Author: David Shama

Condolences to the family of Judy Mona Schell who passed away on Saturday.  Her family included husband George and brother Dave Mona.

The Lions have lost 13 straight dating back to last season.  Opponents have outscored the Lions by 190 points. The latest loss was 47-10 to the Tennessee Titans.  You wonder half seriously if the Lions could win the Southeastern Conference championship competing against Alabama, Florida and other quality college teams in the football crazy south.

Gophers’ athletic director Joel Maturi said six hockey playing schools would be needed to form a Big Ten Conference.  Penn State has a quality club hockey program but presently the Big Ten programs with intercollegiate hockey are Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Ohio State and Wisconsin.

Lane Kiffin, the Bloomington Jefferson alum, impressed Maturi when he was a candidate for the Gopher football job almost two years ago.  He liked Kiffin’s energy, passion for football and Minnesota roots.  Of course, Maturi said, he was concerned about Kiffin having no previous head coaching experience.  It was a concern about hiring Tim Brewster, too, but Maturi thought Brewster was a better total “fit” for the Gopher job. Kiffin, 33, is now the new head coach of the Tennessee Volunteers after having coached the Oakland Raiders.

Scout.com has the Gophers ranked No. 37 in football recruiting for the class of 2009.  The Gophers have 15 commits while Ohio State, ranked No. 1 so far in the process, has 24.

The St. Louis Blues rank eighth in the NHL in average attendance, according to espn.com, but the Blues web site was promoting 50 percent off on single game tickets a few days ago.  The Blues are at the Xcel Energy Center tonight for a game against the Wild who are 10^th in the league averaging 18,568, according to espn.com.  St. Louis is playing to about 90 percent capacity while the Wild is over 102 percent, per ESPN.  Chicago, which averaged almost 17,000 per game last season and was far down in NHL attendance, is leading this season at 21,485 per game.

The New York Daily News web site (www.nydailynews.com) had this observation last week: “Kevin Garnett has been going after smaller guys, including Toronto’s Jose Calderon and Milwaukee’s Luke Ridnour, and it’s starting to hurt his rep. One executive said of Garnett, ‘He’s nothing but an instigator.’  With several teams complaining about Garnett’s antics in recent weeks, the league has taken note.”

Gopher public address announcer Dick Jonckowski tells a joke to basketball coach Tubby Smith before home games.  Jonckowski, known as the “Polish Eagle,” asked Smith why all Polish names end in “s-k-i”?  “Because we can’t spell toboggan,” Jonckowski said.

Conrad Smith, the new chief operating officer of the Minnesota Lynx, has been involved with local pro sports teams here since the early 1980s.  His front office public relations, marketing and management experiences include the Minnesota North Stars, Minnesota Twins, and Minnesota Timberwolves.

Greg Wicklund’s Racquet Ramblings column in the USTA Northern Section magazine features Jim Holden’s book, Tennis in the Northland. The former Northfield tennis coach has written a comprehensive history of boys’ high school tennis in Minnesota.  https://www.jim-holden.com/

Concordia’s Justin Foss and Augsburg’s Alex Hildebrandt have been named to the ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America® Men’s Soccer Team, as selected by the College Sports Information Directors of America. They were named third team All-Americans in the College Division (non-Division I).  Foss, a senior, has a 3.58 grade point average while majoring in psychology.  He had a career year in 2008, finishing the season with 15 goals and two assists for 32 points.  Hildebrandt, a junior, is a finance major with a 3.86 grade-point average.  He received All-MIAC and All-MIAC Sportsmanship Team honors recently.

Yup, Ohio State got a share of yet another Big Ten title (33rd in school history) but there were more surprises than ho-hum developments during the conference’s 2008 football season that ended last Saturday.  Joe Paterno, 81, proved he could still recruit and coach (even if it was from the press box on game day) leading his Penn State team to a co-title with the Buckeyes and along the way showed the Nittany Lions were the best in the Big Ten.

