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U Waits for Summer to Find Burner

Posted on April 12, 2013April 12, 2013 by David Shama

The Gophers are working their way through 15 spring practices but one of the team’s potentially most explosive playmakers won’t arrive until summer. Freshman running back Berkley Edwards, 5-9, 190 pounds from Novi, Michigan, is already on the minds of head coach Jerry Kill and offensive coordinator Matt Limegrover.

Edwards has game changing speed, the kind of attribute otherwise absent on the Gophers’ running backs roster. “He’s one of (the) top 10, 12 sprinters in the country,” Kill said in February when he announced Edwards will play for Minnesota. “Those things we need. And he’s a great fit for us at running back because we got some big backs, but we’d like to have one just to hand it off and it’s over. Goodnight. And he can do that because he’s got that kind of speed.”

The longest run from scrimmage by a Gophers’ running back last season was 38 yards by Donnell Kirkwood. In some games the Gophers didn’t have a running back with a run longer than 15 yards.

Limegrover is diplomatic about the running backs he has now and said he’s “very excited” about what they can do but he knows Edwards will complement the punishing style of Kirkwood and Rodrick Williams, the team’s two leading rushers from last year after now departed quarterback MarQueis Gray.

“I think the great thing about Berkley is that he truly can bring that change of pace over what we have right now,” Limegrover said. “The more weapons you have…the better off you’re going to be because every time you do that, it makes defensive coaches stand up and take notice, and be aware of, ‘Okay, they have a tailback in but which one is it?’

“So having a guy like Berkley with his speed and the things he can do getting the ball to the perimeter I think is going to be just a fantastic complement to what we already have in place.”

Limegrover won’t have to be envious of a team like Wisconsin if Edwards comes through for the Gophers. The famed Badgers’ running game pounds away for yards over and over…and then a speedy Wisconsin back darts through a hole, or jets outside for a long run.

Limegrover said it’s difficult for an offense to just rely on long drives for touchdowns. “Every once in a while you need to have that two play, 80-yard drive. …That’s what we’re working towards and that’s what we need, and Berkley is that kind of kid.”

Worth Noting

Limegrover said he isn’t set on naming the starting quarterback after spring practice ends later this month. “Not really. I think that what it comes down to is I think the offense is kind of bigger than who the starting quarterback is going to be.”

Kill emphasizes competition at all positions. “I think it shows up every day with the way kids compete,” Limegrover said.

Two of the three finalists for the Hobey Baker Award are Minnesotans for the first time in the award’s history, spokesman Wally Shaver told Sports Headliners. The winner of the 33^rd annual award will be announced tonight with coverage beginning at 5 p.m. CDT on the NHL Network.

Finalists are Boston College sophomore Johnny Gaudreau from Carneys Point, New Jersey; Quinnipiac senior goalie Eric Hartzell from White Bear Lake; and St. Cloud State senior forward Drew LeBlanc from Hermantown.

A Minnesotan, UMD’s Jack Connolly who attended Duluth’s Marshall High School, won the award last year. The last Gopher to win was Jordan Leopold in 2002.

With recent announcements that five juniors will be leaving school early, plus the end of eligibility for senior Seth Helgeson, the Gophers’ hockey program has lost more than 25 percent of its roster.

Two football games will be played at sites within walking distance of one another on Thursday, August 29. That evening the Gophers host UNLV in a nonconference game at TCF Bank Stadium while the Vikings play their final preseason game against the Titans at Mall of America Field.

The Vikings’ other home preseason game will be August 9 against the Texans.

Last Sunday in Atlanta Lewis Garrison, the former Gophers football player, officiated the Division II men’s college basketball championship game for a second consecutive season.

This is a big weekend for the Carol Fitzgerald Memorial Fund with a benefit tonight at the Metropolitan in Golden Valley, and a community celebration tomorrow at the Martin Luther King Center in Minneapolis. Pro Bowl wide receiver and Minneapolis native Larry Fitzgerald Jr. will be at both events and sign autographs at a fundraising session on Saturday. Other guests at the Metropolitan event will include Jamecia Bennett, Cris Carter, and Big Sy Huff. The fund supports multiple causes and honors Carol Fitzgerald who passed away from breast cancer in 2003.

