The malaise of the Gophers

Submitted by snarling wolverine on

Astonishing tidbit I found on this Gopher forum:

"Starting with the year 2000, the Gophers have exactly SEVEN wins over teams that finished the season above .500 in conference play.

Mason (3): Ohio State, Northwestern, Michigan
Brewster (1): Northwestern
Kill (2): Nebraska, Nebraska  
Claeys(1): Northwestern 

None of those teams finished better than 5-3 in conference play, none of those teams finished in the top 3 in the conference. It is truly amazing how consistent Gopher football is: If a team is really good, Minnesota ALWAYS loses, If a team is slightly above average in conference play, Minnesota almost ALWAYS loses."

Ouch.

Minnesota fans' postgame thoughts are here.

 

 

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SeattleWolverine

November 5th, 2017 at 7:53 PM ^

Yeah, Minnesota was solid that year and had beaten OSU in Columbus in 2000 before we did IIRC. But rumors at the time said that Mason wanted the job but wasn't offered. 

 

Annoyingly, OSU really hasn't made a bad permanent (eg not Fickell) coaching hire since at least 1947. Fricking 70+ years. Which is pretty amazing, I don't think there is any other school that can say that.

Joined: 11/07/2012

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gruden

November 5th, 2017 at 8:50 PM ^

To their credit, when Tressel was fired no one panicked (ie. freaking out about the recruiting class) and took their lumps that season in order to make a good hire. 

But they also had incredibly good timing where Meyer was available to be had.  LSU hired on their interim as there were no other slam-dunk hires to be had.  It will be interesting to see what Florida does.

Timing is everything and those bastards in Columbus have had it good.

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Carcajou

November 6th, 2017 at 9:16 AM ^

Hate to say, "know you place", but man, does it sure apply to schools like Minnesota.

There's a difference between wanting to be among the elite programs of the B1G, and actually having the resources (including location) to do so.

Elite schools/ programs might be able to have the expectations to compete for the conference title nearly every year. Middle tier programs have to be satisfied with bowls consistently, and truly great teams a couple of years every decade, when all the stars align.

Mason had turned Minnesota from losers to a solid program. If he were still there, I have every reason to believe they would be competing with Wisky, Iowa, and Nebraska regularly to win the west.

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BayWolves

November 6th, 2017 at 11:44 AM ^

So true.  he was the best thing they had going in forever and when they fired him it really came out of the blue.  They thought they were on the edge of greatness but turned their back on the guy who built them into a respectable team.  A lot of folks outside of MN were shocked at the time.

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HailHail47

November 5th, 2017 at 6:41 PM ^

It's tough to recruit in Minnesota. That could start to change with their facilities upgrades, and the fact that Fleck is pretty charismatic. They will be a good program in a few years.

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HailHail47

November 5th, 2017 at 10:55 PM ^

It takes time to build a program man. We are in year three of Jim MotherFucking Harbaugh as our coach and are still experiencing some growing pains from the previous regime. Fleck built a monster at Western, he is a good salesman, he can have success there once he gets a chance to develop his guys.

Joined: 10/07/2017

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lhglrkwg

November 5th, 2017 at 7:13 PM ^

in the West, if they can aspire to split with Nebraska/Iowa every year and basically concede the Wisconsin game, they still have a good chance to go 6-3 or better in conference in a lot of years just by beating the bottom feeders. Their non-con is also a total joke until seeing Colorado in 2021 so they could easily get some 8-10 win seasons in the next few years if Fleck can just get them up to being decent

Joined: 07/03/2008

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Commie_High96

November 5th, 2017 at 6:49 PM ^

Makes you realize why Kirk Ferentz is worth $24 Million per year, or whatever it is. There is no structural reason Iowa should be better than Minnesota, indeed, with another D1 school in the state (and not an altogether bad one, I might add), they should be worse. Also, Minnesota has almost double Iowa’s population.

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BlueMk1690

November 5th, 2017 at 7:01 PM ^

there are structural reasons. The University of Minnesota main campus (and thus the football program) is in the Twin Cities and they are not even the most popular football team in their city never mind the state. The Twin Cities are a pro market, not a college market. And at the HS and college level, hockey is big and attracts talent and fans across the vast expanse of Minnesota.

In Iowa, Hawkeye football is king. There's no pro franchises. The Cyclones are the little brother by some margin. Nobody cares much about hockey either.

