Fleck's Good Wins at Minnesota

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swede2 said:
You ignore my premise - the program has been built, it is no longer being built. 2019 is ancient history and was accomplished in part with players from the previous regime. Where is the indication that the program has been on an upward trajectory since 2019? I of course allowed that perhaps PJ could be adept at navigating the new revenue sharing environment and improve, which is the great unknown. But, 2019 was an outlier and we have what we have. Many believe, like I do, that this is as good as it gets. Many are satisfied with that.
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Your premise ignores facts. PJ has won more than 9 games, and he has had the Gophers “within sniffing distance of the CFP.” Those are facts.
 

IceBoxGopher said:
I think the West Division gave an "easier" path relatively speaking, but it was always a little more complex. It was a competitive division, Jeff Brohm could get that offense rolling, Chryst had consistently solid teams, Ferentz can obviously coach and Bielema strengthened Illinois when he arrived. Plus Fitz got a lot out of Northwestern and Nebraska at least had talent to compete.

Looking at the Big Ten as a whole, Michigan and Ohio State were consistently, Franklin has had Penn State in a good spot, for a good chunk of time Dantonio had Michigan State in a good spot.

I have wondered about the Mason era and a little bit before, though. Was an interesting time for the Big Ten for a while. You had Glen Mason rebuilding Minnesota, Alvarez rolling at Wisconsin, Carr doing good work at Michigan, Tiller resurrecting Purdue, John Cooper being pretty good at Ohio State and then Tressel taking over, plus Penn State entering the picture.
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I agree that the West was competitive -- with each other.

When the conference title game came around, the East was 10-0 in the 10 years of the East/West structure. The average score was 35.2 to 14.5. The last three had an average score of 37 to 8.

While there were a few close games early on, the West was an annual competition to see who would get beaten up by the East champion. I think we're better off back in the no-division, single-conference format.
 

matt said:
Your premise ignores facts. PJ has won more than 9 games, and he has had the Gophers “within sniffing distance of the CFP.” Those are facts.
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You obviously don't know what a premise is. Let's consider 2019 Heather. As you know we finished the season ranked what, 10 in the CFP rankings? With 2 wins against teams with winning records. How many times has PJ won 11 games since? -0- How many times has PJ won 10 games since? -0-. How many times has he won 9 games since? -2- How many times has he won 8 games since? -1-. How many times has he won 7 games since? -0- How many times has he won 6 games since? -1-. We won't consider the covid season -3- even though all teams faced the same adversity. PJ has averaged 7.8 wins here (not counting Covid -3-). The trend is towards fewer wins since the almighty glory days of 19 (9,9,6,8), or 8 wins per year. What facts refute the premise that the program is no longer building and is"built?" Or to put it another way, what evidence is there that the team is improving?
 

Let's accept ( for a moment) the premise that 2019 was the peak, and the program has been stuck in place since.

How many college programs have improved year-over-year from an 11 win season with a Top 10 national ranking?
 

caliGopher said:
I agree that the West was competitive -- with each other.

When the conference title game came around, the East was 10-0 in the 10 years of the East/West structure. The average score was 35.2 to 14.5. The last three had an average score of 37 to 8.

While there were a few close games early on, the West was an annual competition to see who would get beaten up by the East champion. I think we're better off back in the no-division, single-conference format.
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This has been debated on this board many times.

The East was top-heavy, with average to below average teams beneath the top 3. Ohio State and Michigan and Penn State were then exactly what they remain to this day: blue bloods.

The West was much more evenly balanced. Scrappy teams that played each other tough, jostling for the division.

Sorry, but there's simply nothing new here. Maybe you have a larger point you'd like to make?
 


RememberMurray said:
Let's accept ( for a moment) the premise that 2019 was the peak, and the program has been stuck in place since.

