Gopher Football
Quarterbacks
For the second time this season, Gopher starting quarterback Bryan Cupito left the game with an injury, and for the second time this year, Adam Ernst came in as his backup and did not attempt a pass. Thankfully for Cuptio and for the Gophers, his knee injury was minor enough where he could return to the game and resume control of the offense.
Before Cuptio got injured, his results were mixed. He had a couple of nice passes on consecutive plays to wide receivers. But he also misfired to Jared Ellerson on an easy crossing route, and also threw an interception in which he appeared to under throw his receiver by almost 10 yards. After Cupito got injured, his performance is kind of a wash. Bryan suffered a sprained MCL late in the first quarter, missed the remainder of that drive, but returned the next time the Gopher had the ball. After Cuptio returned, he went 3 of 8 passing, but two of those incompletions were potential TD passes that probably should’ve been caught. All in all, Cupito didn’t do a bad job, and any bad passes he had after that were certainly excusable do to the nature of his injury.
So why was Bryan Cuptio playing while he was so injured? Well, unbeknownst to Gopher fans, Adam Ernst had injury problems of his own. Apparently, Adam has had an injured shoulder for quite some time (which will require off season surgery) and cannot throw a football at all. While he was in the game, Ernst finished off a scoring drive by handing the ball off. Just like in the Colorado State game, Ernst did what he needed to do without making any mistakes.
Overall, it’s really tough to give a bad grade for the Gopher QB’s. There were some bad passes and ugly moments with the play clock, but the fact that both Cuptio and Ernst played through their injuries to keep the Gophers from having to insert a true freshman makes up for that. Hopefully both players can heal up and be ready for spring practice.
Grade: A-
Running Backs
What more can you say? Gopher running backs Marion Barber III and Laurence Maroney continue to prove that no defense in America is immune to their threat. Alabama came in with a very good defensive football team; number two in the nation to be exact, but just like against Iowa & Michigan it didn’t matter. Both Maroney and Barber used their skills to knife through the large holes the Gopher offensive line routinely created. In a bit of a change, it was Barber who was consistently going for large gains, while Maroney found himself grinding it out. For the day, Marion Barber ran 37 times for 187 yards, and 1 TD. Laurence Maroney chipped in 29 carries for 105 yards. Coming into this game, Alabama had not allowed a 100 yard rusher against them all season (Not even the might Auburn duo could hit that mark), so it makes these totals by the Gopher running backs even more impressive.
For as good as the Gopher running backs did in piling up yards, they did have several mistakes. First, the Gopher offense runs the halfback pass almost every game it seems. By this point, Marion Barber should know how to handle pressure. Instead of taking a sack when he was getting knocked to the ground, Barber threw the ball up for grabs and into a pack of three Alabama defender who make an easy pick. Earlier, on the Gophers second offensive play, Marion Barber fumbled on an end around, and later in the quarter Maroney was lucky that the refs blew a call on a fumble that would’ve given Alabama the ball on the Gophers 15 yard line. Besides those three plays though, both Gopher backs did a nice job.
Grade: A-
Wide Receivers / Tight End
This was not a game to remember for the wide receivers, especially freshman Ernie Wheelwright. During the year, Ernie has made several great, acrobatic receptions, but in this game he dropped two potential touchdown passes that were easier than others he’s made this year.
Jakari Wallace, who I feel may be the most underrated player for the Gophers this year, came through with two big first down receptions for 24 yards. Jakari doesn’t have a lot of receptions this year, but it seems like most of them go for first downs. Besides Wallace, Jared Ellerson was the only other Gopher to catch a pass. Ellerson led the Gopher with 3 catches for 51 yards. As a group, the wide receivers only had 5 catches for 75 yards, but after Bryan Cuptio got injured, any impact they were going to have in this contest was pretty much taken out of the game plan.
Grade: C
Offensive Line
This may have been the best blocking performance against an elite front 7 as I have ever seen a Gopher team make. Every member of the line deserves credit, so I don’t know that it’s fair to single anyone out as having a great game. They all did. The first half was the ‘pretty’ part. The line made a statement by blowing holes open all over the field and allowing for huge chunks of rushing yardage. After the first drive of the second half, Alabama figured out that Minnesota was not going to pass the ball very much, so they really packed the defense in. There were a few three and outs by the offense after this point, but for the most part the offensive line did a good enough job in that situation to allow Minnesota to grind down the clock in an efficient manner. The Gophers didn’t pass a lot, but when they did the line gave the QB’s excellent protection.
