Golden Gophers – Page 148 – David Shama's Minnesota Sports Headliners

Ageless Peterson Won’t Play at 40

Posted on October 22, 2019October 22, 2019 by David Shama

Adrian Peterson, 34, could be playing against his old team, the Vikings, for the last time Thursday night at U.S. Bank Stadium. There was doubt earlier this week about Peterson’s availability for the game because of an ankle injury but Cbssports.com is reporting this afternoon that he will play in Minneapolis.

The future Hall of Famer has been a starter on a bad 1-6 Redskins team. Peterson, filling for injured starter Derrius Guice, has run for 307 rush yards and one touchdown on 83 attempts in six games. His longest run is 25 yards and he is averaging 3.7 yards per carry. Although time and the pounding of the NFL have surely diminished Peterson’s skills, it’s remarkable he is still productive at such an advanced age for a running back.

Peterson, who played for the Vikings from 2007-2016, has long talked about becoming a king of old age ball carriers. Even when Peterson was with the Vikings he speculated about being on the field at age 40. Then last December in an interview posted on NFL.com he revisited the topic.

With one game remaining in the season his Redskins weren’t going to qualify for the playoffs but Peterson claimed to have “fresh legs” and was upbeat while answering questions. “My body feels great,” he said.

Toward the interview’s end Peterson was asked how many more years he might play in the NFL? “God willing, I am thinking about 40 years (old),” he said.

Peterson, who earlier this season set the NFL all-time record for rushing touchdowns with 107, has also played for the Saints and Cardinals since leaving Minnesota. He loves to play football but money is likely a motivation, too. Multiple media sources last summer reported he had serious financial problems.

The Redskins lost 9-0 to the 49ers on Sunday with Peterson gaining 81 yards on 20 carries. Word from a Sports Headliners source is Peterson was less effective in the second half, and that his third quarter fumble, on the team’s best drive, was a turning point in the game. “He still runs hard, but seems to lack the breakaway quickness or agility of earlier times,” the source said via email.

In the competitive world of the NFL, teams are looking to the future as well as the present. Peterson has set records and made remarkable comebacks from injuries but playing to age 40 seems impossible. More likely is that all those Vikings fans who cheered for him so long will say goodbye Thursday evening.

Worth Noting

The Vikings announced this afternoon the release of cornerback and punt returner Marcus Sherels who has played most of his NFL career with the organization. The Rochester native was a walk-on standout with the Gophers.

Former Vikings quarterback Case Keenum, a featured part of the Redskins’ struggling offense, is expected to be the starter for Thursday night’s game in Minneapolis.

Gophers head football coach P.J. Fleck reiterated today on KFAN Radio that the availability of injured senior linebacker Kamal Martin will be a game-time decision Saturday before taking on Maryland.

Fleck talking on the radio about inspirational four-time cancer survivor Casey O’Brien who is the Big Ten Special Teams Player of the Week, and will visit a hospital to help others this afternoon: “The attitude he has is non-human.”

Fleck’s wife, Heather, will attend Friday’s Goal Line Club lunch at Jax Café where Gophers cornerback coach Rod Chance will speak. Mike Grimm, radio voice of the Gophers, will emcee. More at Goallineclub.org.

It will be interesting to watch the secondary tickets market for Saturday’s showdown game in Brookings between North Dakota State and South Dakota State. Monday StubHub.com was featuring tickets ranging in cost from $ 85.39 to $283.89.

The “coaching tree” is healthy: first year NDSU head coach Matt Entz is 7-0 while Chris Klieman, the mentor he succeeded in Fargo, is 4-2 at Kansas State following a big win over TCU last Saturday. Klieman’s former boss with the Bison, ex-NDSU head coach Craig Bohl, is 5-2 at Wyoming.

Running back Zach Zenner, the former Eagan, Minnesota and South Dakota star, caught a pass for six yards and rushed for a single yard in his debut game for the Saints on Sunday.

Mike Mahlen of Verndale became the first Minnesota prep football coach to achieve 400 career wins when his team defeated Rothsay last week. Mahlen, 400-123-3, is in his 51st season at Verndale (about 150 miles northwest of Minneapolis) where he has spent his entire head coaching career.

