Link: Around the Big Ten: Week 6

I love getting 2 Thanksgivings!

For the rest of you dregs, enjoy your day and your day off at the Post Office @bradt42

1-11 first year
8-4 the next year
7-6 last year (6-2 in conference play)
6-0 this year with 2 more wins against B1G teams than we currently have and a top 25 ranking in the coaches poll. This is the first top 25 ranking ever for WMU.

He has also recruited well. Top ranked classes in the MAC for the last 3 seasons.

On top of all this he's only 35! He's a little Brewsteresque with his bravado, but unlike Brew he is backing it up on the field. Give this guy our stadium, athletes village and local business opportunities to recruit with and watch out!!

Who's with me?

Vikings playing well right now.....Got a lot of weapons and honestly, Bradford has made the difference. As much as I like Teddy, Bradford has given us a different dimension, offensively. Like this trend.

The trend I DON'T LIKE is that we seem to be losing at least one starter to injury, every week we play... Yes, we can say "next man up" but there may be few 'NEXT MEN' to put in the game if the trend continues. Today, we lose Fusco to a concussion and Cordarelle Patterson to a hip injury.. PLEASE GOD, protect the health of the Vikes players.

I agree we should be undefeated right now despite making lots of mistakes and penalties.. Our talent level been there with all these teams.. Execution and discipline have been huge problems, no doubt.... But honestly, we lost 2 games by a combined 10 points while leading in both losses up to the 4th quarter.. Got to finish but the team is competitive as we have not been blown out by any means.

I see 2 probable losses FOR SURE, left on our schedule in Wisconsin and Nebraska..Which means we should be able to play 'free' instead of playing tight in those games. The rest of the games are certainly winnable. Like many of you who have posted, I am afraid when the problem is discipline.. Because we do have some talent. The thing we cannot afford is the lack of discipline and injury on the o-line..I do get disturbed by the lack of ability of receivers to get open and make plays....As undisciplined as we have played, we are still only 2 drives from being undefeated so the sky is not falling yet.

per Chip:

Mitch Leidner made his 34th start as a college quarterback on Saturday. He played in his 40th career game.

He looked like a redshirt freshman.

He missed wide receivers high and wide. He forced passes into double coverage. He stared down receivers and threw two interceptions. He didn’t crack 100 yards passing until one last desperation drive.

One week after throwing a critical interception in the end zone in the fourth quarter of a loss at Penn State, Leidner became a liability for the Gophers offense. Again.

Some fans undoubtedly will scream for a quarterback change, but that’s not happening. The Gophers have stuck with Leidner this long. They’re not going to reverse course now.

He’s still their best option, a sobering reality after watching the first two conference games of his senior season.

http://www.startribune.com/gophers-q...tom/396424921/

Go Gophers!!

can't after the past 2 weeks. When the Gophers are losing, consuming CFB media just isn't any fun.

The fourth down pi call was brutal. Little to no contact and not catchable. Did we play well as a team. No, but that call was huge.

Link: Maryland must regroup ahead of Minnesota: The 3-2-1

Gophers football coach Tracy Claeys finally was given a specified parking spot at TCF Bank Stadium two weeks ago. His predecessor, Jerry Kill, was incensed that he didn’t have a regular place to park.

This is WHY it will be hard to be successful at Football in Minnesota! You have to wonder why we've been unsuccessful and I can say it's the little things that add up to bigger problems.

This is why I feel Minnesota has lost the winning edge. Push Back by Administration!

They will never allow a Coach at any of the Sports programs to become to popular and powerful. So they send little messages like NO PARKING. It sounds so small but it's not about the space, it's about the message. You don't treat a Chief Executive like that! It sends a message that we don't care about you and your program.

SAD!

From Bossi, who's watching Hurt and others at the Team USA Junior Minicamp in Colorado Springs:

"Combo forward Matthew Hurt backed up his five-star status in the class of 2019. He showed off deft shooting touch, nose for scoring in the paint and never looked intimidated when matched up against the older players.