Now obviously neither is a great structural situation because of the obvious limitations, but the reality is that if you're in one of those states, you're recruiting the neighboring states as well as the leftovers from Ohio, Texas, Florida, Cali etc. anyway i.e. the guys who didn't get offers from powerhouse programs.

If I have to sell a program to those recruits..well would you rather be a king in Iowa City i.e. play on THE team in the state or just a dude in Minneapolis.

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Commie_High96

November 5th, 2017 at 8:54 PM ^

I get your points, but Minnesota was historically a powerhouse in a way that Iowa has never been. Minnesota was only behind UM in the Midwest as a football power through the 60s, I understand the rise of Hockey...but my point is Minnesota is just underperforming relative to Iowa.

Joined: 02/10/2012

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BlueMk1690

November 5th, 2017 at 9:12 PM ^

cancelled anything Minnesota did before the advent of color TV. And really Minnesota's glory days were the 30s with a brief revival in the early 60s. By the mid 60s they were mediocre. From 1963 to 1980 they won more than 6 games exactly 3 times. Mason's 1999 was basically their best year in 30 years.

Iowa is a persistently underrated program (which is how games like yesterday happen). In the 80s, they were the 3rd program of note in the Big Ten and since then they've been good for some really good seasons in a way that Minnesota hasn't sniffed in 50+ years. Ferentz is really just continuing what Fry started.

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Hotel Putingrad

November 5th, 2017 at 7:10 PM ^

certainly there are a multitude of reasons for their sustained long-term mediocrity. More recently a lot of locals believe Claeys should not have been fired. PJ's act is wearing pretty thin.

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Hotel Putingrad

November 6th, 2017 at 8:40 AM ^

I'm just saying that exuberance does not play well up here, especially in the absence of on-field results. This was s 9-4 team last year that retuned a ton of players, and there were legitimate bowl aspirations. They should beat Nebraska, but that Northwestern game is a toss up. And he's got to keep them somewhat competitive against Wisconsin.

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trueblueintexas

November 6th, 2017 at 10:10 AM ^

Interesting take, I have not heard any comments about Fleck that would lead me to believe there is even a tinge of disappointment. Most fans I talk to are basically saying, wait and see if he can get a QB. 

Regarding Claeys, the primary sentiment I heard was that everyone agreed he wasn't really given a chance, but if you were going to make a change, you may as well do it earlier than later. Keep in mind, that was in the middle of the bad PR U of Minn. was getting about the incident with the wrestling team and a seperate incident with a couple football players. That was part of it all also.

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markusr2007

November 5th, 2017 at 7:55 PM ^

in the modern college football era.

Consistent success has not been found there since the Eisenhauer administration.

Even Fritz Crisler went 10-7-1 coaching football at Minnesota (1930-1931).

Clarence Spears and Bernie Bierman are the only coaches at Minnesota to have any significant success there over 5 seasons or more:

1925–1929 Clarence Spears 5 28–9–3 .757
1930–1931 Fritz Crisler 2 10–7–1 .558
1932–1941, 1945–1950 Bernie Bierman 16 93–35–6 .727
1942–1944 George Hauser 3 15–11–1 .577
1951–1953 Wes Fesler 3 10–13–4 .435
1954–1971 Murray Warmath 18 87–78–7 .526
1972–1978 Cal Stoll 7 39–39 .500
1979–1983 Joe Salem 5 19–35–1 .352
1984–1985 Lou Holtz 2 10–12 .455
1986–1991 John Gutekunst 6 29–36–2 .441
1992–1996 Jim Wacker 5 16–39 .291
1997–2006 Glen Mason 10 64–57 .535
2007–2010 Tim Brewster 4 15–30 .333
2010 Jeff Horton 1 2–3 .400
2011–2015 Jerry Kill 5 29-29 .500
2015–2016 Tracy Claeys 2 11-8 .579
2017–Present P. J. Fleck 0 4-3 .333
Totals 32 coaches 131 seasons 686–498–44[13] .570

 

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M-Dog

November 5th, 2017 at 11:27 PM ^

When Holtz took the Minnesota job, a reporter asked him: "How do you sleep at night knowing you face Ohio State and Michigan every year?"

Holtz replied:  "I sleep like a baby.  I wake up every 2 hours and cry."

 

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