The Timberwolves, who open their NBA regular season Wednesday night against the Nets in Brooklyn, are predicted to finish 13th among 15 Western Conference teams by Sports Illustrated. In the magazine’s NBA preview issue the Wolves are ranked No. 22 among the league’s most fun teams to watch. There are 30 NBA teams.

“The offensive brilliance of Karl-Anthony Towns is basically weighed down by the offensive brickiness of Andrew Wiggins,” the magazine said in the story about the entertainment appeal of all 30 NBA teams.

Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor on Towns’ whose offensive game is among the NBA’s best: “He’s pretty well got that down.”

Taylor told Sports Headliners last week that coach Ryan Saunders has asked him to travel with the team, something that Ryan’s dad, Flip Saunders, also requested.

Taylor, an investor in the Minnesota United, said the third-year MLS franchise will not be profitable this year and probably won’t be for awhile.

It’s believed Twin Cities winter time teams are finding it a challenge to sell season tickets. A guesstimate is the Wild could be at about 11,000 season tickets, with the Timberwolves and basketball Gophers in the 7,000 to 8,000 range. Sports Headliners reported Sunday that Gophers hockey non-student season tickets are at 4,610 and down from 5,060 in 2018-2019, according to the University of Minnesota.

Budget ticket prices are featured now by the University in multiple sports including a $15 single game ticket for men’s basketball.

Condolences to family and friends of former Gophers volleyball coach Mike Hebert who passed away Monday at age 75.

It was 20 years ago last Sunday that original Twins owner Calvin Griffith died at age 87.

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What Vikes’ First Division Win Means

Posted on October 20, 2019October 21, 2019 by David Shama

The Vikings defeated the Lions 42-30 today in Detroit and won their first NFC North Division game after earlier road losses to division rivals Green Bay and Chicago. Although nine games remain on the regular season schedule, a loss to the mediocre Lions might well have diminished chances of winning the division.

The 5-2 Vikings are chasing the 6-1 Packers who have benefitted from a favorable schedule to start the season. Minnesota has won three consecutive games after a 2-2 start, and perhaps the Vikings can duplicate the success of two years ago when that team won eight straight after splitting the first four games of the season.

Thursday night the Vikings are at home against 1-6 Washington, but then Minnesota has consecutive road games against difficult opposition, Kansas City and Dallas. Assuming a win in the next game, Vikings fans could stay optimistic with a split versus the Chiefs and Cowboys. With the Lions win today, even two losses wouldn’t be devastating to playoff aspirations.

After the game Vikings coach Mike Zimmer told KFAN Radio he gave game balls to the entire offense and quarterback Kirk Cousins. The offensive line, labeled a liability earlier in the season, has become impressive at run and pass blocking as the Vikings have scored 80 points in the last two games.

Cousins threw four touchdown passes for the second consecutive week. “Kirk made some unbelievable throws,” Zimmer said.

Minnesota’s secondary was less than impressive against the Lions including on Detroit’s first touchdown when pass interference calls were made against Xavier Rhodes and Trae Waynes, who also missed a tackle allowing wide receiver Marvin Jones to score. For the day Rhodes was beaten twice by Jones on touchdown catches.

The Lions, though, a dysfunctional franchise that hasn’t been great since Elvis Presley was first gyrating across America, lost to the Vikings for the fourth straight time.

Worth Noting

The 7-0 Golden Gophers, ranked No. 20 last week in two national polls, are now No. 16 in the Coaches Poll and No. 17 in the Associated Press Poll. Minnesota has won nine straight games dating back to last season and has the fourth longest winning streak in the country.

Host school St. Thomas and classic rival St. John’s drew a Division III record football crowd of 37,355 two years ago at Target Field and a capacity attendance of 19,508 in the first football game at Allianz Field on Saturday but a new record will be set November 16 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Ticket sales for the Ithaca College and SUNY Cortland game exceeded 39,000 earlier this month.

After not qualifying for the NCAA playoffs last winter and playing in front of many empty seats for home games in recent years, the U men’s hockey program is trying to reclaim the excellence of its storied past and regain the support of its once passionate fan base.

