NCAA – Page 97 – David Shama's Minnesota Sports Headliners

Tommies’ Hoops Future Looks Bright

Posted on March 13, 2020March 13, 2020 by David Shama

Ten years from now on Selection Sunday there might be Minnesotans other than Gophers fans sitting in front of televisions to learn where their men’s basketball team is headed in the famous NCAA Division I Tournament. St. Thomas, as a member of the Big East Conference, might be in line for an invitation to the Big Dance, too.

As of today, the Tommies are a long way from membership in the prestigious Big East, but this scenario could have more credibility than you think. The Division III Tommies are optimistic about an NCAA vote this spring allowing them to jump to Division I status starting in the 2021-2022 school year. Most of the St. Thomas sports, including men’s and women’s basketball, are likely to compete in the mid-major level Summit League whose nine members are Denver, North Dakota, North Dakota State, Omaha, Oral Roberts, Purdue Fort Wayne, South Dakota, South Dakota State and Western Illinois.

The switch to Division I status will be expensive but St. Thomas is a school with deep pockets and generous donors. The Tommies will also count on the men’s basketball program becoming a profit center. As a mid-major, the Tommies will be looked at in their early Division I years as “cannon fodder” for major conference teams, and many of them in leagues like the ACC and Big Ten pay large guarantees to easy opponents. Six-figure paydays from programs like Duke, Michigan State and Kansas will ease the financial burden (including scholarships) of going Division I for St. Thomas.

Home crowds in St. Paul for the Tommies are likely to be small in the initial years of men’s Division I basketball, but eventually school leaders could build an on-campus arena seating about 8,000 to 10,000 fans. Such a facility, combined with an improving and competitive basketball roster, and a home in the Big East Conference, would help fulfill the St. Thomas vision to establish the school in the same image as nationally known Catholic schools like Marquette and Villanova.

St. Thomas president Julie Sullivan wrote about the Division I process in an October, 2019 article on the school’s website last fall. “This decision is about more than athletics – it’s about advancing our vision to be a leading Catholic university recognized at the national level. An important outcome of increasing St. Thomas’ visibility, for example, is an ability to attract a more geographically diverse cross section of students who are accomplished in and out of the classroom.

“This additional representation would add value to classroom discussions, campus life, co-curricular activities and virtually every aspect of St. Thomas while providing St. Thomas with the opportunity to extend the reach of our mission and impact. The presence of Division I sports teams will also build on the strong Tommie fan loyalty and provide the campus and alumni with more engaging fan experiences.”

The caliber of high school basketball in the state of Minnesota has been impressive for years, and still seems to be trending upward. The Gophers have frequently blundered acquiring their share of the talent, consistently seeing top players attend schools far and wide, including the Wisconsin Badgers who tied for the Big Ten championship this year with Minnesotans playing key roles.

With the arrival of St. Thomas in Division I, the Gophers will no longer be the only program in the state with that status. Word is St. Thomas is already showing interest in younger high school players whose college years will match the launch of the Tommies D I debut in the Summit League.

The St. Thomas athletic director is Phil Esten who once was a top administrator in the Minnesota Athletic Department. Esten’s responsibilities with the Gophers included overseeing the building of TCF Bank Stadium. He has also worked in athletic departments at California, Ohio State and Penn State. He is respected in college athletics, and his relationships and experiences are an asset to St. Thomas in gaining Division I status and growing its programs.

One day the Tommies may have progressed to a position of authority in the Summit League and could receive an invitation to join the Big East Conference whose membership is dominated by Catholic schools including Creighton, DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Providence, St. John’s and Villanova—all programs with rich basketball legacies.

St. Thomas men’s and women’s teams have been Division III powers for years, including in NCAA tournaments. Most recently, the St. Thomas men won the 2016 Division III national title.

