomorrow and I hope they win. Then they get Ohio St and Iowa at home. So definitely a chance to bounce back, but I don't think so - was thinking L, now tentatively thinking W



So at the end of the day, the only teams that area looking considerably better than I thought are the teams I picked us to lose to anyway (except the hopeful Wisc pick).

Nebraska down, NW down, Purdue down in a sense (and we already won).

A_Slab_of_Bacon said:

Not sure being under the radar really helps.

Bama and Clemson have a target on their back every game and they're not dropping games because of that

Either way yeah they have potential... except that Iowa and Wisc look like freight trains this year.

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Tough to prove if Clemson played down, North Carolina played up, or both, but Clemson almost lost last week.


Bama, OU, and Ohio State look great right now, though. Obviously Auburn is always a dangerous game for Bama. LSU wants a piece too.

Taji34 said:

Especially considering how much our defense was in the field. The offense was scoring so quickly that the defense never really got to rest. By the end of that game they must have been wiped!

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Yes, this is exactly what I was thinking when it comes to us letting them come back at the end. Our defense looked gassed. I think it’s because we had a few drives that were only 2-4 play TD drives that only lasted a minute or two. And then drives we didn’t score, were fairly quick. A few 3 and outs. I don’t think our defense had time to regain much energy and by the end they were just wiped out. They played a solid game for 3 quarters. If we could get some longer drives (not that I’ll complain about a 2 play 75 yard TD drive) that take up more time than the Purdue game, our defense might be in it for all 4 quarters.


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So basically, if we were gonna make a run, this is what I think of for a "likely best case" type of scenario (not an all-out best case):

- Iowa loses @Michigan, and vs Penn St, then loses at Madison. 3 Big Ten losses
- Wisconsin loses @Ohio State, then we need them to lose one more somewhere. Not sure if Michigan St can pull it off in Madison. Might need to hope that Nebraska plays the spoiler in Lincoln. That gives them 2 Big Ten losses heading into the final game.
- I think we will play tough but unfortunately lose vs Penn St and @Iowa. That gives us 2 Big Ten losses heading into the final game.


That still gives us a chance to control our destiny and win the West, if we can beat Wisconsin at home in the final regular season week.

Very realistic to get to 8-0 and beyond if some guys improve and we stay healthy. It’s a long season, and literally anything can happen as NW exposed some chinks in Sconnie’s armor, Iowa is beatable, and Northwestern has a really bad offense. PSU may be the best of the lot. Hopefully our run of the gauntlet goes better than this underdog gold team.




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We could have a pretty solid season by just winning the games we are favored in.

This is where we find out if the new DC is better than the alternative.