Minnesota men’s hockey, now in its 99th season, has won five national titles but none since 2003. Although the Gophers have won four of the six Big Ten hockey titles since the league began, conference coaches predicted in a preseason vote that Minnesota will have a fifth place finish behind Penn State, Notre Dame, Wisconsin and Ohio State in the seven-team league.

After Saturday night, and a two-game sweep of Niagara at home, the Gophers are 3-1 in nonconference games. Bob Motzko, in his second season, is labeled outstanding if not a great coach by observers who know college hockey. His roster includes sophomore forward Sammy Walker, last season’s Big Ten Freshman of the Year who scored the winning goal in overtime on Friday night against Niagara. First-year goalie Jared Moe is 2-0 this fall for Minnesota. The optimistic view is the Gophers have the coaching and talent to improve considerably over last season’s 18-16-4 record. The previous season the Gophers were 19-17-2.

Announced attendances for the first two home games of the season were 7,294 and 7,802 in Mariucci Arena at 3M, with a seating capacity of 10,000. The early season single game attendances should increase if the Gophers continue their successful start, but season tickets have declined from last year when the program also struggled at the box office, and so many empty seats were visible game after game.

According to figures provided by the U to Sports Headliners last week, the nonstudent season tickets total for this year is 4,610, compared to 5,060 for 2018-19. For this season 4,098 tickets, or almost 81 percent, are renewals. The student season ticket total is 1,387, versus 1,999 in 2018-2019.

For this season 1,520 mini-plan tickets have been sold, while the total last year was 1,669. Group tickets were 8,133 last season and now total 3,537.

Season tickets start at $500, the lowest price point for men’s hockey at the U since 1999-2000. The home schedule is attractive with all six Big Ten teams (Notre Dame, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State, Wisconsin), along with nonconference games against North Dakota, Minnesota Duluth, Minnesota State, Bemidji State, St. Cloud State and Niagara.

Calling it a “serious situation,” Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor deferred questions about the Chinese-NBA controversy to league commissioner Adam Silver when asked by Sports Headliners to comment. Taylor is on the NBA Board of Governors and familiar with the league’s lucrative dealings with the huge China market. He acknowledged meetings will be forthcoming to discuss recent American criticism about the authoritarian Chinese government.

A few years ago Taylor sold a minority stake in the Wolves to a Chinese businessman who he has since bought out. Taylor said “nothing bad happened” during the experience, but a situation arose where businessman Lizhang Jiang needed his money returned for non-basketball reasons. Taylor made Jiang the first Chinese minority owner of an NBA team and was comfortable in doing so because he already was doing business with the Chinese via his other companies.

“When we do business over there we have to be mindful how they do things,” Taylor said. “Even if we disagree, we have to be respectful to honor them if they consider it (something) a law… .It makes it difficult sometimes.”

Minnesota Twins ratings on Fox Sports North in primetime were up 65 percent this past season, the second largest increase in MLB after the San Diego Padres, according to a October 15 Forbes.com story.

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Downtown Safety Concerns Wolves Owner

Posted on October 16, 2019October 16, 2019 by David Shama

A week from Sunday night the NBA Timberwolves open their home regular season schedule at Target Center against the Miami Heat. Many of the Wolves’ customers will be concerned about safety in downtown Minneapolis for that game and the 40 other home dates to follow.

Patrons of city-owned Target Center and many other places downtown are alarmed by the shootings, beatings, harassment and other abhorrent behavior by thugs who roam downtown streets, say and do what they want, and threaten the well-being of defenseless men, women and children.

The environment in a once great downtown and admired city has changed with a population of troublemakers who brazenly do everything from panhandling to stealing to inflicting physical harm and property damage. A downtown proprietor told Sports Headliners about his building being spray painted with graffiti and his entrance doors frequently being urinated upon. Another person confirmed she and her workers are funneled off the street into a protected place to ensure their safe arrival.

Downtown business leaders, and the police, want more cops hired in the city, maybe even 400 additional law enforcement officers. The City Council, though, hasn’t approved additional hires and many skeptics don’t think it will. Critics say the Council just thinks differently. “They’re on another plane,” a former city official said.