A local source told Sports Headliners assistant basketball coach Ben Johnson interviewed on Monday for a position on Minnesota coach Richard Pitino’s new staff. Johnson, a former Gopher player, joined the Nebraska staff last year.

The 2013 Division I men’s basketball tournament, televised on four networks, was the most-watched NCAA tourney in 19 years, according to a Wednesday story by Sportsmedianews.com, attributing viewership statistics to Nielsen. “The tournament averaged 10.7 million total viewers, up 11% from last year’s 9.6 million total viewers, and is the highest average for the NCAA Tournament in 19 years (11.2 million, 1994),” Sportsmedia.com reported.

The story also said Monday night’s title game between Louisville and Michigan had 23.4 million viewers, an increase of 12 percent from the 2012 game.

The Timberwolves FastBreak Foundation will host a jersey auction after tomorrow night’s game against the Suns at Target Center. Fans can bid on jerseys worn by Timberwolves players during the game. The winning bidders will have jerseys signed and photos taken with players.

St. Thomas men’s basketball coach John Tauer, who led the Tommies to a 30-2 record and the NCAA tournament semifinals, is the Basketball Times Division III Coach of the Year.

Vance Worley (0-1, 5.73 ERA), acquired in the offseason from the Phillies, makes his third start of the season tonight for the Twins against the Mets and Jonathon Niese (1-0, 2.13 ERA) at Target Field. Worley has a 3-3 career record with a 5.17 ERA against the Mets.

Yesterday was the 52^nd anniversary of the first Twins’ regular season game ever, a 6-0 win in New York against the Yankees. Pedro Ramos was the winning pitcher, Whitey Ford the loser in that 1961 game.

Oswaldo Arcia, the Twins Minor League Player of the Year in 2012, is hitting .458 with three home runs and eight RBI in 24 at bats for Triple-A Rochester.

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Mussy & Pitino: Deja Vu in Dinkytown?

Posted on April 8, 2013April 8, 2013 by David Shama

More than four decades ago the Gophers hired a 30-year-old head basketball coach who eventually got the school in trouble with the NCAA, but Bill Musselman revived a dormant program and long after he was gone Minnesota basketball was still benefitting from his fiery work.

Last week Rich Pitino, 30, took over a Gophers’ program again in need of revival and heavy lifting to make it one of the best in the country. His passion was obvious at his Friday news conference. “I believe this is one of the best jobs in college basketball,” he said even though many college coaches might roll their eyes at such a statement.

Pitino’s reputation is that of a tireless worker who may devote 18 hours per day to his task at Minnesota. He’s known as an effective recruiter and a coach who favors full court pressure defense. To be hired as a Big Ten basketball coach at 30 years old is a remarkable achievement.

Open the Musselman file and see similarities. Like Pitino, Musselman wasn’t the first choice to become the Gophers’ coach but once he arrived you knew this guy was serious —even fanatical— about his business.

Musselman worked long hours and prided himself on his own conditioning. When he wasn’t in the office or on the phone at home, he might be playing pickup basketball where a frustrated and immature Gophers’ coach could resort to fisticuffs. He hated to lose in any competition.

In the summer of 1971, Musselman’s first year in Minneapolis, he told a pumped up crowd at Williams Arena he planned on his Gophers winning the 1971-72 Big Ten championship. Skeptics in the audience remembered that Minnesota had last been conference champs in 1937, and the 1970-71 Gophers finished 5-9 in the Big Ten.

Musselman inherited some talent on his roster in 1971 but knew he needed more. It didn’t take long to sign up junior college stars Clyde Turner and Ron Behagen. They and others formed a roster that won the Big Ten title in 1972, just as predicted.

It was more than recruiting that made the Gophers a winner, though. Musselman employed a zone defense that regularly held opponents to point totals in the 50s. On offense Minnesota was a disciplined team willing to hold the ball for long stretches to find a high percentage shot.

