Gophers Basketball – Page 125 – David Shama's Minnesota Sports Headliners

Vikings Need to End Pack Win Streak

Posted on November 18, 2015November 18, 2015 by David Shama

The Vikings, 7-2 and leading the NFC North, appear to have their best team since 2009 and can provide more evidence about that by defeating the Packers on Sunday at TCF Bank Stadium. Green Bay, the elite team in the division for years, is 9-1-1 against the Vikings since 2010 and is 4-0-1 in the last five games of the series.

It was 2012 when the Vikings last defeated the Packers in Minneapolis. Minnesota hasn’t won in Green Bay since 2009 when ex-Packers quarterback Brett Favre led the Vikings to a 38-26 victory. That team, with a 12-4 regular season record, won the NFC North and almost advanced to the Super Bowl.

The Packers haven’t scored less than 23 points against the Vikings since the 2006 season. Green Bay is struggling right now, though, and managed just 16 points last Sunday in a loss to the now 2-7 Lions. The Packers, 6-3, have lost three straight games, and the Vikings haven’t allowed an opponent to score more than 23 points all season.

Sunday starts an unusual week for the Packers who will fall two games behind in the loss column to the division-leading Vikings if they can’t win at TCF Bank Stadium. On Thursday night next week the Packers meet the Bears in a Thanksgiving game in Green Bay.

Vikings players probably won’t say anything provocative about the Packers this week but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a special feeling at Winter Park. Coach Mike Zimmer has given the players black T-shirts with these words on the back: “Beat Green Bay.”

Vikings defensive tackle Linval Joseph told Sports Headliners he’s excited about Sunday’s game. “I can’t wait to play against the Packers. They’re a very good team. You can’t sleep on the Green Bay Packers. Not at all.”

Mike Wallace (Photo courtesy of Minnesota Vikings.)

Vikings wide receiver Mike Wallace said he’s isn’t paying attention to his team’s winning streak or Green Bay’s losing skid. “It’s not about when we’re catching them. It’s about one day, one week, one game. It’s not really about them. It’s about us and trying to build toward something we’re trying to get to (division title, playoffs).”

Worth Noting

Vikings wide receiver Charles Johnson after being asked what he thinks of Packers All-Pro quarterback Aaron Rodgers: “That man can do it.”

Bleachereport.com’s Monday NFL power rankings listed the Vikings fourth and Packers ninth among the NFL’s 32 teams. The top three ranked teams are the Patriots, Bengals and Panthers.

Former Vikings defensive lineman Bob Lurtsema said 29 current members of the team, including Adrian Peterson and Harrison Smith, attended the “Bowl with the Vikings” event last week in Oakdale to benefit the Vikings Children’s Fund.

60 Minutes devoted a segment to football’s concussion issue last Sunday night with reporter Steve Kroft warning this is the sport’s biggest crisis in more than 100 years when there was talk of banning football. The segment focused on the NFL and concussion research.

No Big Ten football team with a 5-7 record has ever been invited to a bowl game. The Gophers, with a 4-6 record, have two remaining regular season games and could finish 5-7. With 80 teams needed for 40 bowl games, 5-7 teams may have to fill some of the vacancies if there aren’t enough qualifying schools with .500 or better records.

True Thompson, the son of Gophers all-time leading rusher Darrell Thompson, is a senior wide receiver at Robbinsdale Armstrong High School. Among the football schools he has heard from are Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin—all of whom have raised the possibility of him being a preferred walk-on with their programs. (Preferred walk-ons, although they aren’t scholarship players, generally are assured of roster spots their first year on the team.)

St. Thomas and Saint John’s could be headed for a rematch in the Division III football playoffs. The 10-0 Tommies host La Verne in an opening playoff game on Saturday while the 9-1 Johnnies have Dubuque at home. If both MIAC schools win, they will play each other on November 28 at St. Thomas.

St. Thomas defeated Saint John’s 35-14 during the regular season. That was the closest score in a St. Thomas game this season. It might not be exaggerating to say the Tommies could finish high up in the Division II Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference that includes UMD and Minnesota State.

