The Gophers’ season record may end at 6-6 if they can win November home games against slumping Illinois and small school South Dakota State.  Coach Tim Brewster’s Gophers, 4-4, also have remaining games with Michigan State and Iowa.

The Illini, a Rose Bowl team a year ago last January, is in free fall having lost five consecutive games.  The only Illini win is against Illinois State, a Missouri Valley Conference team as is South Dakota State.  Illinois was 5-7 last season and considered a possible Big Ten conference contender going into this season, but the Illini (1-6) have imploded badly losing by double digit margins in every game including to so-so Indiana and Purdue.

The struggling Gophers can hardly be over confident about beating Illinois, or South Dakota State.  The Jackrabbits have a 6-1 record playing teams such as Cal Poly, North Dakota State and Northern Iowa.  Those aren’t scary teams but the Gophers got more than a fright put into them two years ago when North Dakota State (same conference as SDS) upset Minnesota in the Metrodome.

The Gophers’ two other remaining games, against Michigan State and Iowa, definitely look spookier.  This Saturday, on Halloween night at TCF Bank Stadium, the Gophers play MSU (4-4), a solid team.  MSU went down to the last play before losing 15-13 to undefeated Iowa (8-0) last Saturday. The Spartans have one of the Big Ten’s better defenses, although probably less formidable than what the Gophers have faced in recent weeks.

The Gophers had 138 yards in total offense against Penn State a week ago last Saturday in a 20-0 loss.  At Ohio State last Saturday the Gophers managed one late fourth quarter touchdown in a 38-7 loss.  Minnesota had 286 total yards but 78 of those yards came on the touchdown drive when the game was long decided.

The Gophers put together a heavy list of mistakes in Columbus on Saturday including five dropped passes in the first half alone.  A blown coverage in the secondary gave the Buckeyes an easy touchdown pass for a 7-0 lead at halftime.  A fumbled kickoff return to start the second half and later two Gopher interceptions and other mistakes made for a disappointing outcome against an Ohio State team that has a struggling offense, too.

With successive home games coming against Michigan State, Illinois and South Dakota State, the Gophers are likely to have better performances than the last two weeks.  Two or three wins are possible.  A November 21 finish at Iowa looks much more difficult.  The Hawkeyes are the favorite now to win the conference championship and they beat Minnesota 55-0 last season.

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Former Vikings quarterback Brooks Bollinger is playing for Florida in the United Football League.

Expect Adam Weber to be the starting quarterback against Michigan State but MarQueis Gray will play frequently in the game.

Rumors about where Cretin-Derham Hall offensive tackle Seantrel Henderson will attend college continue to include Southern California, Notre Dame and Minnesota.

Last week’s issue of Sporting News magazine named a mid-season All-America team and not a single Big Ten Conference player made the offensive or defensive units.

Will Chad Hartman, now working Monday afternoons, be full time with WCCO Radio by next year?

Lights at Target Field are being tested until Friday of this week, according to https://minnesota.twins.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20091021&content_id=7515904&vkey=news_min&fext=.jsp&c_id=min.

Major League Baseball International has agreements with 50 television and radio partners to broadcast the World Series in 15 languages to 233 countries and territories around the world.  The World Series opens on Wednesday in New York with the Yankees hosting Philadelphia.

Lynx star Seimone Augustus, who tore the ACL in her left knee just six games into the season last June, is rehabbing in Minneapolis.  She hopes to return to the court in late January or early February.  Augustus recently cut her dreads off, saying she “wanted to start fresh.”

Former Edina resident Brian Burke, now general manager in Toronto, has seen the Maple Leafs have a winless start to the 2009-10 season after a last place Northeast Division finish in 2008-09.  An NHL source said: “Brian will get it done, but it takes time, effort and patience.”

Former Wild coach Jacques Lemaire, who has New Jersey winning and in third place in the Atlantic with 12 points, is admired by that same source. “Fans need to understand that Jacques Lemaire is all about hockey and will talk hockey with anyone who would ask a question and wants to learn.  Lemaire, away from the game, loves investing and tinkering in the stock market, fine wine, cigars and golf.  He spends his summers in Sarasota, Florida on his boat fishing and relaxing.  He also has a fine sense of humor.”

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Think the Big Ten isn’t having a difficult time in football?  The BCS standings have Boise State and Cincinnati, Western Athletic Conference and Big East Conference schools, ranked ahead of Iowa, the top rated Big Ten team.

The first six schools in the standings are: Florida, Alabama, Texas, Boise State, Cincinnati and Iowa.  A WAC school ahead of everybody from the Big Ten?  Woody Hayes and Bo Schembechler must be fuming in their graves.

Opinion by some who follow college football is that the following conferences are better than the Big Ten: Southeastern, Pac-10, Big 12 and Big East.  The SEC is in a class by itself with Florida and Alabama both in the league’s East Division.  LSU at No. 9 and South Carolina at No. 23 give the 12 member league four teams in the BCS top 25 rankings.

The Big Ten has four teams also, with No. 13 Penn State, No. 19 Ohio State and No. 21 Wisconsin joining Iowa in the rankings.  But based on this season and past performance the Big Ten isn’t impressive.  Watching conference teams leads an observer to see fewer extraordinary players and sometimes less team speed on defense than the elite teams in other parts of the country.

Ohio State, the conference’s poster program for success, couldn’t win signature games against Southern California this season and last.  The Buckeyes were one of six Big Ten schools to lose bowl games after last season.  Iowa was the only winner.  And in the last three years the Big Ten has lost all six of its BCS bowl games.

Forty or more years ago it was a good argument as to whether the Big Ten or SEC played the better football.  In that era Big Ten teams played black athletes when many other schools didn’t.  In the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s the Big Ten was more active than any other conference in its recruiting and playing of African-Americans.  Other conferences were segregated or much more restrictive about opportunities. That edge is long gone.

The Big Ten has been in decline since the 1970s when for the first time it started losing Rose Bowl games with surprising frequency, coming up short in nine of 10 games.  More recently Ohio State, for example, has lost three of its last four bowl games, including two games for the national championship.

This season the Big Ten may deserve better than to be ranked behind four other conferences.  It’s questionable that the Big East is superior, that’s for sure.  And those who are anti-Big Ten shouldn’t go too far in their excitement over conferences like the WAC, Big East and Mountain West (TCU is No. 8 in the BCS standings).  Teams like Boise State and TCU play schedules that aren’t all that challenging.  Boise’s weak schedule will keep the Broncos from a place in the national championship game.

But give a lot of other schools and conferences across the country credit for improvement and achievement.  College football’s limitation on the number of scholarships that schools can provide has created more parity across conferences and the country.  The marquee schools can’t hoard players like they once did.

More and better athletes in the south, southwest and west are stocking team rosters with greater talent than in the past.  Schools with geographic proximity to that talent often have an advantage in recruiting.  There’s an edge some places, too, in academic admissions regarding who gets into one school versus another.

Coaching makes a difference and few would argue that the Big Ten is a league of great coaches.  Certainly Kirk Ferentz at Iowa deserves the label.  Based on longevity and reputation, Penn State’s Joe Paterno does, too.  Ohio State’s Jim Tressel, who has won one national championship and lost in two other title games, is a good coach.  Michigan’s Rich Rodriquez must prove he can have the same success in Ann Arbor that he created coaching West Virginia.

The commitment of Big Ten schools to producing winners may not be as all consuming as it once was.  At places like Florida and Alabama they have no problem justifying a 24-7, 365 day commitment to football.

In college football, as in life, you get what you ask for.  Looks like the Big Ten needs to ask for more.

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