How many college programs have improved year-over-year from an 11 win season with a Top 10 national ranking?
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This isn't about other programs. This is about PJ'S Minnesota. The thread within the thread started with an assertion that PJ is "building" a program (and some other malarkey that we are a top 25 program and on the cusp of CFP contention). I maintain that in fact the program isn't building, it is built; it is what it is. I allowed that perhaps PJ will be a profit sharing savant and that assessment could change but after 8 seasons, what we have is what we have and even acknowledged that PJ has punched above his weight when considering recruiting rankings to on field results. Heather took offense but obviously isn't aware of the statistics or didn't comprhend the premise of my take.
 

swede2 said:
You obviously don't know what a premise is. Let's consider 2019 Heather. As you know we finished the season ranked what, 10 in the CFP rankings? With 2 wins against teams with winning records. How many times has PJ won 11 games since? -0- How many times has PJ won 10 games since? -0-. How many times has he won 9 games since? -2- How many times has he won 8 games since? -1-. How many times has he won 7 games since? -0- How many times has he won 6 games since? -1-. We won't consider the covid season -3- even though all teams faced the same adversity. PJ has averaged 7.8 wins here (not counting Covid -3-). The trend is towards fewer wins since the almighty glory days of 19 (9,9,6,8), or 8 wins per year. What facts refute the premise that the program is no longer building and is"built?" Or to put it another way, what evidence is there that the team is improving?
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In his years 5-8, PJ Fleck went 32-20 (19-17).
In his years 5-8, Barry A went 27-19-3 (15-15-2).

Both coaches had one good year in their first four. Do you suppose @swede1 was out lamenting the program going into Barry’s year 9? Complaining that there was an artificial ceiling on the program and that the team could never improve?
 

How many teams have hit a High mark and then have to shut everything down due to a Virus. The uncertainty of 2020 was horrible most teams but, I believe it was really tough on the Gophers to build on the 2019 teams success.
 

swede2 said:
This isn't about other programs. This is about PJ'S Minnesota. The thread within the thread started with an assertion that PJ is "building" a program (and some other malarkey that we are a top 25 program and on the cusp of CFP contention). I maintain that in fact the program isn't building, it is built; it is what it is. I allowed that perhaps PJ will be a profit sharing savant and that assessment could change but after 8 seasons, what we have is what we have and even acknowledged that PJ has punched above his weight when considering recruiting rankings to on field results. Heather took offense but obviously isn't aware of the statistics or didn't comprhend the premise of my take.
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Of course it's about programs.

Your premise is that the Gophers are "no longer building" this program because the won-loss record hasn't improved since 2019. But all programs are always building; it's the nature of the beast. Players graduate, move on. Coaches replace those players. Recruiting, scouting, lining up transfers. All of that constitutes building — and re-building. It's how this all works.

Minnesota isn't Ohio State, and probably never will be. But Minnesota has definitely made strides under Fleck. This is a program that kids want to play for. This is a program Minnesotans can be proud of. Look at the offer lists of the recruits.
 
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matt said:
In his years 5-8, PJ Fleck went 32-20 (19-17).
In his years 5-8, Barry A went 27-19-3 (15-15-2).

Both coaches had one good year in their first four. Do you suppose @swede1 was out lamenting the program going into Barry’s year 9? Complaining that there was an artificial ceiling on the program and that the team could never improve?
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Great points.
 

swede2 said:
This isn't about other programs. This is about PJ'S Minnesota. The thread within the thread started with an assertion that PJ is "building" a program (and some other malarkey that we are a top 25 program and on the cusp of CFP contention). I maintain that in fact the program isn't building, it is built; it is what it is. I allowed that perhaps PJ will be a profit sharing savant and that assessment could change but after 8 seasons, what we have is what we have and even acknowledged that PJ has punched above his weight when considering recruiting rankings to on field results. Heather took offense but obviously isn't aware of the statistics or didn't comprhend the premise of my take.
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Referring to a fellow poster as "Heather" because they happen to disagree with you is lame. Stick to your argument(s) and you'll sound more convincing.
 

caliGopher said:
There are three kinds of lies. Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics - Mark Twain.

This post aims to highlight that you are not comparing apples to apples when evaluating Fleck's conference record in comparison to previous coaches, without taking anything away from Fleck's accomplishments.

There have been numerous changes in college football during Fleck's tenure. The most significant impact on any comparison like this is that Fleck has played more B1G games per season (9) than all previous coaches (8), except Claeys, who had 9 games as well in his one full season.

Additionally, not all schedules are created equally. When you look at the number of ranked opponents per season, Fleck averages 2.375, the lowest of all of the coaches since Holtz. Mason played the most ranked opponents per season at 3.2. Thus Fleck played on average 2 more games against non-ranked opponents (1.825) than Mason did in conference. All of this said, Fleck's winning percentage against ranked opponents is the highest at 26% which can't be overlooked.