Worth Noting

Because of Coronavirus concerns the Twin Cities Dunkers has postponed its March 18 meeting where Texas A&M head football coach Jimbo Fisher was scheduled to speak at the Minneapolis Club. Gophers coach P.J. Fleck was to introduce Fisher who has a family tie to the University of Minnesota.

Congratulations to former Gophers All-American defensive end Bob Stein after the National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame named him a member of the 2020 College Football Hall of Fame Class. A key contributor to Minnesota’s 1967 co-Big Ten championship team, he is the 19th Golden Gopher player to join the College Football Hall of Fame, and first since quarterback Sandy Stephens in 2011.

Sean Engel, a 2016 Chaska High School graduate, will be a senior at Augustana (Sioux Falls) next season and the 6-foot-5 wide receiver has pro football ambitions. He made the NSIC South Division all-conference first team in 2019 after catching 39 passes for 546 yards and helping his team to a 9-3 season and the NCAA playoffs for the first time since 2015. Older brother Derrick was a wide receiver for the Gophers.

Harvey Mackay, the University of Minnesota alum, former Gophers golfer and New York Times best selling author, has a new book out, You Haven’t Hit Your Peak Yet, and in late January it was Barnes & Noble’s best selling business book.

Comments Welcome

Brian Dutcher Underpaid in San Diego

Posted on March 1, 2020March 1, 2020 by David Shama

If offered, Bloomington native Brian Dutcher almost certainly would have accepted the University of Minnesota men’s basketball coaching job in the past. Minnesota has hired three head coaches during the 21 years that Dutcher has been in San Diego, including 18 as an assistant for the San Diego State Aztecs and the last three as head coach for the west coast power.

If the Gophers’ job were to open this month, it’s unknown whether Dutcher will be interested despite earning a reportedly modest salary of $855,424. That amount is not even the most in the Mountain West Conference and about one-third of what Minnesota coach Richard Pitino is paid. Pitino has a seven-year 47-79 Big Ten regular season record.

Dutcher, son of former Gopher Big Ten championship coach Jim Dutcher, has his Aztecs at 28-1 this winter. The Aztecs, ranked among the nation’s elite teams, were the only undefeated major college team in late February before losing their first game.

Other schools are certain to come calling on Brian Dutcher after the season, but even if Minnesota has an opening it could well be that Gopher athletic director Mark Coyle doesn’t make him a target. Dutcher is not only an outstanding coach and recruiter but a high character individual. He also has a minimal contract buyout of a reported $950,000. However, Dutcher turns 61 years old in October, and Coyle could favor a young hire like he did when abruptly firing head football coach Tracy Claeys and replacing him with 36-year-old P.J. Fleck in 2017.

The Aztecs are expected to soon offer Dutcher a considerable salary bump, although there are budgetary restraints on a school like San Diego State that doesn’t receive rich revenues from its football program, nor its conference. He and his family have learned to love San Diego after living there for more than two decades. Whether Dutcher wants to coach five or ten more years, he might well want to stay in San Diego, even though it will never be a job that can pay like the lucrative athletic departments in the Big Ten and elsewhere.

Of course it is speculation now where Dutcher will be two months ahead, and whether the U will even have an offer for him. But a Dutcher homecoming to Minnesota and a program where his dad once coached, surrounded by his father and two sisters who live in the Twin Cities, would be a special story line. The one certainty now is the window is closing fast on the possibility of another Dutcher ever coaching the Gophers.

Worth Noting

This Florida visitor was recently impressed with the customer service at Hammond Stadium in Fort Myers where the Twins play their spring training games. Friendly and helpful workers abound from the security gates to the press box.

Twins first base coach Tommy Watkins, 39, is a lifer with the organization, having spent 22 seasons with Minnesota as a player, coach and minor league manager.

TV viewing choices Sunday afternoon include: Twins and Rays on Fox Sports North, or NFL Network coverage of defensive backs (presumably including the Gophers’ Antoine Winfield Jr.) from the NFL Scouting Combine. Draft expert Mel Kiper predicted last month the Vikings will use their first round selection at No. 25 to select Winfield.