Before the season there was expectation that Wisconsin, Illinois and maybe even Michigan would out-do Penn State in the conference race to see if any team could finish ahead of Ohio State.  Instead the Badgers, Illini and Wolverines faltered, while Penn State, Michigan State, Northwestern and Iowa enjoyed surprising celebration seasons.

Here’s a summary and report card from Sports Headliners on Big Ten teams with remarks and grades based on preseason expectations and actual performance.

Put the Gophers down for a B-.  Losing the last four games was bad and on a family Web site I can’t write the word that describes Minnesota’s performance in the 55-0 final game loss to Iowa, but remember the Gophers were a popular choice before the season to finish last in the conference.  The Gophers, 1-11 in 2007, won four marshmallow-like nonconference games, and then won three of their first four conference games defeating Indiana, Illinois and Purdue.  Two of the wins were on the road.

The Gopher season changed after a 24-17 loss to Northwestern that if played differently might have gone into overtime and led to a Gopher victory.  Coach Tim Brewster’s play-to-win style produced an opening game closing minute win against Northern Illinois, but a late fourth quarter interception by a Northwestern defender sent the Gophers on their way to four consecutive losses.

On Monday offensive line coach Phil Meyer announced his resignation.  Yesterday Tim Davis, an assistant at Alabama, joined up with Brewster as running game coordinator/offensive line coach.  Expect, too, that in the upcoming bowl game (site not determined) the Gophers run some plays with the quarterback under center and show modifications in their play package trying to liven up an offense that produced six points in two of the last three games.

Hardly anyone thought the Gophers would win more than four, five, or six games, and fewer foresaw bowl eligibility.  Mostly behind an improved defense under coordinator Ted Roof, the Gophers won seven, lost five and despite the awful finish surprised the Big Ten and made improvement.

With three national championship appearances since the start of the new millennium, it’s difficult to give Ohio State anything better than a B+ for a 10-2 season.  The Buckeyes had almost all their starters back from the national championship game against LSU last winter but hopes of making the next title game vanished with a 35-3 third game loss to USC.  Ohio State (what else is new?) will be formidable again next season, in search of its second national championship since 2003, but may not be so powerful if junior running back Beanie Wells goes pro.  Good news for Gopher fans is that they won’t have to hear anymore about all-honors linebacker James Laurinaitis, the former Wayzata High School star who is a Buckeye senior.

Penn State, 11-1, has a nice collection of senior players, but none as important as junior quarterback Daryll Clark.  He was among the conference’s most efficient passers and his running ability brought to life a Penn State offense that had struggled at the quarterback position the year before.  Seems like when Penn State commits to an option quarterback (see Michael Robinson and 11-1 season in 2005) the Nittany Lions have an offense, plus there’s always a good defense in Happy Valley.  This season Penn State led the Big Ten in scoring offense and defense.  Give the Lions an A grade with an asterisk that it would have been A+ if not for a 24-23 loss at Iowa.

Who can blame them for crying in their beer in Madison?  Before the season, except for Ohio State, the Badgers looked like the Big Ten’s best.  Three games into the year Wisconsin was 3-0 and ranked No. 8 in the country.  Then the Badgers blew a 19-0 lead at Michigan, lost the game and things were never the same.  Wisconsin lost four of the next five games before recovering to win against three season ending softies, Indiana, Minnesota and Cal-Poly.  It’s a D+ grade for the Badgers who finished 3-5 in the conference, 7-5 overall.  Coach Brett Bielema, 12-1 in his first season and 9-4 last year, better do something about his fading popularity in Dairyland.

Ron Zook is wearing the “Coach February” label after Illinois stumbled to a 3-5 Big Ten season, 5-7 overall.  Zook is known as a superb recruiter who has rounded up impressive talent on February signing days but he’s produced only one winning season in four years at Illinois. The Illini, 9-4 last season and a Rose Bowl team, had a majority of their starters back from last season but they are among the conference’s biggest flops in 2008.  A low point was a 23-17 loss to Western Michigan earlier this month before 12,865 fans at Ford Field in Detroit.  Junior quarterback Juice Williams led the Big Ten in total offense and passing offense per game, but Illinois faltered on defense.  Illinois earns a D grade and a cap D for disappointing.