Furthermore, the conference had divisions for only the Kill, Claeys, and the first 7 years of the Fleck tenure. Kill coached in the Legends Division with Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Nebraska and Northwestern for three years (with 3 of those teams in the top 25 in 2011 and 2012, and the number 3 team in the country in 2013) and two years in the West (which was stronger early on that it was in the later part of its existence, when it was considered teh weakest division in all of the P5.

Finally, the situations coaches inherited are very different, which has an impact on results in the first few years of the program.

For example, Gutekunst took over from Holtz after two years. The team had won 7 conf. games the two years before Gutey took over, and was 6-5 (4-4) the year before, making a bowl game in a year there were 18 bowl games.

Mason took over from Wacker, who had won a total of 8 B1G games over 5 years and finished with one B1G win per year in the three years before Mason was hired.

Brewster took over from Mason who won 7 conf. games in the two years before he took over and had been to five consecutive bowl games (28 bowl games in the first 4 years, 32 in the last year).

Kill took over from Brewster/Horton who won 5 B1G games in the two years prior, but had signficant issues with grades and lack of discipline on the team.

Claeys was a part of the program that he took over, similar to Gutekunst. The transition was unusual, but there was continuity in the program and coaching staff that Gutey didn't have.

Fleck took over a team that had won seven conference games in the previous two years, including five the year before he assumed the role. He also inherited some roster issues due to injury (OL), recruiting failures (QB), and fallout from the SA scandal.

The numbers clearly demonstrate what we already knew: Wacker and Brewster performed below the other coaches in this conversation.

If you look below, Fleck is stronger in key areas but weaker in one critical area. Overall, I'd say that the program is in great shape and heading in the right direction. However, if you argue that this is a step forward, the step forward is that we are more consistently in a position to take the next step, not that we've actually taken it. Mason, Kill/Claeys, and Fleck are different variations of the same thing with different strengths, weaknesses, and upside.

Fleck's higher winning percentage against ranked teams is offset by the lower winning percentage against non-ranked teams. Fleck's weak point is the lower winning percentage against unranked opponents, winning 29 of 53 games, which is why I say the program may be in better shape than at any time in the past 40 years, but not in another tier above where Mason and Kill/Claeys got the program. I agree with the idea that there is more stability and more possibilities in the program today than in the past 40 years. However, in 8 seasons, we still haven't converted these possibilities into results. When we do that, then we've taken the next step. In total, the program has come a long way in 40 years, but as they say in marathon running, there are two halves to a marathon: the first 20 miles and the last 6. We need to finish this marathon. We can and we will, the question is when.

Notes:
  1. The Michigan ranking was omitted from the total of ranked games as it pulls Fleck's winning percentage against ranked teams down (unfairly in my opinion) when ranking was impossible to reflect any indication of the team's capabilities during that season.
  2. Because .500 seasons were a bigger reality pre-9 game conference season, I've included .500 seasons vs. only winning conference records since the results of winning records only are included in MNVCGUY's post above, and it provides some additional perspective for coaches that were making progress as the program rose from the ashes.
  3. Bolded numbers indicate the best mark in those numbers.

Gutey
B1G Games per season: 48
B1G Games per season: 8
B1G ranked opponents: 15
Average # of B1G ranked Opponents per season: 2.5
% of games against B1G ranked opponents: 31%
Winning % against B1G ranked opponents: 20%
% of games against B1G unranked opponents: 33
Winning % against B1G non-ranked opponents: 82%
.500+ Seasons: 3

Wacker
B1G Games: 40
B1G Games per season: 8
B1G ranked opponents: 13
Average # of B1G ranked Opponents per season: 2.6
Percentage of games against B1G ranked opponents: 33%
Winning % against B1G ranked opponents: 0%
% of games against B1G unranked opponents: 69%
Winning % against B1G non-ranked opponents:
.500+ Seasons: 0

Mason
B1G Games: 80
B1G Games per season: 8
B1G ranked opponents: 32
Average # of B1G ranked Opponents per season: 3.2
Percentage of games against B1G ranked opponents: 40%
Winning % against B1G ranked opponents: 9%
Winning % against B1G non-ranked opponents: 60%
.500+ Seasons: 4