Grade: A
Offense Overall
This was a mostly good, but not great performance by the offense. On the surface it looks like a great performance when you see the numbers that Minnesota put up against a great defense. But it wasn’t always that pretty. To start off the game, Minnesota had a 2 yard gain, a lost fumble, a 3 yard agin and a false start. That was followed soon after by an interception, another interception, and then a blown call on what should’ve been a lost fumble. The offense did also have several penalties, mostly in the nature of procedure and holding calls. Besides all of the mistakes there were also all of the QB injuries that I discussed above. But somehow, despite all of these setbacks, the Gopher offense was able to put itself back together and show several stretches of dominance. Anytime you have put up the kind of rushing yards that you have against the top defense in the SEC you have done a great job.
Grade: B+
Defensive Line
I said in my preview that I thought Anthony Montgomery play needed to be a key player in this game for the Gophers, so I scored on that one. But I also said that even if he did have a good game, I didn’t think it would be enough to dominate the Alabama offensive line. This is a prediction where I am happy to be wrong! Led by Montgomery, the Gopher defensive line turned in perhaps their best performance of the year when you consider who they were up against. There was penetration from tackles, a pass rush from the ends, a forced fumble which led to a Keith Lipka touchdown, sacks, and forced throws.
The other player who had a great game was Darrell Reid. In my opinion, Reid may have had his most impressive performance of the season with his pass rush. In the first quarter, there was one instance where he used his strength to push the blocker back into the quarterback and almost record a sack, and a few minutes later he broke away from the blocker and using his speed almost chased down the quarterback for a huge loss. While this wouldn’t be news with most teams, it’s something we haven’t seen a lot of this year. If there was a downside to the line’s performance, it’s that they lost effectiveness as the game went on. It would be easy to attribute this to fatigue, but seeing how the Gophers dominated the time of possession in the first half I’m kind of doubting that was the case. In fact, for the game, Minnesota held the ball for 16 minutes more than Alabama. Regardless, this game marked a big improvement for the defensive line, and gave us some reasons to be excited for next year.
Grade: A-
Linebackers
With the great game the defensive line had, it made the linebacker’s job much easier than usual. In many cases, the linebackers actually saw themselves making TACKLES rather than trying to bust up blocks and then make a tackle. Due to this, Alabama had no running game, rushing 21 times for just 21 yards. The linebackers and defensive line both deserve credit for this great stat. But as usual, the linebackers did have some problems in pass coverage. Though they held Alabama to 0-11 on 3rd downs, Alabama did find some early down success throwing into huge holes in the Gopher zone. A few dropped passes on some shorter routes saved the linebackers even more embarrassment in this area. As a unit, it was a solid performance, or at least better than we’ve become accustomed to.
Grade: B
Defensive Backs
For as many good things as the Gophers did on defense, the secondary had one of their worst games of the season. Like the linebackers, the defensive backs also gave us several long receptions in lax zone coverage, and they also didn’t do a very good job of tackling. Compounding these errors were three things. 1. Several dropped passes by the Alabama receivers, 2. An uncharacteristic good job of pressuring the QB by the defensive line, and 3. Alabama came in with the 112th ranked pass offense and their 3rd string quarterback. Give those three factors, I would’ve expected a better performance from the Gopher secondary, even with John Pawielski injured. But instead Alabama was able to throw 22/36 for 247 yards, a TD and zero interceptions.
Grade: D
Defense Overall
This overall performance was really a mixed bag for the defense. There were some great numbers (such as 21 yards rushing and 0-11 for the Tide on 3rd down), but there also were some really bad numbers (the passing numbers allowed). The defensive line played as well as they have all season, but the banged up secondary played one of their worst. This is kind of the life of the Gopher defense, as they were only able to put together a complete performance once or twice all year. What really matters here is that the Gophers controlled the line of scrimmage and held Alabama in the end. There is a lot of work to be done before next year, but there also is a lot to build on from this game.
Grade: B-
Special Teams
This really wasn’t a good game for the special teams. Marion Barber had 4 punt returns for 10 yards, Minnesota had only 1 kickoff return for 14 yards, Rhys Lloyd missed a chip shot 31 yard field goal and had his weekly kickoff out of bounds, and Lloyd averaged only 37 yards per punt. The one area where Minnesota did a very good job was kick return defense. Alabama was ranked as one of the top teams in the nation in kickoff returns, and Minnesota held them to about 15 yards/return.
Grade: C-
Team Overall:
Every year before Big Ten ““ SEC bowl games, there is always the speculation about how the slow Big Ten team will do against the fast, athletic SEC team. Like they did in 2002 against Arkansas, Minnesota not only proved they belonged against Alabama, but they dominated both lines of scrimmage and physically whipped a team that didn’t know what hit them. There were ugly moments on both sides of the ball for Minnesota, but any bowl win is a good win, that’s the reality that will push Minnesota through the offseason. Given the untimely injuries at key positions that Minnesota had to endure, the Maroon and Gold should come out of this game extremely pleased.
Grade: B