Expectations Going Forward

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HoustonTXGopher said:
Let me spell it out for everyone one more time. Neither Coyle nor Fleck came to Minnesota to win 7-8 games a year. Fleck came to win championships, define that how you will.
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So did Brewster.
 

Halsey Hall said:
The Big Ten Conference was established in 1895
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I was confused by this when I looked up the records on Wikipedia. It showed us as having been in the Western Conference prior to 1953, yet the Big Ten has existed since the 1890s.
 

John Galt said:
I was confused by this when I looked up the records on Wikipedia. It showed us as having been in the Western Conference prior to 1953, yet the Big Ten has existed since the 1890s.
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I think it has to do with official names vs unofficial names
 


Hates Monikers said:
So you're saying ... what? Since we haven't won a Big Ten championship in 50 years we should stop trying?

I understand that it's hard. But if that's not the goal, what's the point?

The Gophers were right there with Wisconsin and Iowa for years. Then they hired the right coaches and made a commitment and won championships. But we can't?

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I am saying that, in order to meet the expectations that some people are stating, PJ Fleck would have to produce results that have not been seen in 50 years - results only reached by the 2 most successful coaches in program history.

If he does it, great. Build the statue. But, if something has not been done for 50 years, by definition, it is not easy to achieve.

I just prefer realistic expectations. win 8 games in a season, then you can talk about winning 9 or 10 games. Win a division title, then you can talk about a conference title. Win a conference title, then you can talk about national playoffs.

PJ Fleck in his first two seasons has won 5 games and 7 games. from that, some people are claiming that he is going to be one of the most successful coaches in the history of the program. that is a leap of faith I am not prepared to make at this time.
 


short ornery norwegian said:
I am saying that, in order to meet the expectations that some people are stating, PJ Fleck would have to produce results that have not been seen in 50 years - results only reached by the 2 most successful coaches in program history.

If he does it, great. Build the statue. But, if something has not been done for 50 years, by definition, it is not easy to achieve.

I just prefer realistic expectations. win 8 games in a season, then you can talk about winning 9 or 10 games. Win a division title, then you can talk about a conference title. Win a conference title, then you can talk about national playoffs.

PJ Fleck in his first two seasons has won 5 games and 7 games. from that, some people are claiming that he is going to be one of the most successful coaches in the history of the program. that is a leap of faith I am not prepared to make at this time.
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I'm not looking to start an argument here, but I'm amazed at the low expectations. Why on earth would you hire a new coach, let him work like a fiend at recruiting and at building a program — if the expectation is 8 wins?

What does 8 wins do for the program here at the U, long-term? Nothing, really. We've already seen 8 wins, more than a few times, in that 50 years you refer to. It never really got us anywhere, in point of fact. It didn't move the needle much at all. It certainly didn't change how the program is viewed.

I believe Fleck and Coyle are shooting higher than that. They certainly should be.
 

I would rather PJF average 7 wins a year and have them come like (5, 7, 12, 3, 8) than I would have them come (6, 7, 8, 7, 7). I think the reasonable among us don't expect what Wisconsin has had the past decade averaging 10 wins a season. We would like it, and it's possible to achieve, but it's not a reasonable expectation.

I'm simply dying for our special football season though. Us and Indiana are the only B1G schools who haven't had one in modern times, and they at least have basketball. Even Rutgers was #2 in the nation at one point under Schiano. I would take the lumps for a couple years to have one. I don't care if the net is only an average 7 win/yr program...I want our big year.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
I am saying that, in order to meet the expectations that some people are stating, PJ Fleck would have to produce results that have not been seen in 50 years - results only reached by the 2 most successful coaches in program history.

If he does it, great. Build the statue. But, if something has not been done for 50 years, by definition, it is not easy to achieve.

I just prefer realistic expectations. win 8 games in a season, then you can talk about winning 9 or 10 games. Win a division title, then you can talk about a conference title. Win a conference title, then you can talk about national playoffs.