The Gophers basketball team has only neutral court and home games on its entire nonconference schedule that began earlier this month. Minnesota plays Thursday morning against Temple in the Puerto Rico Tip-Off tournament. Then the Gophers have four home nonconference games before facing Oklahoma State in Sioux Falls on December 12. Two home games follow to finish the nonconference schedule before playing Ohio State in Columbus on December 30 in Minnesota’s first Big Ten game.

Dick Jonckowski, who is in his 30th season as the Gophers basketball public address announcer, is now cancer-free after being diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma in 2014.

The Wild play the Bruins in Boston tomorrow night where Minnesota’s all-time record is 7-1-0. Devan Dubynk, the Wild’s regular goalie since last winter, is 0-4-0 lifetime against the Bruins with a 5.56 goals-against average.

Former Gophers football player and ex-pro wrestler Jim Brunzell admired Nick Bockwinkel who passed away at age 80 late last week. “Not only was Nick the consummate professional in the ring, but a wonderful, classy gentleman whose friendship and charisma will be missed by all,” Brunzell wrote via e-mail.

Bockwinkel had a long wrestling career that included being the American Wrestling Association’s champion. Brunzell considered Bockwinkel a great wrestler and praised him for his “psychology, precision and timing in the ring.”

Bridget Hennen, Bethany Lutheran College’s lone senior, is one of seven soccer players from the school selected by the Upper Midwest Athletic Conference for all-league recognition. Hennen is a midfielder from Apple Valley and St. Croix Lutheran High School who over her four-year career started every match for Bethany, was selected All-UMAC each season and was a two-year team captain.

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Claeys Needs Wins & Style Points

Posted on November 6, 2015 by David Shama

Some call it moral victories. Let’s refer to it here as style points. Either way, hello, Tracy Claeys.

The Gophers interim head football boss is coaching for scoreboard wins in the team’s last four games of the season, but there’s more to it than that as he auditions for the permanent job. Minnesota is all but certain to lose some of those games but what matters along with the number of W’s will be how the team looks.

Will the Gophers play with emotion the rest of the season? Do they sustain effort if the score is one-sided? Will sloppy play characterize the performances of players? Is this going to be a team making excessive mistakes including turnovers and penalties? How about the effectiveness of the play calling? What about the in-game adjustments by the coaches?

It’s anyone’s guess whether Claeys can be a successful head coach. His debut game last Saturday against Michigan didn’t dazzle. While the Gophers played with effort and execution, and the game plan looked solid, clock management and play selection at game’s end were troubling and directly contributed to the 29-26 loss.

Claeys’ predecessor, Jerry Kill, was a zealous, leave no stone unturned leader who inspired players. Gophers defensive back Antonio Johnson said Claeys can get after his players with emotional outbursts but his personality isn’t as intense as Kill’s. Asked if Claeys will be fiery on occasion, Johnson said: “Yeah, he’ll lose it if something just goes completely wrong. But overall, though, he’s pretty laid back and calm.”

Different coaching personalities can produce desired results, but Claeys will have to prove himself in the emotions department and everything else if he gets the interim tag removed—from recruiting to game plans, from fundraising to disciplining players, from media relations to halftime adjustments. The highly regarded staff of assistant coaches Kill assembled and kept in place is still around to work for Claeys who was promoted from defensive coordinator when Kill resigned last week. That’s a huge plus for Claeys and the program.

The four games ahead won’t deliver the final judgment on Claeys but will provide a lot of insights. Minnesota plays at No. 1 ranked and undefeated Ohio State tomorrow. A week from Saturday the Gophers face another nationally ranked and unbeaten team in Iowa on the road. Then it’s home to finish the season against mediocre Illinois, and play a Wisconsin team that has only lost two games and seems to be gaining momentum. That’s no day at the beach for Claeys and the Gophers who have a 4-4 overall record and are 1-3 in Big Ten games.

This has been a disappointing season to date—characterized by a lot of injuries and also an inconsistent offense that sometimes looks unimaginative and often lacks playmakers. If the Gophers surprise most everyone by winning three of their final four games the results will put a huge smiley face on Gopher Nation. If the Gophers win two of the last four, and thereby qualify for a bowl game, the program’s more starry-eyed supporters might say, “Pretty good season considering all the setbacks this fall.”

