College Football News - Gophers preview

[pk2]

Quick synopsis from College Football News:

You know when there’s a discussion about coaches and the superpower Saban or Krzyzewski type makes a crack about the best coach being somewhere out there doing big things with marginal talent, Jerry Kill is one of those guys.

The season will be a success if … the Gophers come up with a winning record and a few big upsets. Yeah, they went 6-7 last season and got to a bowl game, but they feasted off the cupcakes, got by Syracuse, and beat mediocre Purdue and Illinois teams to get to six wins. It was a terrific step forward for a program that fell on hard times, but in Kill’s third season it’s time to start making some more progress. Beating the mediocre teams is a must, but beating a Nebraska or Wisconsin at home would truly make some noise.

Key game: Sept. 28 vs. Iowa. The schedule isn’t too bad to start the season, but with road games at Michigan and Northwestern and a home date against Nebraska to follow, the Gophers can’t afford to give away the Big Ten opener against the hated Hawkeyes. There aren’t any breaks late in the conference slate, either, and while there should be some upsets along the way, every win is critical to go bowling. Beating Iowa could become a must.

There are separate previews for the offense, defense and depth chart, as well.

http://cfn.scout.com/2/1295530.html

 

[die hard gopher]

good read, i think we get 8-9 wins this year beating the 6 teams we should beat being the 4 NC games and iowa and indiana and 2 of either wisconsin, MSU, penn state and the team in our bowl game assuming we get one, i assume we wont get by michigan, nebraska and northwestern, everybody says that iowa is the most important game, i say wiscy/MSU/penn state our the most important and we need to get an upset of one or two of them, i also hope we can, maybe not this year but next year and the year after break through are 8-9 win ceiling and get to an 11-12 win season like iowa and wisconsin have been able to do, even northwestern is poised for an 11-12 win season this year

 

[Miles Tarver]

good read, i think we get 8-9 wins this year beating the 6 teams we should beat being the 4 NC games and iowa and indiana and 2 of either wisconsin, MSU, penn state and the team in our bowl game assuming we get one, i assume we wont get by michigan, nebraska and northwestern, everybody says that iowa is the most important game, i say wiscy/MSU/penn state our the most important and we need to get an upset of one or two of them, i also hope we can, maybe not this year but next year and the year after break through are 8-9 win ceiling and get to an 11-12 win season like iowa and wisconsin have been able to do, even northwestern is poised for an 11-12 win season this year

Your name should be changed to "Die hard homer"

I would love to see you be right, but wow is that prediction pretty lofty

 

[everybody knows my name]

I'm sitting on seven wins. Considering the schedule, 7-5 plus whatever happens in a bowl game looks pretty good to me.

 

[Cayman]

The season will be a success if … the Gophers come up with a winning record and a few big upsets. Yeah, they went 6-7 last season and got to a bowl game, but they feasted off the cupcakes, got by Syracuse, and beat mediocre Purdue and Illinois teams to get to six wins. It was a terrific step forward for a program that fell on hard times, but in Kill’s third season it’s time to start making some more progress. Beating the mediocre teams is a must, but beating a Nebraska or Wisconsin at home would truly make some noise.http://cfn.scout.com/2/1295530.html

People just love to downplay this win for some reason. We held them to 3 points for something like the first 58 minutes of play, and they went on to win 8 games last season. I realize they play in the Big East which isn't very good at football, but I think that's offset by playing a non-conference schedule against 4 BCS teams, 3 of whom went to bowls. In fact you could argue that they were our most impressive win last year. With a non-conference schedule like ours they probably would have won 10 games.

 

[die hard gopher]

Your name should be changed to "Die hard homer"

I would love to see you be right, but wow is that prediction pretty lofty

It's only 2 to 3 more wins then we got last season, and we made a 3 game stride from 2 years ago to last year, i think we have or will make just as much progress from last year to this year as we did from 2 years ago to last year

 

[Big Ten Mind]

good read, i think we get 8-9 wins this year beating the 6 teams we should beat being the 4 NC games and iowa and indiana and 2 of either wisconsin, MSU, penn state and the team in our bowl game assuming we get one, i assume we wont get by michigan, nebraska and northwestern, everybody says that iowa is the most important game, i say wiscy/MSU/penn state our the most important and we need to get an upset of one or two of them, i also hope we can, maybe not this year but next year and the year after break through are 8-9 win ceiling and get to an 11-12 win season like iowa and wisconsin have been able to do, even northwestern is poised for an 11-12 win season this year

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpgPi-A_ou0

Guess it doesn't cost anything to dream however San Jose State and @ Indiana aren't going to be layups let along MI, MSU, WI, NE, and IA

5-7 to 7-5 range seems real to me

 

[Sparlimb]

I'm still down with an 8-4 regular season. The effort in the bowl game was impressive. I hope to see that effort for an entire year...