PJ Fleck in his first two seasons has won 5 games and 7 games. from that, some people are claiming that he is going to be one of the most successful coaches in the history of the program. that is a leap of faith I am not prepared to make at this time.
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I think we should have expectations as least as high as Wisconsin, Iowa and Northwestern. That should be our goal. In the 80's both Northwestern and Wisconsin were worse than the Gophers are now. Until the 80's and Hayden Fry, the same would be said of the Hawkeyes. Hopefully PJ Fleck is our Barry Alvarez, Hayden Fry and Pat Fitzgerald. I don't understand how some people have such low expectations that they think 9 wins in a season, while the two signature wins that season are against a 8-5 Washington State team and 7-6 Northwestern team, is supposed to be great. When PJ Fleck became coach....he seemed to talk differently than any other Gopher coach I had heard before as far as team expectations. For the first time as a Gopher fan, I felt we had a coach who truly had expectations that matched the expectations of Wisconsin, Iowa and Northwestern.
 

I think this might be an issue with definitions. I think I just define "expectations" differently than some people on this thread.

What you call expectations, I would call hopes or dreams.

Now, please understand - there is nothing wrong with having hopes or dreams.

But, there is still a difference between saying I hope to get a raise at work versus I expect to get a raise at work. (in real life, I neither hope nor expect to get a raise from my cheap-ass bosses)

I have very few expectations in life. That is just my nature. I try to be as realistic as possible. If things turn out better than I thought, that's great. I just don't plan on it - because I accept that life, and sports, rarely turn out the way we want.

If the Gophers win 9 games next year, I will be very happy. I just don't "expect" them to win 9 games, because I understand all the variables involved. I don't expect to win the lottery, but I still buy tickets. I don't expect to win the Publishers Clearinghouse sweepstakes, but I still enter online. Because it would be fun to win. I just don't expect it.
 



short ornery norwegian said:
I think this might be an issue with definitions. I think I just define "expectations" differently than some people on this thread.

What you call expectations, I would call hopes or dreams.

Now, please understand - there is nothing wrong with having hopes or dreams.

But, there is still a difference between saying I hope to get a raise at work versus I expect to get a raise at work. (in real life, I neither hope nor expect to get a raise from my cheap-ass bosses)

I have very few expectations in life. That is just my nature. I try to be as realistic as possible. If things turn out better than I thought, that's great. I just don't plan on it - because I accept that life, and sports, rarely turn out the way we want.

If the Gophers win 9 games next year, I will be very happy. I just don't "expect" them to win 9 games, because I understand all the variables involved. I don't expect to win the lottery, but I still buy tickets. I don't expect to win the Publishers Clearinghouse sweepstakes, but I still enter online. Because it would be fun to win. I just don't expect it.
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I didn't mean any disrespect towards you with my post. I'd be a little let down if we only won 8 games next year, and disappointed if we won less than that. I wouldn't be surprised if we saw a big jump. Some day we will have a coach who comes to the University of Minnesota that will bring our program to the level of where Iowa, Wisconsin and Northwestern have been. Mason almost got us there. I think there are a lot of people on this forum who think Fleck will be that coach. Five, six, seven, eight and even nine wins is not going to move the needle. Winning the B1G West and going to the B1G Championship will. If PJ Fleck never makes it to a B1G Championship game while at the U, he will not live up to my expectations.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
I think this might be an issue with definitions. I think I just define "expectations" differently than some people on this thread.

What you call expectations, I would call hopes or dreams.

Now, please understand - there is nothing wrong with having hopes or dreams.

But, there is still a difference between saying I hope to get a raise at work versus I expect to get a raise at work. (in real life, I neither hope nor expect to get a raise from my cheap-ass bosses)

I have very few expectations in life. That is just my nature. I try to be as realistic as possible. If things turn out better than I thought, that's great. I just don't plan on it - because I accept that life, and sports, rarely turn out the way we want.

If the Gophers win 9 games next year, I will be very happy. I just don't "expect" them to win 9 games, because I understand all the variables involved. I don't expect to win the lottery, but I still buy tickets. I don't expect to win the Publishers Clearinghouse sweepstakes, but I still enter online. Because it would be fun to win. I just don't expect it.
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That is a valid take. I want the team to be competitive; a team that can be competitive in almost every game and a team that is usually competitive for a B1G West title. I believe that the team can be that good. I believe that PJ can get the team there. Like others, I really hope that we can have a dream season every decade or so. I think that you have to be a consistent 8-9 win team to increase your chances of everything falling into place in your dream year. Outside of the helmet schools, I don't think that expecting conference championships is realistic. Everything is stacked against us. The "helmet schools" are hard to dethrone. Since 2005 (yes I cherry-picked that year) tOSU has 8 titles or shares, then if I counted right PSU, MSU, and Becky have three each. Wisconsin is the only current Western Division team to win a conference title since they implemented the conference title game and they did that in the old leaders/legends configuration. I would take an 11-2 season with a loss to a playoff-bound tOSU in the B1G title game with the consolation prize of a trip to the Rose Bowl. A B1G title would be gravy. If tOSU can remain a national power through their coaching change it will be tough to win a conference title. It will be interesting to watch Wisconsin over the next few years. Will they fall back to mediocre or will they get back up to to the top of the conference. With all their recent success I feel like Wisconsin is the team that could possibly become a helmet school. Can Nebraska regain their helmet school status? What would it take for the Gophers to become a helmet school?