What about if the team wins only one—or zero games—the rest of the way? That’s pretty much an “ugh”—although make one of those wins against Ohio State, Iowa or Bucky Badger, and Gophers loyalists won’t be quite so down in the dumps.

Long ago Gophers football had a high standard of excellence. There were expectations about Big Ten titles, even national championships.

Moral victories? Bull.

Style points? Really?

But reality is today’s Gophers program is still trying to prove winning half of its conference games year after year is doable. What Claeys and the staff might show us in the next few weeks and months (recruiting season) is this program could go beyond what Kill delivered including 5-3 and 4-4 conference records the last two seasons. It requires Forrest Gump-like optimism to see the Gophers winning three more times this fall and finishing at .500 in Big Ten games. But let’s be willing to drink enough feel good Kool-Aid to think the Gophers are going to find a way to win two more regular season games and then get Minnesota’s first bowl victory since 2004.

Yeah, win a couple more games and in the losses don’t embarrass Gopher Nation—the tag Tim Brewster put on the fan base. During the Brewster era he had games where he lost 55-0 to Iowa and 48-12 to Wisconsin. Seven games into the 2010 season he was fired. Two weeks later his successor, interim head coach Jeff Horton, lost 52-10 to Ohio State.

Get the idea about style points?

Worth Noting

Ohio State running back Ezekiel Elliott is a Heisman Trophy candidate and he does more than make explosive runs. He is a willing blocker. “No question, and I don’t think he gets credit for the way he blocks,” Claeys said. “I think he’s the best blocking tailback that there is. …”

The Vikings have won six consecutive home games and play the Rams on Sunday at TCF Bank Stadium. Minnesota has also won two consecutive road games for the first time since 2012.

Vikings place kicker Blair Walsh knows Todd Gurley, the Rams rookie running back who is averaging 6.1 yards per carry and has gained 575 yards. Both Walsh and Gurley are from the University of Georgia, although the two didn’t play together in Athens. Gurley left the Bulldogs after his junior season while drawing comparisons to legendary Georgia and NFL running back Herschel Walker. Walsh is among Gurley’s admirers and quipped with this: “He was only there three years. We would have loved for him to stay four. …”

Since week four of the NFL season, Vikings rookie wide receiver Stefon Diggs has 10 catches of 20-plus yards.

St. Thomas (8-0, 6-0 MIAC) can cinch an automatic bid to the NCAA playoffs and share of the conference championship with a win tomorrow afternoon at home again Carleton (1-7, 0-6 MIAC). Coach Glenn Caruso’s Tommies are having one of their more impressive seasons in memory, winning each game by at least 21 points. A victory means a fourth MIAC title in six years.

Caruso told Sports Headliners this is the healthiest team late in the season that he’s had at St. Thomas. “It’s not even close to any other year,” said Caruso who has led the Tommies since the 2008 season.

Caruso gives much of the credit for his players’ health to strength coach Tommy Becker who even teaches the Tommies yoga for flexibility. Becker, a former linebacker at Wayzata High School, started his college career with the Gophers before playing for Caruso.

The 10 finalists for the 2015 Mr. Football Award are Isaac Collins, Maple Grove; Carter Coughlin, Eden Prairie; Logan Hatfield, Bemidji; Amani Hooker, Park Center; Tyler Johnson, Minneapolis North; Kamal Martin, Burnsville; David McCuskey, Orono; Bishop McDonald, North St. Paul; Dillon Radunz, Becker; J.D. Spielman, Eden Prairie. The award is sponsored by the Minnesota Football Coaches Association and the Vikings. The 2015 winner will be announced at the Mr. Football Banquet on Sunday, November 22 at the Doubletree by Hilton Minneapolis Park Place Hotel.

Lightning right wing J.T. Brown, the Burnsville native and son of former Vikings running back Ted Brown, has two goals and one assist in 13 games this season. He and his Tampa Bay teammates play the Wild at Xcel Energy Center tomorrow night.

