Tom Dienhart: Can Minn really win the BT West with an offense that can’t get rolling?

[BleedGopher]

per Dienhart's hot takes heading into Week 5:

8. Can Minnesota really win the Big Ten West with an offense that can’t seem to get rolling? It’s stunning to think the Golden Gophers have played 16 quarters of football—and have scored eight TDs. The team with the second-fewest TDs? Northwestern with 11. The Gophers and Wildcats just happen to meet this Saturday in Evanston. Jerry Kill’s club still hasn’t reached the 30-point mark in 2015. In fact, Minnesota has been held to 28 points or fewer in each of its last eight games. The Gophers are averaging 19.3 points this season, which is the fewest among power conference teams. More dreariness: Minnesota has gone three-and-out on 32.7 percent (18/55) of its offensive possessions this season, which is the highest mark among all power conference teams.

http://btn.com/2015/10/02/big-ten-football-tom-dienharts-hot-takes-heading-into-week-5/

Go Gophers!!

 

[Section2]

Our offense got rolling just fine last week. The 3 and outs are a problem though.

 

[GoldenRodents]

The freshman running backs are week older. Look out!

 

[Cayman]

Wow, I didn't realize our offense had done THAT poorly. I'm pretty much hoping that last week's offensive performance was a sign of things to come, and that defense and special teams were an aberration.

 

[homermn]

I don't think Tom watched the game we all watched last week. I thought it was a huge step forward and the play makers are beginning to surface. As Kill aptly put it "you fix one thing and it breaks somewhere else" ... Special Teams almost lost us last weeks game, not the lack of offense. The only significant area of improvement I want to see from our offense tomorrow is Red Zone performance. If we can score touchdowns when we are inside the 20 against Northwestern and no turnovers; huge accomplishment.

 

[GophersInIowa]

per Dienhart's hot takes heading into Week 5:

8. Can Minnesota really win the Big Ten West with an offense that can’t seem to get rolling? It’s stunning to think the Golden Gophers have played 16 quarters of football—and have scored eight TDs. The team with the second-fewest TDs? Northwestern with 11. The Gophers and Wildcats just happen to meet this Saturday in Evanston. Jerry Kill’s club still hasn’t reached the 30-point mark in 2015. In fact, Minnesota has been held to 28 points or fewer in each of its last eight games. The Gophers are averaging 19.3 points this season, which is the fewest among power conference teams. More dreariness: Minnesota has gone three-and-out on 32.7 percent (18/55) of its offensive possessions this season, which is the highest mark among all power conference teams.

http://btn.com/2015/10/02/big-ten-football-tom-dienharts-hot-takes-heading-into-week-5/

Go Gophers!!

We had 0 last week so that number was even higher through three games.

 

[MNVCGUY]

I don't think Tom watched the game we all watched last week. I thought it was a huge step forward and the play makers are beginning to surface. As Kill aptly put it "you fix one thing and it breaks somewhere else" ... Special Teams almost lost us last weeks game, not the lack of offense. The only significant area of improvement I want to see from our offense tomorrow is Red Zone performance. If we can score touchdowns when we are inside the 20 against Northwestern and no turnovers; huge accomplishment.

The performance last week was a step in the right direction for the offense but you also have to factor in the opposition. Will be very interesting to see how the offense looks against a very good defense. Hopefully we get a performance closer to the Ohio game then the Kent State one.

 

[jaymil]

Further proof to my theory that nobody at BTN actually watched the Ohio game, or even looked at the box score.

 

[bemidjigopher]

The performance last week was a step in the right direction for the offense but you also have to factor in the opposition. Will be very interesting to see how the offense looks against a very good defense. Hopefully we get a performance closer to the Ohio game then the Kent State one.

To be fair Ohio's no slouch, beat a good Marshall team that trounced Purdue. MAC is an underrated league this year, I think Ohio, Bowling Green, NIU, Toledo are all solid teams. heck Toledo beat an SEC team. Ohio could very well win that league. CSU ill probably win 7 or 8 and go to a bowl. Should we have one by more yes, but we played three teams that were either better then us, TCU or could beat us on an off day, CSU and Ohio, and we finished 3-1 where we are suppose to be.

 

[MNVCGUY]

To be fair Ohio's no slouch, beat a good Marshall team that trounced Purdue. MAC is an underrated league this year, I think Ohio, Bowling Green, NIU, Toledo are all solid teams. heck Toledo beat an SEC team. Ohio could very well win that league. CSU ill probably win 7 or 8 and go to a bowl. Should we have one by more yes, but we played three teams that were either better then us, TCU or could beat us on an off day, CSU and Ohio, and we finished 3-1 where we are suppose to be.

Outside of Kent State the wins are against solid teams but I don't any of them, including TCU, are great defensive teams. TCU has given up 89 points over their last 2 games so I think it is fairly clear that their defense has taken a step back this season at least to this point.

I think Dienhart's question is a valid one in regards to our prospects of winning the West with the way the offense has played to date. The way the offense plays on Saturday will tell us a lot about how they are going to fare against Big Ten defenses. Solid as the performance was on offense against Ohio even Limegrover said the offense is going to have to play better in order to win conference games. Now we just have to find out if they can do it.

 

[GopherWeatherGuy]

Run a hitch and go to Gentry the first play of the game for a TD. That'll open things up.

 

[MNGoldenGophers1]

The performance last week was a step in the right direction for the offense but you also have to factor in the opposition. Will be very interesting to see how the offense looks against a very good defense. Hopefully we get a performance closer to the Ohio game then the Kent State one.

C'mon and get with the program! When are you going to learn that there is nothing wrong with projecting the future based on one-game trends against inferior competition. If you understood how this works, you'd know it's our defense we need to worry about this Saturday.