 

[50PoundHead]

I'm not the most optimistic guy in the world, but if the team plays disciplined, hard-nosed football, I think bowl eligibility is pretty much a given. Talent is getting honed. This will sound inconsistent given some of my light criticism of Kill's comments about needing more time, team is young, etc., but a lot of young guys have gotten more experienced and Kill should be able to shuffle around things on defense based on the situation to get maximum effectiveness. If the offensive line is healthy, we should be fine (but probably not great) on offense.

 

[Deleted_User]

I'm not the most optimistic guy in the world, but if the team plays disciplined, hard-nosed football, I think bowl eligibility is pretty much a given. Talent is getting honed. This will sound inconsistent given some of my light criticism of Kill's comments about needing more time, team is young, etc., but a lot of young guys have gotten more experienced and Kill should be able to shuffle around things on defense based on the situation to get maximum effectiveness. If the offensive line is healthy, we should be fine (but probably not great) on offense.

He accomplished this by recruiting for need. The defensive line has been an area of need since the 70's. Kill gets it. I think that unit will be a better unit this year than last. I think with the rotation along the line, our play against the run will be better than last year. I think fresh bodies is key to a defensive front. We will have plenty of players to rotate and that will translate to a very dangerous unit.

 

[ncgo4]

We find out this year and next if Kill is a real good coach or a miracle worker. At NIU he was a miracle worker...in the Big10 we'll see.

 

[nc2mn]

That's pretty much the way I see it, ncgo4. And I'm looking (hoping?) for miracle worker!

 

[matt]

We find out this year and next if Kill is a real good coach or a miracle worker. At NIU he was a miracle worker...in the Big10 we'll see.

He was not a miracle worker at NIU.

 

[Big Play]

He was not a miracle worker at NIU.

He only recruited most of the guys that played in a BCS bowl game last year and if they still had him they probably would have won!

 

[scools12]

He only recruited most of the guys that played in a BCS bowl game last year and if they still had him they probably would have won!

Did you actually watch NIU's BCS bowl game? It was a complete mismatch and the only reason NIU was even invited was because of the quirk in the selection system.

Taking nothing away from Kill and the job he did at NIU but they didn't belong on the field with Florida St and no they wouldn't have won if Kill was still the NIU coach for the game.

 

[Big Play]

Did you actually watch NIU's BCS bowl game? It was a complete mismatch and the only reason NIU was even invited was because of the quirk in the selection system.

Taking nothing away from Kill and the job he did at NIU but they didn't belong on the field with Florida St and no they wouldn't have won if Kill was still the NIU coach for the game.

Yes I did and it was 17-10 going into 4th Q if Kill was there they would have had more depth and would have had a good chance at winning the game idiot!

 

[Kratos3]

That was surprisingly accurate and insightful.

As far as predictions go, 6 wins should be expected, 7 is attainable, 8 would be a great season, and anything else would win Kill B1G COY.

 

[Kratos3]

Did you actually watch NIU's BCS bowl game? It was a complete mismatch and the only reason NIU was even invited was because of the quirk in the selection system.

Taking nothing away from Kill and the job he did at NIU but they didn't belong on the field with Florida St and no they wouldn't have won if Kill was still the NIU coach for the game.

Maybe not, but when was the last time a MAC team played in a BCS game? Never.

 

[jaymil]

That was surprisingly accurate and insightful.

As far as predictions go, 6 wins should be expected, 7 is attainable, 8 would be a great season, and anything else would win Kill B1G COY.

Yep, I have settled on these assumptions as well. I'd be fully happy with 7 wins.

 

[Parski1]

Starting off (5-0).....we can easily win 2 or 3 more. J1 Bowl territory.

 

[MNVCGUY]

Maybe not, but when was the last time a MAC team played in a BCS game? Never.

It has been discussed before, NIU had a very strong team this past year but there is no way they should have been playing in a BCS game. They got there due to a quirk in the system, they deserved to play in a very good bowl game but did not belong in one of the elite games.

The writeup is pretty solid. Shows what has to happen for the team to take the next step in year three under Kill. And as someone else pointed out these next couple years will really start to show us if Kill can recruit Big Ten caliber players. If he is the coach many here think he is we will continue to see steady improvement over the course of this year and into next year.

 

[Sparlimb]

I'm still down with an 8-4 regular season. The effort in the bowl game was impressive. I hope to see that effort for an entire year...

See, despite what my wife says, I'm right once in a while. At this point in the season, I think I may have undersold our win total...