Musselman was a motivator who could be so crazed to win he talked to his players prior to the first practice in October of 1971 about beating Big Ten powerhouse Ohio State. Never mind that there would be no game between the schools until winter.

The desire to motivate his team and pack Williams Arena resulted in Musselman’s use of a pregame ball handling drill set to music. As the Gopher players performed 25 minutes before tipoff, nearly all the seats in the arena were filled with hand clapping, foot stomping fans.

In less than a year Musselman transformed the Gophers on the national college basketball map. During his career at Minnesota the Gophers had Big Ten finishes of first, second, sixth and third. The team was so popular games were regular sellouts, and fans who couldn’t get in the arena paid to watch on a large screen in the next door hockey arena.

Musselman left the Gophers after the 1975 season with NCAA infractions brewing and the bad taste of the infamous 1972 Minnesota-Ohio State brawl on his resume. But he had the program rolling in recruiting, victories and at the box office from the start of his assignment in Minneapolis, and that momentum carried over for years and contributed directly to the success of the two coaches who followed him, Jim Dutcher and Clem Haskins.

If Pitino can duplicate the “Good Mussy” and not the “Bad Mussy,” it will be déjà vu in Dinkytown.

Worth Noting

Rich Pitino said he welcomes the idea of the Gophers playing nonconference games against Louisville, the team coached by his father, Rick Pitino. “I would love to, if he would be willing to do it. We were going to do it at FIU, and hopefully we can do something here. I think it would be great. It would be fun to go against him head-to-head.”

Although Rich Pitino didn’t say it, the game is something the Minnesota Sports Facilities Authority should be looking at for 2016, the first year of the new Minneapolis Vikings stadium. A crowd of 20,000 to 30,000 could be likely, and installing a basketball setup in the new covered stadium would be a trial run for hosting NCAA Tournament games.

Pitino has already contacted Minnesota high school recruits including Apple Valley junior point guard Tyus Jones. He plans to have individual meetings with Gophers players this week.

The April 8 issue of Sports Illustrated said Minnesota natives Nate Wolters and Mike Muscala didn’t help themselves with their performances in the NCAA Tournament. Wolters, the South Dakota State point guard from St. Cloud Tech, “got destroyed” against the quickness and long arms of Michigan defenders in the tourney, according to an NBA executive.

Muscala, the Bucknell center from Roseville, has talent but an NBA executive quoted in the magazine said, “You can see his skills. But he needs to develop. If I were taking him, I’d try to get him to play in Europe for a couple of years.”

S.I. predicted the Timberwolves, drafting at No. 8 in the first round, will choose Indiana shooting guard Victor Oladipo.

The Vikings will play a home preseason game against the Titans at Mall of America Field on either Thursday, August 29, or Friday, August 30. A game on August 29 will be the same date the football Gophers play UNLV at TCF Bank Stadium.

A Vikings’ spokesman said the team’s date will be finalized within a couple of weeks. The Vikings’ August 25 preseason game at San Francisco will be nationally televised by NBC’s Sunday Night Football.

Gophers’ offensive coordinator Matt Limegrover said he thinks former Gophers’ quarterback Max Shortell is home in Kansas still deciding where he will finish his college career. Shortell, who would have been a valuable junior for the Gophers next fall, decided to transfer from Minnesota after the season ended last year.

Limegrover, who used to weigh 400 pounds, is now at about 230 and coaching with renewed energy.

At the Minnesota Football Clinic on Friday night newscaster Randy Shaver thanked high school and college coaches for fund-raising $121,000 for his cancer research foundation. The “Tackle Cancer” promotion involved 150 high schools and two colleges in the state. The Gophers will participate this year at the San Jose State game at TCF Bank Stadium.

The clinic, a three day event led by the Minnesota Football Coaches Association and held at the Double Tree Park Plaza in St. Louis Park, reported a record attendance of over 1,300, according to an e-mail from Ron Stolski, executive director of the MFCA.

