All Things Gophers 2024-25 Schedule Updates

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topos said:
This drives me insane. How do you not learn from last year's debacle and sack the *** up?

You have the deepest, most experienced team during your tenure and will lose your job if you don't make the tourney. With the advanced analytics, there's no excuse to schedule like this if you have tournament aspirations.

Honestly, at this point, schedule a road game at a quality mid-major if you have to. We need two legitimate tests, and even if we get them, I still think our noncon schedule will be generally "weak."

My guess on the last two games: We have a neutral court game with a "meh" opponent (like USF the previous year) and a home game against another cupcake.

Please, for the love of god, surprise me and play a road game (hopefully two, or at least road/neutral)!
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Why do I even care.
 







What started off with some optimism has sputtered down the stretch.

Just pathetic. Our expectation level is so fucking low with scheduling that this one will probably finish in the 330's and it's an upgrade because it's literally not the worst in the nation like last year.
 


Gophers7633 said:
Thoughts on this schedule?
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Disappointing end result after it appeared they were making moves to upgrade the schedule.

This schedule will be good for working in a bunch of new pieces without a ton of pressure but as others have already pointed out it really won't do much to help the team build any sort of tournament resume so they will need to win a lot of conference games to make it.

Can definitely understand why season ticket holders would be pissed because that is a very uninspiring slate of non-conf home games to suffer through prior to Big Ten season.

Assuming it is in fact tournament or bust this year, Johnson will have his work cut out for him qualify for the dance with this schedule. Shouldn't change the expectation though and will be very disappointing if they don't make the tournament and there is no coaching change.
 




So, the final two games we were waiting on and holding out a little hope for ended up being Central Michigan and Morgan State...? And when it was thought an upgrade in the non-conference schedule was needed, we get one with no real quality opponents at home and no road game...? Not good.
 

MNVCGUY said:
Disappointing end result after it appeared they were making moves to upgrade the schedule.

This schedule will be good for working in a bunch of new pieces without a ton of pressure but as others have already pointed out it really won't do much to help the team build any sort of tournament resume so they will need to win a lot of conference games to make it.

Can definitely understand why season ticket holders would be pissed because that is a very uninspiring slate of non-conf home games to suffer through prior to Big Ten season.

Assuming it is in fact tournament or bust this year, Johnson will have his work cut out for him qualify for the dance with this schedule. Shouldn't change the expectation though and will be very disappointing if they don't make the tournament and there is no coaching change.
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Nothing is good about this schedule. The new pieces thing is a bunch of bs. We might have the oldest team in the country. Challenge them. Our experience is our greatest strength, and we just pissed it away because CBJ is afraid to schedule anyone.
 

Gophers7633 said:
Nothing is good about this schedule. The new pieces thing is a bunch of bs. We might have the oldest team in the country. Challenge them. Our experience is our greatest strength, and we just pissed it away because CBJ is afraid to schedule anyone.
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I get why fans are pissed/disappointed. Bummer to see a team like Missouri drop off and not be replaced with another name school of some kind.

Tough to sell this schedule to non season ticket fans/students in terms of inspiring them to come out and check out a game.

Will be interesting what comments Coyle and Johnson make about the non-conf schedule. Coyle mentioned the need to upgrade it and they definitely didn't do that (at least not in any significant way) so hopefully some reporters will call him out on those comments to see what he has to say.
 



MNVCGUY said:
I get why fans are pissed/disappointed. Bummer to see a team like Missouri drop off and not be replaced with another name school of some kind.

Tough to sell this schedule to non season ticket fans/students in terms of inspiring them to come out and check out a game.

Will be interesting what comments Coyle and Johnson make about the non-conf schedule. Coyle mentioned the need to upgrade it and they definitely didn't do that (at least not in any significant way) so hopefully some reporters will call him out on those comments to see what he has to say.
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Any attempt to defend this schedule by Ben, Coyle, or any self-respecting media/columnist/social media presence (Marcus, Ryan James, etc.) should be immediately ridiculed.
 

tjgopher said:
That's the problem. He probably does indeed think he is coaching for his job so thinks the best way to keep his job is to win games. So, he scheduled a bunch of wins.

Problem is, the best way (and maybe only way) to keep his job is to make the NCAA Tourney. And, this schedule made that harder, not easier (imho).

He'll need to go out and win 12 or 13 games now in the Big Ten.

I'm afraid there will be some November and December games where we see 3k fans at Williams Arena for men's basketball. That is gross.
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And that is the correct answer.

Ben Johnson needs as many wins as possible to give the impression he is building on last season and has the programming moving in the right direction.

Going to be awful tough to get to double digit wins in conference. No matter how many non-conference wins he racks up this season it may not be enough to save his job.
 

MNVCGUY said:
I get why fans are pissed/disappointed. Bummer to see a team like Missouri drop off and not be replaced with another name school of some kind.