Returning as Twins official scorers at Target Field for a sixth consecutive season will be Stew Thornley, Kyle Traynor and Gregg Wong.

The name of Babe Ruth hangs over baseball like no other legend. In 2019 his game-worn jersey from 1928-1930 sold for $5.64 million, breaking the previous record for sports memorabilia of his 1920 jersey that sold for $4.4 million in 2012, according to an email last month from sales@collectiblexchange.com.

The Star Tribune’s Sid Hartman, who turns 100 March 15, will become one of about 80,000 centenarians in the United States.

Michigan State’s overreach this winter to hire Mel Tucker as its football coach could be leverage for more proven coaches like Minnesota’s P.J. Fleck when compensation discussions surface late next fall. Tucker, with one season of head coaching experience during which his record at Colorado was 5-7, will reportedly be paid $5.5 million and much more than predecessor Mark Dantonio, who ranks with the greatest coaches in MSU history. Fleck, who in three years has turned the Gophers into a nationally ranked program, makes $4.6 million.

The Gophers begin spring football practices this week with a session open to the public starting at 4:30 p.m. Friday, March 8 at the Athletes Village.

Wyoming head coach Craig Bohl, who built North Dakota State into a FCS power, will be a featured speaker at the Minnesota Football Clinic March 26-28. The annual clinic, known as among the best in the nation, is a partnership between the Minnesota Football Coaches Association and the Golden Gophers. The MFCA is offering coaches a registration discount through today (March 1) via the organization’s website.

The Hobey Baker Award, started here in 1981 with organizers Chuck Bard and John Justice from the old Decathlon Club in Bloomington, is celebrating its 40th year to honor America’s best college hockey player. Fan voting is available at hobeybaker.com/vote.

The Capital Club will hear from former Minnesota North Star and now Minnesota Wild executive Mike Modano this Tuesday at 317 Washington in St. Paul—the same building that houses the corporate offices of the local NHL franchise. More information about the club is available from Patrick Klinger, patrickklinger@klingercompany.com.

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Ex-U Captain Lived All-American Life

Posted on February 4, 2020February 4, 2020 by David Shama

Mike Wright had a lawyer’s analytical mind, a teacher’s warm heart and the gut instincts of a great businessman. He was a friend and mentor to me dating back to the 1970s.

The 1959 University of Minnesota football captain died last week at age 81 after living a remarkable life that benefitted so many organizations and individuals including this writer. We shared a passion for football and the University of Minnesota. Those two things brought us together, but the relationship never would have lasted if not for Mike’s kindness and wisdom.

I regret not telling him how grateful I was for his friendship. A few years back he approached me about writing a book on his life, but the project never developed. Certainly my loss, but in recent times we did occasionally see each other at a breakfast club we belonged to. A tall man at about 6-foot-4, Mike greeted me with his friendly smile and soft spoken words. I can’t recall those words ever being mean spirited about anything or anyone. I was pleased to hear more than once how he enjoyed reading my column.

I first met Mike in the 1970s when he was a young lawyer with Minnesota-based Supervalu Inc. I was the editor of the University’s M Club publication, and he was serving as the volunteer president of the organization. The M Club was one of many nonprofit entities that Mike gave his time to over the years, including chairing the Twin Cities United Way.

I came to Mike for support multiple times in the early 1980s on behalf of a nonprofit organization I worked for that sponsored the Minnesota High School All-Star Football Game as a fundraiser. Mike twice accepted the volunteer role as general chair for the game and made Supervalu a generous annual supporter. Not only that but he enlisted the financial support of other Twin Cities business leaders.

As chief executive officer, Mike led grocery wholesaler Supervalu to great success before retiring almost 20 years ago. A strong but humble leader, he was much admired inside and outside the organization. Those leadership skills were tested and developed playing tackle for the Gophers during trying times. Minnesota had losing records in all three of his seasons on the varsity.