Brewster
B1G Games:
B1G Games per season: 8
B1G ranked opponents:
Average # of B1G ranked Opponents per season:
Percentage of games against B1G ranked opponents:
Winning % against B1G ranked opponents:
% of games against B1G unranked opponents:
Winning % against B1G non-ranked opponents:
.500 Seasons:

Kill
B1G Games: 34 (1 partial season)
B1G Games per season: 8 (he only coached 3 B1G games in his final season.
B1G ranked opponents: 13
Average # of B1G ranked Opponents per season: 3 (only 1 of 3 games in his final partional season)
Percentage of games against B1G ranked opponents: 38%
Winning % against B1G ranked opponents: 15%
Winning % against B1G non-ranked opponents: 62%
.500+ Seasons: 2

Claeys
B1G Games: 14 (1 partial season)
B1G Games per season: 9 (he coached 5 B1G games in the partial season)
B1G ranked opponents: 5
Average # of B1G ranked Opponents per season: 8.5 (including the season he split with Kill).
Percentage of games against B1G ranked opponents: 36%
Winning % against B1G ranked opponents: 0%
% of games against B1G unranked opponents: 64%
Winning % against B1G non-ranked opponents: 75%
.500 Seasons: 1

Fleck
B1G Games: 72
B1G Games per season: 9
B1G ranked opponents: 19
Average # of B1G ranked Opponents per season: 2.375
Percentage of games against B1G ranked opponents: 26%
Winning % against B1G ranked opponents: 26%
% of games against B1G unranked opponents: 74%
Winning % against B1G non-ranked opponents: 55%
+.500 Seasons: 4
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Wow! Did ChatGPT help with this?
 




RememberMurray said:
Of course it's about programs.

Your premise is that the Gophers are "no longer building" this program because the won-loss record hasn't improved since 2019. But all programs are always building; it's the nature of the beast. Players graduate, move on. Coaches replace those players. Recruiting, scouting, lining up transfers. All of that constitutes building — and re-building. It's how this all works.

Minnesota isn't Ohio State, and probably never will be. But Minnesota has definitely made strides under Fleck. This is a program that kids want to play for. This is a program Minnesotans can be proud of. Look at the offer lists of the
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Sure, there's the year over year turnover that occurs. But the original premise is that this is a program that's changing or transforming, as if this is still year "zero." But the overall structure remains the same. This program is built out. What's different today from 2017 or 2019? No one is suggesting MN is, can be or should be Ohio State. Again, if you'll follow the thread, I allowed that many, me included, think this is a good as it gets and many, you apparently included, are satisfied with that.
 

PJ is clearly a notch or two above his recent predecessors including Kill and Mason. He’s the best coach we’ve had in over 50 years.

He also got the advantage of playing in the Big Ten west and having 9 conference games while Mason was playing Michigan and Ohio State every year. Not to mention PJ has had practically the easiest bowl match-ups possible with the exception of Auburn in 2019. He doesn’t need to apologize for it because he’s taken care of business and can’t control the draw, but it is the reality.

Both of these can be true.
 

matt said:
In his years 5-8, PJ Fleck went 32-20 (19-17).
In his years 5-8, Barry A went 27-19-3 (15-15-2).

Both coaches had one good year in their first four. Do you suppose @swede1 was out lamenting the program going into Barry’s year 9? Complaining that there was an artificial ceiling on the program and that the team could never improve?
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Your comparison actually supports my point. But Alvarez took a team that had 1 winning season (none in the Big 10) the entire decade prior and won a Big 10 championship and Rose Bowl in year 4. Fleck took a team that won 7 games the year before year "zero" and went backwards before ascending the lofty heights of being runner up in the Big 10 Mountain West division. I would argue that Barry had already built his program as well by year 9 and had hit his ceiling. Did that mean he didn't have better or worse seasons? Of course not. You noted that years 5-9 weren't great seasons, but year 9 saw another Rose Bowl for the skunks and he would win another Big 10 championship and make 2 more trips to Pasadena. But he never got over that hump. He built his program and had what he had. Fleck has built his and has what he has. Fleck hasn't whiffed Alverez's success but to date, the career arcs are fairly similar. I would ask again, what evidence is there that this program is still being "built?"
 