At the clinic Minnetonka High School coach Dave Nelson was given the Tom Mahoney Man of the Year Award by the MFCA. “Tom Mahoney was one of the founders of the Minnesota Football Coaches Association, and an inspirational, tireless leader of it for decades,” Stolski wrote in an e-mail. “The Tom Mahoney award is presented to an MFCA member who represents the best in our association. A person who devotes leadership and enthusiasm for and energy to the efforts of the MFCA. Dave Nelson epitomizes all that the award represents.”

St. Thomas football coach Glenn Caruso said his Tommies will return “more kids than any top five” Division III program in the country. Among his top 60 players last year, 35 were freshmen and sophomores. Caruso said the Tommies might be ranked No. 2 in the nation prior to the start of next season.

St. Thomas begins the first of seven spring practices next Sunday. The Tommies, who have 91 Minnesotans on the roster, return nine starters on offense and six on defense.

Twins’ closer Glen Perkins, who earned his second save of the season yesterday in a 4-3 win over the Orioles, has yet to give up a hit in three innings over three games. The Twins, now 4-2, have swept their two opening series.

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Flip’s Tweets Draw Attention to Gophers

Posted on March 15, 2013March 15, 2013 by David Shama

What’s up with Flip Saunders’ tweets yesterday during and after the Gophers game?

The former Gophers guard and assistant coach had plenty to say about Minnesota’s performance including sharing his expertise on lack of execution. Saunders wasn’t critical of individuals but his passion for the Gophers was obvious.

Was it all the emotion of a U alum? Or was it more? Flip followers think the unemployed former NBA coach has interest in the Gophers if there is a job opening.

His resume is loaded with pluses including popularity with the fan base, Gophers donors and media. And this is one guy that doesn’t come with a costly buyout involving his former employer. During a year of coaching unemployment Saunders has stayed close to basketball on the college and pro levels, and even the Minnesota high school scene.

Meanwhile, the Gophers will learn on Sunday if they can back their way into an NCAA Tournament invitation after losing eight of their last 11 games and turning up the heat on embattled coach Tubby Smith. The Gophers, 20-12 after losing 51-49 to Illinois in the Big Ten Tournament yesterday, are still a likely selection for the NCAA Tournament because of the difficult schedule the team has played and its high RPI ranking.

But if the perspective is about recent results and appearances, this is a team that has doused plenty of public enthusiasm concerning postseason play. Minnesota has lost three consecutive games and only won five times since January 9 when the Gophers were 15-1. And the way Minnesota has often played has to cause doubt among the players and coach.

Smith was asked before yesterday’s game if the Gophers might have renewed energy with the regular season over and about to open play in the Big Ten Tournament. “That’s a good question,” Smith said on 1500 ESPN. “This team has been hard to read all year long. I would like to think so. We’ve got a lot to play for. …But again, we’ve had many opportunities before.”

Minnesota said no to its latest opportunity, displaying both energy and focus that faded in and out. In a 49-49 tie and possession of the ball with about 16 seconds remaining in the game, the Gophers turned the ball over when guard Austin Hollins stepped out of bounds. Illinois’ Brandon Paul then made a jump shot as the game ended to defeat Minnesota.

The Gophers self-destructed at the end just as they had earlier in the game and so many times during the last two months. The team’s turnovers prompted BTN play-by-play man Gus Johnson to say early in the second half: “Minnesota just looks sloppy from top to bottom.”

Eleven first half turnovers (19 total yesterday) played a significant role in changing an early 7-2 Minnesota lead into the Illini pushing ahead 19-12 with about six minutes remaining in the period. Austin Hollins had scored five of the first seven points in the first half and was moving effectively without the ball. Center Trevor Mbakwe was a brute on the boards. But after seven minutes both players were on the bench with two personals each.

Hollins and Mbakwe were grounded for the rest of the half. Their presence almost certainly would have lifted a team that has often been in free fall in past weeks, and one that was stumbling again yesterday. Why not risk the possibility of more fouls on either or both players?

Instead the Gophers played without Mbawke and Hollins while missing defensive assignments that twice allowed Illini players to race down the lane without being guarded. Offensively, Minnesota was even more of a mess in the first half, often passing up shots, and playing indecisively with ineffective player and ball movement.

