Author: David Shama

DeLeon Eskridge, who scored three touchdowns for the Gophers in Saturday’s 35-23 win over Montana State, is a true freshman who has yet to start a game for Minnesota (3-0).  He replaced Shady Salamon, another true freshman in the first half, and provided the Gophers with more quickness.  Prior to Saturday, Eskridge had only one previous rushing attempt for five yards against Bowling Green.  At Junipero Serra High School in San Mateo, California he broke the school touchdown record of former USC and Pittsburgh star Lynn Swann.

Local dentist John Williams and other former Gopher athletes and Minnesota friends will travel to Las Cruces, New Mexico later this month to visit Dr. McKinley Boston.  They will watch the New Mexico State-New Mexico football game on Saturday, September 27 in Las Cruces.  Boston, the former Gopher football player and later athletic director, is now the athletic director at New Mexico State.

Former University of Minnesota football letter winner Eric Dalen, 1993-94, is an NBA referee.

Joe Mauer is likely to catch 135 games or more for the Twins, a high number for any catcher.  Mauer, 25, is still young but some people fret about the physical toll catching takes on any catcher.  He has caught 126 games this season and his previous high for catching was 120 in 2006, according to baseball-reference.com.

Twins’ rookie right fielder Denard Span has hit safely in 45 of his 67 games since being called up from Triple A Rochester.  He has 20 RBI in his last 23 games.  A decent prediction for next year is that Span will move to center field replacing the erratic Carlos Gomez while Delmon Young remains in left and Michael Cuddyer takes over in right after injuries have limited him to 64 games so far this season.

Gomez has stolen 30 bases, the most by a Twin since Luis Rivas had 31 in 2001.

The Twins are 38-40 in games when American League MVP candidate Justin Morneau doesn’t have an RBI.  Morneau is tied with Josh Hamilton of Texas for the league lead in RBI with 124. The Twins have scored 769 runs this season with Morneau’s RBI’s accounting for 16 percent of them.

Jim Holden will be signing copies of Tennis in the Northland from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday at Reed-Sweatt Tennis Center in south Minneapolis.  The former Northfield tennis coach has written a comprehensive history of boys’ high school tennis in Minnesota.  Among the many people he writes about is 1951 state singles champion Vincent Bugliosi from Hibbing who was the lead prosecutor at the Charles Manson trial and author of the book Helter Skelter.  More recently Bugliosi has authored the best seller The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder.

Tim Brewster admires Indianapolis’ Tony Dungy as a football coach but listen to what he has to say about him as a person.  Although Brewster knew Dungy before taking over as Gopher coach, he has become much better acquainted with him since January of 2007.

“…Just the classiest human being that maybe I’ve ever been around and met,” Brewster told Sports Headliners this week.  “And the way he carries himself with such dignity, and the way he treats others is just amazingly inspiring.  And to know that he’s a Minnesota Golden Gopher makes me extremely proud.”

Dungy, of course, quarterbacked the Gophers in the 1970s, later was an assistant coach at Minnesota and then worked as Denny Green’s defensive coordinator for the Vikings from 1992-1995. Although Dungy has been the Indianapolis head coach since 2002, this Sunday will be the first time he’s brought the Colts here for a game against the Vikings.

The Dungy name is part of the coaching gold standard in the NFL.  He became the first African American to coach a Super Bowl winner when his Colts won XLI in 2007.

The Colts, 0-1 after losing their opener to Chicago, are favored to again win the AFC South.  Indianapolis has won the last five AFC South titles.  Dungy’s record with the Colts is 73-24 and his overall NFL wins and losses including his time at Tampa Bay as head coach is 136-75.  His Colts have won 12 games or more each season for five consecutive years, an NFL record.

Why does Brewster have several photos of the former Gopher on his office wall?  “Because it says everything about who we are to be associated with a guy like Tony Dungy,” he said.  “He stands for everything that’s great in coaching in dealing with people.  If I could be a quarter of what Tony Dungy is as a man, that would be more important to me than anything about being a coach.”

Brewster said Dungy was encouraging to him after his first Gopher team finished 1-11.  He said a five minute phone conversation with Dungy can make him feel better.

The Vikings, 0-1 after Monday night’s loss to Green Bay, will be following precedent if they lose to the Colts on Sunday.  Indianapolis has won 21 of 22 games in September and October since 2004.

With 10 games remaining on the schedule there’s no need to rush to judgment about the Gopher defense.  Still, Minnesota has won its first two games and in the process the defense has indicated its predicted improvement from last season is reality.

In wins over Northern Illinois and Bowling Green the Gophers have given up a total of 34 points.  In the first two games last year, a loss to Bowling Green and a win against Miami of Ohio, the total was 67 points.  (All are Mid-American Conference teams.)

In the first two games this season the Gophers have held opponents to 100 yards per game rushing, 293.5 passing and 393.5 total offense.  For all of last season the totals were 229.3 rushing, 289.3 passing and 518.7 total yards.  In the first two games last season opponents averaged 129.5 rushing, 415 passing and 544.5 total yards.

With several new starters, added athleticism and a fresh approach with new defensive coordinator Ted Roof, the Gophers want to believe they’re revitalized defensively.  Senior linebacker Deon Hightower talked about the defense’s success in the first two games and the resulting confidence.

“I think it helps our confidence tremendously because making plays in practice is great, but also it comes down to executing when it’s not going against your buddies,” he said. “Going against somebody else that wants to score just as much as you want to prevent them to score.”

Senior linebacker Steve Davis was literally wearing a construction job hard hat in the Gopher football offices this week, a reward for an aggressive hit he put on a Bowling Green player in last week’s game.  Coaches named him the weekly winner of the team’s “Hard Hat” award.

Davis has played on some much criticized Gopher defenses in the past.  “I am convinced this is a very sound defense that we have right now,” he said last week.

Davis believes there’s more ability on this defense than in the past.  “Athletic wise, yes, I feel like this is the most talented so far,” he said.  “…We’ve still got a lot of young guys who have to learn a lot of things as far as like technique wise and assignment wise. …”

He and other seniors are playing for their third defensive coordinator in four years.  Roof is a former head coach at Duke and was one of the great linebackers in Georgia Tech history.

“Coach Roof is the type of guy where he can get on you when you’re doing wrong and correct you,” Davis said.  “Since he is a guy who was like a great, great football player himself, so you kind of take…that to heart, especially as a linebacker.  At the same time he can be that guy that laugh with you, joke with you.  Be your friend. …We respect his words a lot. …”

The Gophers may improve their defensive numbers tomorrow against Montana State, a team that lost 69-10 to Kansas State last week.  The Bobcats, though, pulled a surprise two years ago defeating Colorado of the Big 12 Conference, 19-10.