Gophers on a Friday night

Ah the state of Gopher sports. I think it’s time for some honest reflections on whats really attainable and where should those NIL dollars go.

Football, lost cause, the Gophers will never compete for a Big 10 Title forget about a national title. So the gophers feel a need to pay Fleck an acceptable salary, problably middle of the pack compared to other Big 10 coaches. So he’s being paid to keep the kids in class and out of prison. He’s done a pretty good job of that. You can triple the amount of NIL money and it won’t matter. It’s a middle of the pack program and no amount of NIL is going to change that. Accept what the program is and has mostly been and just move on. Is Fleck where you want to spend your coaching allowance to finish in the middle or maybe take a bunch and dedicate it to a basketball coach.

Basketball. The great savior Ben Johnson who was going to sew up the borders got himself fired after another miserable season. I believe I heard they paid him 2 million a year and just gave him 3 million to go away. Again not much heard about jail time for the kids so thats a plus. My thoughts are basketball as much as I dislike the sport might be the one place they can get to the top of the conference. Thats where I think the NIL money should go. You only need to buy and retain a handfull of kids every year compared to football. Hire a name coach, pour big NIL money in, get a tutor to write the papers and get after it.

Hockey. I’m confused what goes on over there. They get talented players every year, some go and some come. Yet no recent titles. Maybe they need to use NIL money to keep a few kids from turning pro and stack a few year classes. Do they have the right coach?

Title IX …….. I don’t pay much attention to the womens side.

Friday night thoughts on the program, coaches and NIL money?

If the men’s hockey bomb out in round 1, or even round 2 if it involves laying another egg, I think motzko is gone. He’s had more than enough time and talent to get it done and just doesn’t in big games.

Agree with you on football. Transfer portal rules, NIL, and the expansion of the big 10 all killed the gophers hopes of competing for a b10 title. They’ll get their wins, always have a game they throw away that they have no business in doing so, and will always get pounded by the powerhouses.

Junior transfer rules will do plenty to change the landscape of college hockey.
The U has plenty of other issues to worry about besides sports. Doubt many big time companies donors want to touch the NIL with the U with a ten foot pole. NIL makes college football and Basketball not nearly as fun to follow.

I think a lot of programs would take what the U has done for football. PJ has averaged 8 wins since he got here. Take this from a Nebraska fan whose program is digging out of a ten year hole.

I have no hope for basketball and while the hockey team seemingly has the most talented roster every year they disappoint.

MN sports

I agree with the perception on football. Fleck is kind of a corny guy and there’s no doubt that he has made the program better, but the ceiling is limited. They aren’t going to win big ten titles. The bar is beating your rivals more often and winning the dukes mayo bowl. It is what it is. It’s probably better than what it was in the past with players getting into legal trouble and teams posting worse records. One can’t deny the improvement, but there is a ceiling.

Hoops is clearly in the worst shape. The removal of Johnson after 4 seasons of under performance shows.

Mens hockey is usually pretty good. When Bob showed up from St Cloud, they were in rough shape. The building was empty and they missed the NCAAs frequently. The other programs in this state passed them. That appears to have been reversed again in recent memory. They should have won the natty two years ago too. They will make the NCAAs in a couple weeks, probably as the 4 seed.

The portal and NIL will not go away anytime soon. Adapt or die.

I have lost most all interest in college athletics except for hockey. Will watch a gopher football game or two if I am not hunting and maybe some of the college football and basketball playoffs if I remember to turn the game on.

… love to see D1 college athletics follow the NFL “parity” rules but that isn’t happening.

I’d love to see 3M, Target, Medtronic, Polaris… dump millions into NIL and buy teams like the SEC does. They win a couple national titles and we can all talk about the good old days of Minnesota sports when we’re in the old fisherman’s home.

There are 134 D1 football teams in the country. There are 12 play-off spots chosen for the national play-offs. Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State and Oregon will usually represent the Big 10. On occasion one of those will be replaced by somebody else. To think the Gophers would ever leapfrog into that group is crazy. They can’t even consistently get past Iowa, Wisconsin, Nebraska, and now we can add USC and UCLA to the gauntlet. No, your odds of winning the powerball might be better.

So if we did have a bunch of fortune 500 companies or a drug cartel pony up NIL money wouldn’t we be much better off pouring those funds into basketball or / and hockey? You buy a stud playmaking guard for $5 million and you have a start of something. You have a $5 million dollar quarterback you have nothing until you build the skill players around him.

Dutchboy wrote:

There are 12 play-off spots chosen for the national play-offs. Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State and Oregon will usually represent the Big 10. On occasion one of those will be replaced by somebody else. To think the Gophers would ever leapfrog into that group is crazy.

I don’t think anyone actually thinks that will happen or should be the standard for gophers football. It seems pretty obvious at this point.

One can still cheer for the team and enjoy consistent 7-9 win seasons with some rivalry victories mixed in. Heck, last year wasn’t great but they gave a playoff game winning Penn State everything they could handle. Throw in a chance at double digit wins every 5ish years and that’s a program worth keeping an eye on, at least for me personally.

It is not the big multi-national corporations that typically drop money on NIL college endorsements.

It is the local guys who have done real well and live large by their affiliation with the local college team. Car dealerships, law firms, local insurance, local/regional banks, local eating and entertainment establishments, etc… There is a gopher hockey player doing adds for KSTP so Hubbard is involved.

Many college endowments for individual University departments are the same way. Wealthy individual or couple donate millions to have their name on a building or professor chair or scholarship program.

Most D1 and even smaller schools at least have sponsorship names on most of their facilities (arenas, stadiums, and practice facilities). 3M already had its name on the hockey arena, Huntington Bank on the football field, Williams Arena (no sponsor?). That seems to be the place where larger corporation choose to play on the collegiate sports affiliation.

Agree with other’s comments above. Only a couple of handfuls of NCAA D1 football teams will be play-off bound on a regular basis. The rest hope to have winning season, a good bowl game (becoming less relevant based on with winter portal process) and maybe with hope, luck, and prayer make the play-off once a decade or so.

If MN football can keep up or exceed Wisconsin and Iowa each year that says a lot. Gopher Football 2024 … one some big wins in California, had one or two stolen from them, and laid their regular egg or two. Gophers put a decent amount of players in the NFL, recruit fine, and seem to have found some success in the portal. Can’t imagine Gophers could do better with someone else besides PJ.

Here’s a crazy thought. How about the Gophers dropping down to FBS? The best game I saw all year was NDSU versus SDSU. Montana State’s quarterback was all world. Great football without the million dollar price tag.

SR

Steve Root wrote:

Here’s a crazy thought. How about the Gophers dropping down to FBS? The best game I saw all year was NDSU versus SDSU. Montana State’s quarterback was all world. Great football without the million dollar price tag.

SR

Why would a team that just beat USC, crushed Wisconsin, and went toe to toe with Penn State move down a division? Nothing like games against Lehigh or Jackson state to get the fan base revved up…

In all fairness I did say it was a crazy idea.

Fran mccaffrey would be an excellent hire in Minnesota, did decent with not a lot in iowa

Steve Root wrote:

In all fairness I did say it was a crazy idea.

Yes you gave fair warning LOL