Downtown businesses provide huge revenues to the city via commercial property taxes, and contributing significantly too are the customers who generate sales tax revenues. Without those monies the City Council would have a much different Minneapolis budget to work with. “They (the Council) are killing the Golden Goose,” the source quoted above said.

Glen Taylor has owned the Timberwolves for about 25 years and he has seen the deterioration of downtown. “The safety of our fans downtown at night is of the utmost importance for us,” he told Sports Headliners. “Not to have the proper law enforcement people out there to at least discourage any bad things to happen is just the wrong way to go. I hope the City Council will get in line and help support this idea (of) getting more law enforcement downtown for not only us but for all the events down there.”

Taylor is knowledgeable about his customer base, including families with young children. They may think twice about attending a Wolves game. Perception is enough to frighten fans, even if they haven’t been traumatized by past experiences. Taylor said, “…It just keeps them from coming downtown because they’re frightened that it (an incident) might happen to them.”

Worth Noting

Taylor’s other team, the WNBA Lynx, is done with its season and made the playoffs for a ninth consecutive year. He said the club again was financially profitable, although not as much as in the past when the Lynx had deep playoff runs.

All-Pro forward Maya Moore took a sabbatical and didn’t play last season. What about next year? “I don’t have any knowledge of what her decision is going to be,” Taylor said.

Golden Gophers redshirt junior forward Eric Curry, who suffered a season-ending knee injury last week, will have surgery next week, per an announcement this morning from basketball coach Richard Pitino.

In a couple of “mop-up” situations, including in the fourth quarter last Saturday night when the Golden Gophers had a 34-7 lead over Nebraska, coach P.J. Fleck has not used freshmen backup quarterbacks Jacob Clark and Cole Kramer. By doing so Fleck preserves the option of being able to use either, or both, for up to four games and still preserve their redshirt status if they have to replace starter Tanner Morgan because of injury or illness.

Morgan ranks No. 4 nationally in passing efficiency, while running back Rodney Smith is ninth in rushing yards per game (112.5) and 14th in all-purpose yards (134.33). Minnesota ranks 10th in the country in fewest penalties at 4.50 per game, and No. 12 in time of possession, 33:33.

Fleck said on his KFAN Radio show Tuesday that Gophers offensive tackle Daniel Faalele, who missed last Saturday’s game against Nebraska, was back at practice. He also said quarterback Zack Annexstad, last year’s early season starter, was not wearing a protective boot at practice, and possibly could play before year’s end. He had foot surgery in August.

Twin Cities native Amanda DeKanick, a graduate of Irondale High School, is the first female full-time athletic trainer in Vikings history.

If coach Mike Mahlen’s Verndale team defeats Rothsay Wednesday night, he becomes the first Minnesota prep football coach to achieve 400 career wins. Mahlen, 399-123-3, is in his 51st season at Verndale (about 150 miles northwest of Minneapolis) where he has spent his entire head coaching career. He can become the 18th active high school football coach in the country with 400 or more career wins. The national all-time high school career wins leader is John McKissick from Summerville High School (South Carolina), with a career record of 621-156-13.

Yom Kippur was last week and Minneapolis attorney Marshall Tanick authored an article for the October 4 American Jewish World regarding Jewish athletes who chose not to play on the sacred holiday. Tanick recalled that Dodgers’ superstar pitcher Sandy Koufax sat out the October 6 opening World Series game in 1965 against the Twins at Metropolitan Stadium. In 1967 Gophers All-American defensive end Bob Stein chose not to play when his team’s game against Illinois came on a Yom Kippur Saturday.

Quoting Wild owner Craig Leipold via email: “The NHL scheduler in NY was hard on the Wild this year by starting the season with 4 of 5 games on the road. Tough way to start the year.”

Birthday wishes to classy Fred Hoiberg, the former Timberwolves player and executive, who turned 47 on Tuesday. Hoiberg, now head men’s basketball coach at Nebraska, has twice had open-heart surgery and worn a pacemaker for years.

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