The Gophers reverted to other bad habits including botched efforts to inbound the ball underneath the basket or on the sideline. An early second half pass thrown by guard Joe Coleman was intercepted and resulted in a three-point goal by Illinois that slowed Minnesota’s momentum.

Behind the scoring of Mbawke, Austin Hollins and point guard Andre Hollins the Gophers made a comeback in the second half after trailing 25-16 at halftime. The Gophers built leads by as many as five points.

But Minnesota couldn’t’ score a field goal in the last five minutes and wasted an opportunity to win. The defeat adds to the criticism directed at Smith who in six years has yet to produce a winning record during the Big Ten regular season, or win an NCAA Tournament game.

But he is likely to have an opportunity to win his first “Big Dance” game next week.

Worth Noting

Don’t be surprised if in a couple of years beer is sold to the public at Williams Arena and Mariucci Arena, following the trend started last fall at TCF Bank Stadium. A majority of state legislative leaders might support the additional beer sales and the change will increase athletic department revenues.

Also ahead is a likely Big Ten schedule where each conference football team plays nine or 10 league games. A nine game schedule means in alternate years a school plays four or five home conference games.

Asked on WCCO Radio Wednesday morning about the future of basketball coach Tubby Smith, Gophers athletic director Norwood Teague said Smith is “ensconced” in his work.

New University of Tennessee football coach Butch Jones will speak at the Minnesota Football Clinic on Thursday, April 4 at the DoubleTree Hotel in St. Louis Park. North Dakota State national championship coach Craig Bohl will also speak on Thursday as part of the three-day clinic. Coaches interesting in registering for the clinic can Google Minnesota Football Clinic and find the link for more information.

The Vikings will choose Tennessee wide receiver Cordarrelle Patterson with the No. 23 pick in the first round of the NFL draft next month, according to Joe Dove’s Bleacherreport.com NFL mock draft posted on Wednesday. At No. 25, using the first round pick acquired in the Percy Harvin trade with the Seahawks, the Vikings will select Kansas State inside linebacker Arthur Brown.

Other names of wide receivers you may see on mock draft listings are DeAndre Hopkins, Clemson; Keenan Allen, California; and Tavon Austin, West Virginia.

The Chicago Tribune’s Dan Pompei, writing for a March 9 online story about Marc Trestman, points out how fickle the coaching profession can be. Trestman, the former Gophers quarterback and Vikings assistant coach, has been fired seven times during his pro and college coaching career. At 57 he has his first NFL head coaching job with the Bears. In the story Trestman talks about how he values players as more than athletes.

Tommy Hannon — the St. Thomas All-MIAC and All-Region senior center who has already played for one Division III Tommies national championship team and is trying to win another — could have given up on his basketball career after being cut from the Cretin-Derham Hall team as a junior.

“I was so out of shape then,” Hannon said. “I was 6-foot-2 and weighed about 235. After I was cut from the team as a junior, I played intramurals. I also started working out a lot, and got myself in shape. I lost 35 pounds or so and grew three or four inches.”

Hannon, now 6-foot-7, 210, keeps a picture in his wallet from his junior year to “remind me where I once was.” Hannon and his teammates play Calvin (Michigan) at home on Saturday starting at 7 p.m. The matchup will be a Sweet 16 Division III playoff game between the 28-1 Tommies and 26-3 Calvin.

Timberwolves center Nikola Pekovic will sign autographs on Sunday, April 14 from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. at the Valley West Mall in Bloomington. The Sports Card Show is a two-day event (April 13-14) and is organized by the Twin Cities Sports Collectors Club. Club members receive a discount on autographs.

Fox Sports North will televise the Twins-Red Sox game beginning at 6 p.m. Minneapolis time tonight. Other Fox North Sports telecasts from spring training will be March 21, 23, 24, 25 and 28.

It’s been a winning sports winter at Edina High School where the boys’ hockey team won an 11^th state title, the girls’ hockey team placed third in the state tourney, the boys’ swimming team finished second at state, and the boys’ basketball team has advanced to next week’s state tournament.

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