Former Gophers basketball coach Jim Dutcher, a close friend of the late Flip Saunders, will speak at the next CORES luncheon on Thursday, November 12 at the Knights of Columbus Hall in Bloomington, 1114 American Blvd. Reservations should be made by next Monday. More information about CORES is available by contacting Jim Dotseth, dotsethj@comcast.net. CORES is an acronym for coaches, officials, reporters, educators and sports fans.

Gophers basketball coach Richard Pitino after being asked to name three coaches he admires: “My father (Rick Pitino), he’s somebody that has been so good, for so long. Billy Donovan is another mentor of mine who built Florida into a powerhouse. I kind of look at the model he did there as something we’re trying to do here. I was always amazed by Joe Torre’s ability to handle so many distractions in New York as a manager of the Yankees, and handle it with such great class. That’s something that I think every coach aspires to. …”

The Gophers play Southwest Minnesota State at Williams Arena tonight. That will be Minnesota’s second and final exhibition game of the year.

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Pitino: Gophers Program ‘Can Win Big’

Posted on November 2, 2015November 2, 2015 by David Shama

Richard Pitino—the Big Ten’s youngest head coach at 33 years old—started his third year as Gophers basketball coach last night in an exhibition game win against Minnesota Crookston at Williams Arena. In his first season the Gophers probably exceeded expectations, winning 25 games including the NIT championship in New York. Last year preseason predictions had the Gophers finishing among the top five or six teams in the Big Ten Conference but instead Minnesota landed near the bottom with a 6-12 league record.

Ask the experts what awaits the 2015-2016 Gophers and the stock answer is this: “Not so good.” The consensus is Minnesota lacks the talent to do much better than ninth or 10th in the standings. The Gophers have three starters returning from last year’s team but those players have plenty to prove, and the same can be said for the newcomers on the roster.

Pitino, with a two-year Big Ten record of 14-22 and no NCAA Tournament appearances yet, knows he needs to enhance his results. He came to Minnesota with just one season of previous head coaching experience—at Florida International where his 18-14 team had the school’s first winning year since 1999-2000. Seen as a guy with East Coast roots and the son of coaching legend Rick Pitino, there’s been speculation since coming to Minneapolis that Richard will treat the Gophers as a stepping stone.

But in an exclusive interview with Sports Headliners, Pitino talked about his commitment to Minnesota—along with many other subjects. Pitino was personable and thorough during a visit in his office where he discussed the coming season, what he learned from close losses last season, the long-term potential of his program and whether the Gophers are going to host a game with his father’s Louisville Cardinals.

The following interview also included subjects beyond basketball to provide readers insights about Pitino the person, not just the coach. His responses have partially been edited for brevity and clarity.

You can bet this about the 2015-2016 Gophers: I would hope that we compete regardless of the circumstances at the highest possible level—and play as hard as we possibly can. Get the most out of our abilities individually and…as a team. (I) would hope that we’re playing our best basketball at the end of the year, not at the beginning.

Who are the players vital to Minnesota’s success this season? Probably the six returners (Charles Buggs, Gaston Diedhiou, Joey King, Bakary Konaté, Nate Mason and Carlos Morris). I would say those guys are extremely important because they played last year, so they know what to expect. It’s crucial that they take the next steps and get the younger guys better, and get them…ready for what’s coming.

What did you learn as a coach last season losing nine games by six points or less? I think the one thing I’ve taken out of it is do a better job of preparing your guys. Getting your guys to prepare for the fact that it’s not (always) going to go your way. …It’s how do you respond to that adversity, and that’s something we’re really, really working on a lot.

What will it take to eventually win a Big Ten championship? And even multiple Big Ten championships? Stability would be one (thing). You look at the programs that have been good every single year, there’s stability, (and) there’s continuity from the (school) president all the way down to the head coach, assistant coaches and strength coach. That is so crucial. (Also) great recruiting, and not just one class but three, four, five classes to where you get great stability…because unfortunately you deal with injuries.