John Galt said:
PJ is clearly a notch or two above his recent predecessors including Kill and Mason. He’s the best coach we’ve had in over 50 years.

He also got the advantage of playing in the Big Ten west and having 9 conference games while Mason was playing Michigan and Ohio State every year. Not to mention PJ has had practically the easiest bowl match-ups possible with the exception of Auburn in 2019. He doesn’t need to apologize for it because he’s taken care of business and can’t control the draw, but it is the reality.

Both of these can be true.
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I agree with most of this although I would note that it's hard to compare to some extent considering the lack of institutional support for several decades. I think the support now is still lacking but it's better than where it was 30 years ago.
 

caliGopher said:
I agree that the West was competitive -- with each other.

When the conference title game came around, the East was 10-0 in the 10 years of the East/West structure. The average score was 35.2 to 14.5. The last three had an average score of 37 to 8.

While there were a few close games early on, the West was an annual competition to see who would get beaten up by the East champion. I think we're better off back in the no-division, single-conference format.
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I don't have the numbers in front of me, but I think you'd be surprised at how even east vs west was overall. The east was very top heavy but the bottom was brutally bad.
 
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John Galt said:
PJ is clearly a notch or two above his recent predecessors including Kill and Mason. He’s the best coach we’ve had in over 50 years.
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Yeah, sure. Whatever.

What I want to know: is the program still being "built", or not? Let's focus on something important!
 

caliGopher said:
I agree that the West was competitive -- with each other.

When the conference title game came around, the East was 10-0 in the 10 years of the East/West structure. The average score was 35.2 to 14.5. The last three had an average score of 37 to 8.

While there were a few close games early on, the West was an annual competition to see who would get beaten up by the East champion. I think we're better off back in the no-division, single-conference format.
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If you had two divisions:
Ohio state
Nebraska
Purdue
Indiana
Northwestern
Rutgers
Illinois

Minnesota
Nebraska
Penn state
Michigan
Iowa
Michigan State
Wisconsin

There is no doubt the bottom division is better and there is no doubt the top division would’ve won like 80% of the conference titles during the tressel, meyer, day era



I don’t mind one division but with no round robin scheduling the possibility is greater the best team doesn’t make the conference title game.
Penn state lost to Ohio state but went anyways because they missed Oregon.
The best team in the big ten didn’t make the title game last year.
Yes Ohio state lost to Michigan, but Oregon and Penn state didn’t play Michigan.


The issue with the divisions was you usually got the best team vs the third or fourth best team rather than top 2.
Last year we got 1 vs 3 anyways.
The issue with divisions was imbalanced scheduling. That problem, in my opinion, is worse in the new setup.
 
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swede2 said:
I agree with most of this although I would note that it's hard to compare to some extent considering the lack of institutional support for several decades. I think the support now is still lacking but it's better than where it was 30 years ago.
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The support is 100x better today. For most of the past 50 years the administration could have cared less about football.
 

John Galt said:
The support is 100x better today. For most of the past 50 years the administration could have cared less about football.
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It could still be better. The allocation of revenue to FB should be higher and at least match the revenue attributable to FB.
 

Despite my doubts about the sincerity of the discussion, I believe the evidence that the program is still being "built" is as follows:
  • Fleck appears to have modified his offensive approach. Last year was encouraging, and we'll see what this season brings. But it's no small thing for a HC of his tenure to make this change, and it indicates he believes more growth is necessary to achieve bigger things. There is also mounting evidence that special teams may do more than make fair catches and punt out of bounds. Building.
  • The program now seems to keep the players it wants to retain from season to season, no small thing. It isn't difficult to imagine better records in '22 and '23 if Bucky Irving had been on the roster. Building.
  • Recruiting continues to tangibly improve. Building.
  • Fan engagement, particularly with students, is consistently strong with room remaining for improvement. Building.
This is a wins thread - and I think it's fair to ask where the additional wins are. But I believe they're coming provided Fleck continues to personally improve. He will never be the coach who completely changes identity, but he holds himself accountable and works to improve.

Again, this is a wins thread, so I'll end by saying the 2019 win over Nebraska isn't getting enough love. Nebraska was 4-2 and we weren't really sure what the Gophers were yet (but were hopeful after the Illinois win). The OL made Nebraska quit during the game. It was really a joy to watch.
 

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