Hurt recently had North Carolina's Roy Williams in to see him and Kansas, Kentucky,Wisconsin, Ohio State, Notre Dame, Louisville and Minnesota have all been in as well. All but Kentucky and Notre Dame have offered.

A week ago, Hurt checked out Kansas for Late Night and he's got more trips coming. This weekend, he will head to Wisconsin. The next week, he is planning to visit both Louisville and Kentucky."

He's been on Minnesota's campus several times this year and will be up for games a bunch this winter to watch Michael I'm sure.

From Terrapin Sports Report:

On the issues from Saturday, says they are fixable. Says they got outside of themselves as he said right after the game. They hit us on a couple of plays early and guys tried to do too much and didn't trust the guys next to them and it happened on both sides of the ball. Need to focus and get back to what they have been doing.
On Perry Hills' injury, says he's a tough guy and this shouldn't hinder him for too long. He's day to day but he'll be fine and ready to go.

On Pigrome moving the offense, says the entire team is a work in progress, but he stayed even keel, which is good. He did some good things which should help us in the long run.

Says they will continue to rotate the running backs the way they have up to this point. They are all producing and all helping us.

On Jesse Aniebonam, says today is the first day of practice since Saturday and we'll see what he can and can't do and go from there.

On limiting the offense some when Piggy is in, they might do a little bit of that, but the offense is built for a player like him. Says he can deliver a good ball when he's given the time to do so The key is to create good looks and schemes for him to make his reads so he can do those things.

Everything is a great learning experience. Sometimes the best learning experiences are after a loss. Obviously you want to win, but if we handle this in the right way, we can learn a lot about ourselves moving forward. We just need to trust the guy next to us in our scheme and keep our heads up and doing what we need to do.

Says the snowballing out of control just starts as small things and keeps compounding.

Says he's not sure how much the crowd noise affected things. It can have a little bit of an effect, but doesn't see it as something that really has a big effect. They just came out and made some big plays early and it snowballed from there.

On having Danny Sutton kickoff, says he did a good job. He had good hang time and good placement to help the coverage. But he did a really good job for his first college start and being a kid from Pa.

Had a day to decompress, what are your general thoughts…

“When you lose the disappointment comes with it, from everyone involved. This one was a little bit more because you’re playing a trophy game and it’s a border war and means a lot to the state. To have it there at the end, as a defense coach its 7-6 and you think it’s a great game. We give up the score late and get it back down and have a throw to the end zone and don’t get it done. But the disappointment is offensively we know we can play better. Defensively we had a couple missed tackles that did have an effect, but I thought we played well enough on defense to win. Offensively we have to play better, and that’s my responsibility.”

Giving up big plays not an issue yesterday, what was the difference yesterday playing pretty well…

“We were in a good position for the most part, even that last run we had somebody in a position that didn’t make the tackle. I thought they played with a lot of energy, and the other side of the ball didn’t have a lot of energy for whatever reason. Defensively we had a good meeting today, and offensive line wise we can play better, receivers dropped a few balls, Mitch can play better. It’s a team effort, and I’m responsible. When we go through game film as coaches, coaches lose games and players win games. We need to play to our kids’ strengths. We had an extra practice tonight to get some extra work and fix some of those problems we’re having.”

Offensive struggles yesterday…

“We didn’t finish blocks. The backs were looking to bounce everything and need to put it in there. We didn’t play as physical as we needed to. But like I said, I’m responsible for that.”

Iowa’s weakness was rush defense. Why didn’t you stick with the run game yesterday…

“We only got like 60 snaps. 10 of the 13 possessions before the last one were three and outs. We couldn’t get anything going in the running game and dropped a couple balls, we need to finish blocks better. I told the kids when they played two other Big Ten teams, and both of those teams rushed for over 200 yards against them. So I was really disappointed in that aspect. We got whipped up front, and you have the penalties we hard, it’s hard to run many plays.”