Tough to sell this schedule to non season ticket fans/students in terms of inspiring them to come out and check out a game.

Will be interesting what comments Coyle and Johnson make about the non-conf schedule. Coyle mentioned the need to upgrade it and they definitely didn't do that (at least not in any significant way) so hopefully some reporters will call him out on those comments to see what he has to say.
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Yeah, there is no defense of this schedule. Anyone that tries is just an apologist, whether on here, in the media or by Coyle. If Coyle does we are fucked because that would indicate he gives zero fucks about basketball and will probably run it back with CBJ, unfortunately.
 

Considering Coyle hung his neck out (about as far as he ever will) and said he expected the non-con to be better, CBJ really took a crap on that and made him look bad. If I'm scratching and clawing to keep my job, not sure making my boss look bad is a great way to go.
 

Gophers7633 said:
Nothing is good about this schedule. The new pieces thing is a bunch of bs. We might have the oldest team in the country. Challenge them. Our experience is our greatest strength, and we just pissed it away because CBJ is afraid to schedule anyone.
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Schedule some big boys early and upset them with your "experience". Nope. Cower and play cupcake city. Then be shocked when you get punched in the mouth in B1G play. Poor Ben.
 

forever a gopher said:
Considering Coyle hung his neck out (about as far as he ever will) and said he expected the non-con to be better, CBJ really took a crap on that and made him look bad. If I'm scratching and clawing to keep my job, not sure making my boss look bad is a great way to go.
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How do you keep any season tickets when your best home non-conference game is Yale? $$ still matters.
 

A direct quote from Ben in Marcus' non-conference schedule story for the Strib:

“We got at least three to four NCAA tournament teams from the year before, which I think will be a good challenge."

Fact check:

Not true, Ben, and you no doubt know this, but you think we're all oblivious.

Your team has exactly one NCAA Tournament opponent from the year before (Yale). There will be a second one if you play Florida.
 

howeda7 said:
Schedule some big boys early and upset them with your "experience". Nope. Cower and play cupcake city. Then be shocked when you get punched in the mouth in B1G play. Poor Ben.
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It's pathetic. Going into year 4 and CBJ has scheduled a total of 3 P5 schools(Wake Forest/Florida and Missouri home and home). In Pitino's last regular OOC schedule 2019-2020 season, we had a total of 4 and that didn't even include the Gavitt Games and the ACC/B1G challenge. We played a total of 6 P5 schools that year. It's so pathetic. Even worse, we dropped out an event last year that had Washington, San Diego State and Xavier. Nobody in the country schedules as shitty as our coach.
 


SelectionSunday said:
A direct quote from Ben in Marcus' non-conference schedule story for the Strib:

“We got at least three to four NCAA tournament teams from the year before, which I think will be a good challenge."

Fact check:

Not true, Ben, and you no doubt know this, but you think we're all oblivious.

Your team has exactly one NCAA Tournament opponent from the year before (Yale). There will be a second one if you play Florida.
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And Yale only made it because they won their league. They weren't making it from an at-large perspective. It's like bragging about scheduling Grambling State. Sure a tournament team, but they are terrible.
 


After 38 years of being a die-hard Gopher hoops fan, I’m done until someone…anyone decides they’re going to take running this program seriously. Their coach is going on year 4 of being overmatched. Their scheduling isn't challenging or exciting and inspires no one. And the AD just doesn’t seem to give a shit about either.
 

Ben is a bag of wind. "Steel sharpens steel", "toughest dudes in the room" or whatever the ef he says. How can a coach be this frightened? Boasts about the maturity of the team and schedules like this.
 

It's bad.

But just to put a there-must-be-a-pony-in-that-pile-of-crap spin on it, the Yale and N. Texas games, coupled with a real tournament make this a - marginally - better schedule than last year (the bar to clear on that one was underground, so don't hurt yourself patting yourself on the back).
 

Not all Big Ten non-conference schedules have been officially released, but here are the current number of Power 5 opponents on each Big Ten teams' schedule:

Michigan (6)
Purdue (6)
Illinois (5)
Ohio State (5)
Wisconsin (5)
Rutgers (4)
Michigan State (anywhere from 3 to 5)
Oregon (3 + credit for San Diego State)
Northwestern (will have 3 or 4)
Maryland (3)
Indiana (anywhere from 2 to 4)
UCLA (2 + credit for Gonzaga)
Iowa (2)
USC (will have 1 or 2 + Saint Mary's)
Nebraska (1 + credit for Saint Mary's)
Penn State (will have 1 or 2)
Gophers (1)
Washington (will have 0 or 1)
 
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fan of Ray Williams said:
Ben is a bag of wind. "Steel sharpens steel", "toughest dudes in the room" or whatever the ef he says. How can a coach be this frightened? Boasts about the maturity of the team and schedules like this.
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Ben is a broken record says the same the year after year about the team regardless of who is on the team.
 

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