What’s the likelihood of Minnesota winning a Big Ten championship in the next five years? As a coach you don’t really think that way, but that’s something that we’re building towards, and that’s a dream of ours…to do it. I think we’re moving in that direction. We know there’s a lot of great teams, there’s a lot of great programs. In order for us to do it, we’re going to have to be a really strong program and that’s something we’re moving towards.

People who think I won’t be at Minnesota long-term should know: They probably don’t know how much I love it here. My wife loves it here, our kids (too). I think the biggest thing is there is no reason why we can’t win and win big here. It just takes time. I am really enjoying the journey getting towards that.

If you were a Gopher player what would you think of coach Pitino? He’s a guy who is really, really eager to build this (program) into a powerhouse. Really wants to do it together. Very fair, very honest about the right things, and extremely hard worker.

What’s your worst personal habit? Probably drink too much coffee.

What is a perfect meal? My wife—once in a blue moon—will cook a chicken, broccoli and ziti (dinner). I can’t eat that a lot because I gotta fit into my suits, but that would be my favorite meal.

What really makes you laugh? I turn on “Seinfeld” or “Curb Your Enthusiasm” on the DVR, and I laugh before I go to bed. I do that almost every night.

When can fans expect a game against Louisville and your father Rick in Minneapolis? I don’t know if it will ever happen—to be honest with you. We did it once and it was great (2014 neutral site game in Puerto Rico). …I am not so sure if we’ll do it (schedule Louisville) because I like kind of having him on our team. I like having my family always on my team, just like we’re on his team.

What is the hardest thing about your job? Getting young college athletes to block out all the distractions and just focus. Cell phones are just consuming people’s lives. (I want the players) to not worry about what people are saying about them on Twitter (and) Instagram, and just focus solely on the team. We live in a distraction- filled world. That’s probably the biggest obstacle we’re trying to overcome. (Also) get them to be patient. That’s very difficult for everyone.

What’s the easiest thing about your job? The easy thing is coming to work every single day and being excited about what we’re doing. I don’t know how many times I say…to my wife how much I love living here. How much I love working at the University of Minnesota. How much I love our team, our staff.

How would you summarize your basketball philosophy? Our goal is to attack offensively, attack defensively. Kind of have that mentality of playing up-tempo, playing fast. Speeding up our opponent is something that we’re really striving to do. Making them uncomfortable, as well as being able to operate in some kind of organized chaos. In order to do (all) that you have to have great athletes. You’ve (also) got to have great length, and that’s something we’re moving towards.

How will the new basketball practice facility help the program? It shows people locally and nationally that we mean business. Anytime you invest that amount of money, it shows commitment. It shows that you want to compete with all these other teams. Certainly from a day-to-day standpoint for the players, you now have everything under one roof. …It’s going to elevate our program.

If you have any down time what do you like to do? Family and golf would be the two things that I love to do. (Family consists of wife Jill, four-year-old Ava and one-year-old Jack.)

What’s your lucky charm? Probably my kids. I think when I see them I know I am lucky. Kids don’t care if you win or lose.

What is your favorite movie of all-time? It’s gotta be the “Godfather.”

What’s your favorite music? What I do a lot in the morning is I type Tom Petty, Pandora (Internet Radio). I kind of like that genre of the Tom Pettys of the world—Pearl Jam, Dave Matthews Band. I am kind of open to everything. I love listening to music. Gets your mind off of other things (and) puts you in a good mood.

Four people from history—or alive today—you would most want to invite to dinner: You have to go Jesus (first). Derek Jeter is an athlete that I’ve always kind of admired from afar and I wouldn’t mind spending some time with him. Martin Luther King would be one, just the courage…during that time. It’s always been something that I really, really admired. Lastly, it would have to be Larry David (producer and comic) because I think the guy is absolutely hilarious. He would definitely be the comedic part of the dinner.

What are three favorite college basketball arenas where you have coached? The Breslin Center (Michigan State) was the most impressive college environment I’ve been in. Rupp Arena, where Kentucky plays, (has) got some tradition, obviously. I think Williams Arena has got such a charm about it, such a mystique. It reminds me of the Wrigley Field of college basketball.

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