What are you doing to address the false start penalties…

“Same thing at Penn State we had one illegal shift, but we didn’t have any false start penalties. It’s a focus, a concentration thing. We got a little extra practice in and adjusted it tonight a little bit, and it’s definitely something we’ll address all thru the week. We handled the noise very well on the road, but that’s what we’re paid for to figure that out.”

What approach do you take with a demoralized team…

“I don’t know if there is any standard way to approach it. You have to take each game separately. I’m not happy and a lot of people aren’t happy, our kids aren’t happy. But to lose by one possession it is tough. Last week at Penn State we moved the ball well on them we just didn’t score in the red zone. This week we didn’t move the ball well. I am a believer in tough love when you don’t play as well as your capable of playing. I also know when you’re struggling there’s no way around it, you have to practice. Work your way through it. That’s the most important part to solving it all.”

You mentioned before the game there’s a different level of physicality when it’s a border battle, what do you think…

“No question, our defense line got after that. It was a big time improvement except for a couple plays. Now we have to play as team. When we do that, we’re capable of being a very good team.”

What did you think of Mitch Leidner’s performance against Iowa…

“It all goes back to going through your progressions again. I had a great conversation with Mitch, they truly took away Drew Wolitarsky. They had two guys on him on big downs. That’s who he wanted to throw it to early, he made up his mind. Then the last drive he went through his progressions and he threw the ball well. Average performance for him, at the end he did a good job of giving us a throw into the end zone. He also snapped the ball a couple times too early before everyone was set. No question he’ll tell you he can play better.”

Thoughts on o-line play…

“When you watch the film they left some stuff out there, so did the backs. Our charge sometimes was fine off the ball, the blocking at the second level and finishing off the first level, there wasn’t that extra pop and physicality there yesterday. We want them to knock people off the ball, and we didn’t do that yesterday. It’s disappointing, since other people have. It’s our job to find out why that happened, and to get that corrected.”

How can we get the ball to Brooks more…

“Him and Rodney have really done a good job. When you only run 60 plays on offense there’s only so much that you can do. We have to control the line of scrimmage to be good on offense. At least get stalemates and give yourself a chance. We didn’t do that and that limited what we could do. Which limits the plays for Rodney and Brooks. We feel they are our two better players.”

What to expect from Maryland…

“We don’t have much video of them playing conference oppenents except for what they have done this year. We’ll go to their place and play on the road, I know their coach is a good one and he’ll have his team ready to play. It still comes down to teams all across America, how does Navy beat Houston? It’s the team that shows up and plays the best that day, sometimes that’s hard to project. Next week it’ll be the same thing. Team that shows up and makes the least mistakes will win the football game. We have to do everything we can to make sure we show up and play the best we can.”

Pirsig having breakfast at Mannings. He's in a walking boot, no crutches. Good sign?? Can't tell if he ordered hash browns or potatoe wedges.

Link: Minnesota target talks Vanderbilt interest

Nico talks about his Vanderbilt offer and gives a quote on Minnesota.

Y'all are depressing as hell and my buzz from Saturday is gone.


Two conference games most of us had marked as "toss-ups" prior to the season = two losses.

Maybe it's the alcohol but a lot of this board's Saturday reaction is more dramatic than being around my wife. (In that case, I should cancel my wife subscription because she costs much more than TGR).


If my memory serves, most realists here were saying 8-9 wins is a good season this year. A first year offensive coordinator, easy schedule and senior quarterback coupled with a young defense. Reading the posts here, I should probably get my hotel room in Detroit ready for a late December post-season appearance.

But the "coaching hot board" posters and "Throw Leidner from the Train" rhetoric seems a little soon. And here's why, I think 8 wins is still very possible.

Without further ado, I present the remaining schedule, complete with Sagarin rank differential compared to Minnesota, which currently sits at 60 in his rankings:

@Maryland (+2)
Rutgers (-59)
@Illinois (-30
Purdue (-50)
@Nebraska (+38)
Northwestern (+9)
@Wisconsin (+46)

I've marked the "losses" in that gross blue color, the perceived wins in something close to maroon and the toss-ups in aqua.