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Gophers_4life said:
Not saying this will be wrong at all ...... but man that feels kinda droopy.

Why can't we do what Wisconsin has done?? Why is that impossible?
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The administration at the U. That’s why.


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John Galt said:
It also happened 100% of the time in 2016 and 2003. You seem to be cherry picking results for some reason. Would love to hear the rationale for just picking those 4 seasons?

I also said in my initial post the threshold I used was winning 67% of games in a season, or winning at least 2 out of 3 games. We've only accomplished that twice since 2000, as 8-5 doesn't meet the criteria.
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Are you suggesting that winning at the clip you’ve proposed for “success” 3x in the 4 years is cherry picking results?

It’s looking at the recent trend - which Fleck is working from and saying, yeah that’s not unreasonable and should be expected.

Personally, I don’t think you can compare the situations at all. Fleck has the deck stacked in his favor in ways no coach has at the U since 1961. 67% is a minimum expectation for me going forward. I expect 8 wins next year and barring some strange set of circumstances going forward (think Wisconsin this year) I don’t expect him to fall below 7 wins again.

Because that would be an upgrade from where we’ve been.


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CoMn said:
PJ has a much harder schedule than Kill ever had. I remember Kill would say how important it was to make sure the team was bowl eligible so they could have the extra 3 weeks of practice. He mostly scheduled fluff games for non-conference. Fleck has scheduled three teams that played in Bowls for next year. Minnesota's non-conference opponents had 2018 records of 10-3, 10-3 and 12-2. I won't say Kill was wrong in wanting those 3 extra weeks of practice. But I think PJ will be preparing the team to beat the best teams in the league. But playing this kind of non-conference schedule might not give us those automatic 3 wins every year.
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Really? How many times has Fleck played the #2 team in the country in the non-con schedule?

Never is a big word.....


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short ornery norwegian said:
so, we seem to have people who expect, or believe, that Fleck is going to reach a level of success that Gopher FB has not seen since Bierman and Warmath.

hey, if it happens, that's great. Just saying that means that the Gophers would have to start recruiting on a level that this program has never reached in the modern era. the early 60's teams were boosted by segregation in the south, sending black athletes to northern schools. That situation no longer exists.
Some of the other great Gopher teams were boosted by older players returning from WWII. That situation no longer exists.

so, all Fleck has to do to meet some people's expectations is to recruit at a level never seen in the modern era, and win games at a frequency only seen in years when the Gophers were contending for National honors. good luck.
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While I’d argue Fleck is resources no coach has had since 1961, we still have an administration that is Charlie Brown like in their support of athletics in general, and football in particular. That culture isn’t changing with PJ Fleck. The only AD we’ve had with the balls to tackle it was Tom Moe and on that front only because he knew he wasn’t the long term fix so had rope to work with.

We’ll see if the new prez is our Donna Shalala or another sheep in wolves clothing like Kaler.


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CoMn said:
PJ has a much harder schedule than Kill ever had. I remember Kill would say how important it was to make sure the team was bowl eligible so they could have the extra 3 weeks of practice. He mostly scheduled fluff games for non-conference. Fleck has scheduled three teams that played in Bowls for next year. Minnesota's non-conference opponents had 2018 records of 10-3, 10-3 and 12-2.
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Did PJ set the 2019 schedule or were those games already set before he was hired? Most are set years in advance so I wonder how much PJ had to do with it?

Even so, the non-con record for SDSU and GA Southern need to be taken with a grain of salt as they play in relatively low-level conferences (or FCS in the case of the Jackrabbits).

Fresno is legit, although they will probably not be as good next year as they were this year.