As a sophomore, Mike played on the 1957 team that was a preseason top 10 choice in the national rankings, and a favorite to win the Big Ten championship. A conference title would send the Gophers to their first ever Rose Bowl. The Gophers won their first three games as a top-five ranked team but then stumbled, winning only once more and finishing with a 4-5 season record. The team was beset by injuries and lacked team speed.

The next two seasons, 1958 and 1959, Minnesota won a combined three games. Fans were more than cranky, with some crackpots throwing garbage on the Edina lawn of head coach Murray Warmath. On fraternity row, the coach was hung in effigy. A 1959 story surfaced in a Minneapolis newspaper reporting that downtown businessmen wanted to buy up the remaining years of Warmath’s contract.

In a book about Warmath’s career, The Autumn Warrior by Mike Wilkinson, Wright recalled receiving a note from the coach’s wife after a 33-0 loss to bitter rival Iowa in the fall of 1959. “She wrote to me saying coach Warmath was so down after the Iowa loss that he was mumbling about maybe resigning,” Wright said in the book.

But Warmath carried on and that was a leadership lesson for Wright who played with a young team full of promise in 1959 that just made too many mistakes. “I felt the team would be a good one the next year,” Wright said in the The Autumn Warrior.

Indeed. The Gophers went from a 2-7 record in Mike’s last season to a Big Ten title and national championship the next year. He was recognized as Academic All-Big Ten in 1959 but more importantly his leadership as captain contributed to the culture that would see the Gophers go 22-6-1 the next three seasons.

Warmath had a career record of 87-78-7 as Minnesota’s head coach. Hired in 1954, he was a controversial choice for a program that had won five national championships from 1934 through 1941. The people’s choice to take over in the 1950s was Minneapolis native and former Gopher lineman Bud Wilkinson who had turned Oklahoma into a powerhouse as head coach.

However, there was an anti-Wilkinson attitude within the University during that era. Mike told me that in the 1950s administrators and academics at the U didn’t want football to be too prominent. Warmath, considered a good coach already proven at Mississippi State, was a preferred choice to Wilkinson who had the potential to become a god with the state’s citizens. The Gophers might have turned into the kings of college football with Wilkinson’s high football IQ and recruiting charms that extended into talent-rich Texas.

After Warmath was forced out following the 1971 season, the Gophers struggled until Lou Holtz was hired in 1984. Holtz stayed only two seasons and left for Notre Dame where he became a legendary coach. I remember calling Mike when rumors swirled about Holtz leaving Minnesota. Ever the optimist, Mike asserted that Notre Dame didn’t allow redshirting of its players and that obstacle might factor into Holtz’s decision of whether to stay at Minnesota.

Mike yearned to see the Gophers succeed in football and even served on a search committee to fill a vacancy at Minnesota back in the days when LaVell Edwards of BYU was turning that school into a power. Mike said despite the U program being down, Edwards was interested in becoming head coach at Minnesota but that never materialized.

Something else that didn’t come about was a mutual interest I once had in going to work for Supervalu. The company had a communications opening and Mike thought enough of me to have a department head arrange a long interview process. Lengthy is an understatement because one day I spent about eight hours going through a series of tests and interviews. Talk about corporate America!

I certainly don’t blame Mike for not receiving the job offer because that wasn’t his call. The one thing I should have needled him about is deserting his south Minneapolis home to attend St. Thomas Military Academy instead of attending my beloved Washburn High School. The mighty Millers of the 1950s would have been even greater with Mike on the roster.

Mike’s many honors and awards (I could fill a long paragraph) included receiving the University of Minnesota’s Outstanding Achievement Award and membership in the school’s hall of fame for athletics. I know that if I asked Mike about his life, including those awards, he would offer a humble answer and deflect praise to others.

Mike, thank you for being part of my life.

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