If they win the "wins" and manage to beat Maryland on the road along with Northwestern at home, Claeys gets to 8 wins without any miracle required.

Soft schedule or not, 8 wins at Minnesota is something the program has done just five times since 1968. In that case, buy stock in bronze because Claeys will probably get an extension and we'll have to start hoarding to buy the materials required for his statue. That's something we can all applaud.

...again. We have spent the last decade rebuilding: first Brew ran us into the ground and then Kill picked up the pieces. Did Indiana start over and rebuild when it took Kevin Wilson 4 years to get to a bowl game? No, and last week they beat Sparty.

The team is far more Talented now than it was during the Brew years, the latter Mason years and the early Kill years. We have better athletes than we had then.

But if we rebuild? Then you've got attrition and schematic upheaval which leads to inconsistent play and big holes and a lack of depth in the roster. Brew's teams were so slow and unathletic. The Mason D's of the last 5 years of the Mason regime were the same. I do NOT wanna suck for 3 years only to find out we hired another Brew.

Let's see what Claeys can do before we blow everything up and return to the Big 10 cellar.

All tee'd up for OPD. in federal court. be curious to see how the federal judge responds.

some day freedom of religion (and establishment clause) will clearly not be equated to a freedom from religion (of any sort) standard. wonder if this was foreseeable when the warren court hijacked the Jackson Quaker letter verbiage. good reading for those that really want to know the history of the cliché "separation of church and state."

https://proudamericans.org/the-rush...ge-facing-suit-for-voluntary-prayer-in-court/

You all make me sick!

Go VIKINGS

Go VIKINGS

Go VIKINGS

Go VIKINGS

Go VIKINGS

Go VIKINGS

Gophers football coach Tracy Claeys finally was given a specified parking spot at TCF Bank Stadium two weeks ago. His predecessor, Jerry Kill, was incensed that he didn’t have a regular place to park.

This is WHY it will be hard to be successful at Football in Minnesota! You have to wonder why we've been unsuccessful and I can say it's the little things that add up to bigger problems.

This is why I feel Minnesota has lost the winning edge. Push Back by Administration!

They will never allow a Coach at any of the Sports programs to become to popular and powerful. So they send little messages like NO PARKING. It sounds so small but it's not about the space, it's about the message. You don't treat a Chief Executive like that! It sends a message that we don't care about you and your program.

SAD!

They are losing to Michigan 78-0 with 3:30 left in the 4th. We should beat them

Claeys excuse for abandoning the run was the line was getting whipped. Curious your thoughts? I thought the line play while not fantastic certainly wasn't getting whooped.

Couldn't hear it today, but anything new from Claeys on the game? Wondering if Sid repeated the JJ is the worse OC?

If I was a media member, here are the questions I would have asked:

1. Why does your best offensive weapon get only 11 touches?
2. Why is he not on the field when the game is on the line, especially when Smith had an injured hand and fumbled already?
3. Is the option read a true option? If so, what did you think of the decisions of Mitch?
4. With the game on the line, there were some stop routes and plays that allowed receivers to make plays. I would assume we run the best plays at that time, so why wait until a minute left?
5. I assume #45 Hart is one of the best players as he was in the game on the last drive. Do we have a 4 wr set that perhaps matches our 4th wr against their 4th corner?
6. Where is Getty, Holland, Register and any other WR we recruited in the last 4 years?
7. With 5 minutes left and trailing by 7, I would assume we would go to our bread and butter, however we chose to NOT have Brooks on the field at all, and also not run ever again.
8. This is the 3rd straight game where we didn't throw the ball past 15 yards, is Mitch's arm sore?

If anyone has any answers to these questions, please respond. The only response I wanted out of Claeys in the press conference was, WE GOT OUTPLAYED, WE GOT OUT COACHED AND GOT OUR BUTTE KICKED. THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE AND WILL NOT BE TOLERATED.

unfortunately, I didn't get this response but rather a bunch of ho-hum bs, so I may have just given my last dollar and attended my last game. At least my golf game can only improve.