Desperate Michigan would probably love a D.  Instead the Wolverines receive an F in coach Rich Rodriguez’s first season in Ann Arbor.  How could it be anything else for Michigan, 9-4 last year and a team that returned about half its starters?  The Wolverines were 2-6 in the conference, 3-9 overall.  You’ve heard multiple times the historic firsts about this season: most school losses in school history, first losing season since 1967 and 33 year streak of bowl games halted.  Michigan’s problems started with not having a quarterback who could fit into the new spread system Rich-Rod brought from West Virginia.  A 2009 recruiting class will help make the Wolverines better next season but 2008 will long be remembered in Ann Arbor.

Michigan State used the performance of senior players and the tough mindedness of second year coach Mark Dantonio to finish second in the Big Ten with a 6-2 record, 9-3 overall.  Senior running back Javon Ringer rushed for 21 touchdowns, best in the Big Ten.  The offense benefited, too, from a senior leader at quarterback, Brian Hoyer.  Senior safety Otis Wiley was among the conference leaders in interceptions and part of a Spartan defense that both performed well and failed.  The defense helped beat Wisconsin by one point and Iowa by three, but the Spartans gave up 45 to Ohio State and 48 to Penn State.  The Spartans weren’t quite ready to play with the league’s best but still they almost won the school’s first conference title since 1990.  They deserve their A-.

Northwestern used a senior group and a coach still young enough to be playing on Sundays to shock the Big Ten world with a 9-3 season, 5-3.  Senior quarterback C.J. Bacher was third in conference total offense.  Senior receivers Ross Lane and Eric Peterman were Big Ten leaders in receptions and before he was injured senior running back Tyrell Sutton was outstanding rushing and catching.  But Northwestern’s rise from 6-6 a year ago was partially attributable to a defense led by first year defensive coordinator Mike Hankwitz.  He had been dismissed after last season from the same job at Wisconsin.  The man smart enough to hire him was Pat Fitzgerald, the 33-year- -old head coach already in his third season in Evanston.  Give the Wildcats a savvy A grade for the season.

In Iowa the lunatic fringe who had been disrespecting coach Kirk Ferentz after a 6-6 season last year and 3-3 start this season is now presumably cowering behind closed doors.  The Hawkeyes, 8-4 overall and 5-3 in the conference, played classic late season Big Ten football, winning five of their last six games behind a power running game and solid defense.  Junior running back Shonn Greene leads the nation’s runners with 1,729 yards.  The Hawkeye defense finished in the top three in the conference in scoring defense, run defense and total defense.  Orchestrating the defense was coordinator Norm Parker, an assistant at Minnesota in the 1970s.  Doesn’t matter whether he’s working with under recruited kids from Florida, or no name high schoolers from Iowa or Minnesota, they become players under Parker.  For juicing the most possible out of the material, rallying from that 3-3 start and playing wonderful football at season’s end, the Hawks earn an A.  By the way, Iowa’s four losses were by a combined 12 points.

Purdue and Indiana are in the same state so we’ll lump them into a final paragraph.  A little more than a .500 season was expected at Purdue in coach Joe Tiller’s last season.  Instead the Boilers, who experienced internal dissension and injury to senior quarterback Curtis Painter, finished 2-6 in the Big Ten and 4-8 overall.  Tiller won more games than any Purdue coach in history but he’s riding off to a retirement home in Wyoming with a D+ for the season.  Assistant Danny Hope will be his successor.  The last name is a positive start to the post-Tiller era.  As for Indiana, the Hoosiers fulfilled expectations, minimal as they were.  Picked for near the bottom of the conference, the Hoosiers finished 1-7 and in last place in the Big Ten, and 3-9 overall.  Wins were against Western Kentucky, Murray State and Northwestern.  The Hoosiers deserve an F including for their 62-10 loss to Purdue in their final game. A sad season, bad tradition and gloomy future.