Looking at future opponents to see what PJ wants to do in the non-con shows me:
2020: FAU, Tennessee Tech, BYU
2021: Miami of Ohio, Bowling Green, Colorado
2022: New Mexico St., Colorado
2023: Eastern Michigan, North Carolina
2024: North Carolina
2025: Bowling Green, BYU

These don't seem all that different than what we saw during Brewster/Kill. (now Mason.....he was the king of the cream puff schedule)

By the way - didn't we used to have Mississippi State on the non-con schedule down the road? When did they get dropped?
 
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I thought Kill postponed the UNC games because he wanted to be Bowl eligible. That might be a smart strategy. I personally think no FCS and one decent P5 team in the NC is the way to go. I like playing teams like UNC and Colorado. I might travel to both.

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rugger14 said:
I thought Kill postponed the UNC games because he wanted to be Bowl eligible. That might be a smart strategy. I personally think no FCS and one decent P5 team in the NC is the way to go. I like playing teams like UNC and Colorado. I might travel to both.
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Kill demanded that Teague cancel those games to increase his chances of making a bowl game. He felt that in the early stages it was important to make a bowl game to get those extra practices and build some excitement around the program.
 

I think people are arguing over the definition of expectations.
When someone says, "I'm expecting 7-8 wins" the response is "Fleck and Coyle should be shooting for higher than that".

That's two different things.
The first one is "If I had to bet with Vegas, I'd expect 7-8 wins".
What Coyle and Fleck are shooting for is to win every game.

But I've said on here a couple times is I have hopeful expectations we could go 10-2 in 2019.

But....
if we lose our 3 best QB's in the first game of the season, or some scandal comes out that makes 33 players ineligible, 3 wins might be the cap.

In the end, all we can do is set our own expectations and enjoy the season.
I'm hoping for 10 wins. Will I be disappointed with 9 or 8? Unlikely.
6 or 7? Possibly. Depends on what happens.
 

Face The Facts said:
I think people are arguing over the definition of expectations.
When someone says, "I'm expecting 7-8 wins" the response is "Fleck and Coyle should be shooting for higher than that".

That's two different things.
The first one is "If I had to bet with Vegas, I'd expect 7-8 wins".
What Coyle and Fleck are shooting for is to win every game.

But I've said on here a couple times is I have hopeful expectations we could go 10-2 in 2019.

But....
if we lose our 3 best QB's in the first game of the season, or some scandal comes out that makes 33 players ineligible, 3 wins might be the cap.

In the end, all we can do is set our own expectations and enjoy the season.
I'm hoping for 10 wins. Will I be disappointed with 9 or 8? Unlikely.
6 or 7? Possibly. Depends on what happens.
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Good post.

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fmlizard said:
I would rather PJF average 7 wins a year and have them come like (5, 7, 12, 3, 8) than I would have them come (6, 7, 8, 7, 7). I think the reasonable among us don't expect what Wisconsin has had the past decade averaging 10 wins a season. We would like it, and it's possible to achieve, but it's not a reasonable expectation.

I'm simply dying for our special football season though. Us and Indiana are the only B1G schools who haven't had one in modern times, and they at least have basketball. Even Rutgers was #2 in the nation at one point under Schiano. I would take the lumps for a couple years to have one. I don't care if the net is only an average 7 win/yr program...I want our big year.
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You know, folks...

... I was born in St. Paul, and I am a life-long Minnesotan. I have lived here my entire 62 years.

And yet my fellow Minnesotans still, sometimes, astonish me. We are truly a unique breed.

Is there any other fanbase in college football that would openly say what I bolded in the quote? Can you picture a Michigan fan saying that about Ohio State? An Auburn or Georgia fan making the same concession speech about Alabama? Florida fan, Florida State?

What's next? Are we going to concede that we shouldn't "expect" what Iowa or Northwestern has had recently?

Good grief, people.

That is just INCREDIBLY depressing. No wonder we haven't won anything in 50 years!
 

RememberMurray said:
You know, folks...

... I was born in St. Paul, and I am a life-long Minnesotan. I have lived here my entire 62 years.

And yet my fellow Minnesotans still, sometimes, astonish me. We are truly a unique breed.

Is there any other fanbase in college football that would openly say what I bolded in the quote? Can you picture a Michigan fan saying that about Ohio State? An Auburn or Georgia fan making the same concession speech about Alabama? Florida fan, Florida State?

What's next? Are we going to concede that we shouldn't "expect" what Iowa or Northwestern has had recently?

Good grief, people.

That is just INCREDIBLY depressing. No wonder we haven't won anything in 50 years!
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Go ahead and "expect" or "demand" greatness. I want greatness but it takes a long time. There is no reason that we can't have Wisconsin success but it will take a lot of good fortune. 3 B1G titles in this century is good. No natties and no CFP appearances. Becky is not a helmet school. Holy cow I want to be as good as they have been and they are still a second rate football school.

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I expect at least 8 wins this fall, more like 9 or possibly 10. The ceiling for the Gophers program in the future is higher than the Badgers in my mind given the type of player I see on the Wisconsin team the last 10 years. Sure they are good but not good enough to compete with OSU. This is new territory for us Gopher fans, it is hard to see the future but we will be happy campers with Fleck here and 9 or 10 wins will be the floor. If you were at the Purdue game you saw how the team looked with Shannon Brooks in the backfield. Yes, Mo is very good and will be fun to watch but if healthy Brooks and Smith behind the returning offensive line will be better than Maroney and Barber. Save Mo for 2020 if at all possible.
 

It boils down to this:

Are the Minnesota Golden Gophers and the Wisconsin Badgers actually RIVALS in football?

If your answer to that question is YES, then I don't see how you can also say that the level of success achieved by the Wisconsin football team is out of reach for Gopher football.

The two things are contradictory.

What's more, I don't see what we as fans could possibly stand to gain by waving that particular type of white flag.

It makes no sense to me.
 

RememberMurray said:
It boils down to this:

Are the Minnesota Golden Gophers and the Wisconsin Badgers actually RIVALS in football?

If your answer to that question is YES, then I don't see how you can also say that the level of success achieved by the Wisconsin football team is out of reach for Gopher football.

The two things are contradictory.

What's more, I don't see what we as fans could possibly stand to gain by waving that particular type of white flag.

It makes no sense to me.
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Are people questioning that the program can't reach wi level success? News to me.
 



RememberMurray said:
You know, folks...

... I was born in St. Paul, and I am a life-long Minnesotan. I have lived here my entire 62 years.

And yet my fellow Minnesotans still, sometimes, astonish me. We are truly a unique breed.

Is there any other fanbase in college football that would openly say what I bolded in the quote? Can you picture a Michigan fan saying that about Ohio State? An Auburn or Georgia fan making the same concession speech about Alabama? Florida fan, Florida State?

What's next? Are we going to concede that we shouldn't "expect" what Iowa or Northwestern has had recently?

Good grief, people.

That is just INCREDIBLY depressing. No wonder we haven't won anything in 50 years!
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I don't think Wisconsin fans could have reasonably expected what they got over some of their runs. Frankly, almost no fanbase should expect that. Not with the basic disadvantages Wisconsin has to work with. Does that mean we should believe it to be impossible? No!

I wish I didn't have to use Wisconsin as the example, but frankly they are the best example nationally of my point. Their success in a very similar situation as the Gophers should be the proof it's possible that keeps us going.

There's been very few programs that have elevated into the annual top 15 teams when they were far from it before. Expecting that is likely to leave a person disappointed. The far more reasonable goal is something like Iowa where we're almost never awful, consistently good, and occasionally great. It's the stopover on the way to the top Wisconsin and Oregon did between 1993-200x. That would be a big step up for Gopher football.
 

caliGopher said:
The administration at the U. That’s why.
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Maybe that was true in the past .... but I feel at least since Kaler that the admin has not been actively trying to sabotage the success of football. He told Maturi to hire the best football coach he thought he could, and he got Kill. He hired Coyle and told Coyle to hire the best football coach he think he could, and he got Fleck.

New stadium, new practice facilities. And I really doubt that, within reason, Fleck is being denied any request for the team due to monetary issues.


I feel that they've been giving the football team every thing they possibly can, to do the best that they can do, at least since Kill was hired.

Someone please correct me if this is simply wrong.


(note: firing Claeys isn't a valid example in my opinion, because they went right to work to hire the best coach they thought they could get ...... some even argue that they fired Claeys in ORDER to go after a specific coach .... so that would not be a valid example of trying to sabotage the success of the team)
 

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