Going Forward

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GoForGold

GoForGold

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At this point, the Gophers could be favored in all of their next 8 games, just going by ESPN's Power Index. Gophers are #39.

Schedule going forward:
Miami Ohio #108
Colorado #75
Bowling Green #126
Purdue #61
Nebraska #48
Maryland#65
Northwestern #50
Illinois #73
Iowa #15
Indiana #45
Wisconsin #23

ESPN Power Index
 




#2Gopher said:
Give it time for them to get it right. They'll dip.
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They did drop 5 spots this week. Normally, they are in the top 25 to start the season. They probably have top 25 talent. Just think, Nebraska was #43 and Minnesota was #41 in the power index last week. Let's see how Nebraska does against Ohio State.
 
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Wally said:
I don't see another loss...
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Take week 1 with a grain of salt, but Iowa looked legit and other teams will improve. I think we’ll get to 9 wins, maybe 10 with some luck.
 





It's always good to get the old, oh-so-familiar KFAN bits out of the way.

But, seriously: the schedule going forward looks very favorable for building some positive momentum heading into the game in Iowa City. And after playing Iowa, we finish with the Hoosiers and the Badgers — and neither Indiana nor Wisconsin looked like world-beaters in Week One.
 

GoForGold said:
At this point, the Gophers could be favored in all of their next 8 games, just going by ESPN's Power Index. Gophers are #39.

Schedule going forward:
Miami Ohio #108
Colorado #75
Bowling Green #126
Purdue #61
Nebraska #48
Maryland#65
Northwestern #50
Illinois #73
Iowa #15
Indiana #45
Wisconsin #23

ESPN Power Index
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The ESPN power index now shows our remaining schedule as the easiest in the Big Ten just by virtue of having played Ohio State already. Somehow I doubt that.
 





cjbfbp said:
The ESPN power index now shows our remaining schedule as the easiest in the Big Ten just by virtue of having played Ohio State already. Somehow I doubt that.
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You doubt... what, exactly? You're saying the rankings are wrong? How so?
 

GoForGold said:
At this point, the Gophers could be favored in all of their next 8 games, just going by ESPN's Power Index. Gophers are #39.

Schedule going forward:
Miami Ohio #108
Colorado #75
Bowling Green #126
Purdue #61
Nebraska #48
Maryland#65
Northwestern #50
Illinois #73
Iowa #15
Indiana #45
Wisconsin #23

ESPN Power Index
Click to expand...

Perhaps but I'm not sure why they have Maryland so low. They just beat a pretty credible program. I know they have a history of fading after fast starts but Taulia lit us up last year and he had 322 yards in their opener against West Virginia. They also had a guy run for 123 yards on 18 carries.

As someone else said, the schedule looks like 2019 but I'm not convinced yet that our team looks like 2019. We just lost our bell cow running back. Mo, with his characteristic modesty, said that the other running backs on the roster could do what he did but I kind of doubt it. I think they will have to do it somewhat differently. Our defense isn't (at least not yet) like the one we had in 2019. I have faith in Tanner and the receivers but I don't know that I can expect Tanner and the receivers to duplicate the fabulous performances of 2019.
 


RememberMurray said:
I strongly disagree.

We led the #4 ranked team in the country at halftime, and took the lead back in the middle of the third quarter. We were within 7 points with less than six minutes remaining. That's pretty damn good.
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Yes, but it's not so unusual for lesser teams to hang with a better team, or even lead for awhile. The effects of being outmatched in a number of key areas often has a cumulative effect that tends to show up later in the game. We had a pretty good team in 2014 (definitely better defensively than this team looked in its first game); went to the Citrus Bowl and played Missouri who ended the season 14th ranked. With 7 minutes left in the 3rd quarter it was 19-17 but we lost the game 33-17.
 

cjbfbp said:
Good one!
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d3HjM7X.gif
 


Our defense really has to improve in terms of communication, complimentary assignments and pre-snap positioning. If it doesn’t, we’ll lose some games to higher powered offenses (eg Maryland) that we shouldn’t. If the defense does improve, if it starts to play with confidence and coordination instead of confusion, we should win a lot of games. I say this assuming CAB will be back hopefully by the Colorado game, certainly by the Purdue game.
 

Gophergrandpa said:
Our defense really has to improve in terms of communication, complimentary assignments and pre-snap positioning. If it doesn’t, we’ll lose some games to higher powered offenses (eg Maryland) that we shouldn’t. If the defense does improve, if it starts to play with confidence and coordination instead of confusion, we should win a lot of games. I say this assuming CAB will be back hopefully by the Colorado game, certainly by the Purdue game.
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Definitely agree about the defense. I will say that I thought the performances of Tanner and the remaining receivers in CAB's absence were encouraging.
 

The offenses in the west are all pretty weak. I think if our defense can be average we’d be a favorite.
 

btowngopher said:
The offenses in the west are all pretty weak. I think if our defense can be average we’d be a favorite.
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Nobody in the West has anything close to the weapons that Ohio State does. No doubt our defense needs to play better but they won't have nearly as much thrown at them or nearly as many weapons to account for as they did against Ohio State.

Just week 1 but Wisconsin, Illinois, Nebraska and Northwestern all looked terrible on offense. Didn't see Iowa but they didn't exactly light up the stat sheet against Illinois and Purdue was playing a bad Pac 12 team so tough to say how good they are.

On the flip side, our offense put up 400 yards and 31 points on Ohio State. Last year only 2 teams managed to top 30 against them (Indiana, Alabama) and in 2019 nobody did. The fact that our offense could produce those kind of numbers against OSU bodes well for the remainder of the season with the obvious caveat that someone may be forced to fill Mo's shoes and that won't be easy.
 

MNVCGUY said:
Didn't see Iowa but they didn't exactly light up the stat sheet against Illinois
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You meant Indiana. No, Iowa rarely lights up the stat sheet on offense; they tend not to be very impressive on the offensive end. Iowa's specialty is holding high scoring teams well below their season average - like they did with us two years ago (averaged 34.1 points a game but scored 19 in that one).

Here are Iowa's conference rankings in terms of offense (points scored, yards per game gained) and defense (points allowed, yards per game allowed) over the past five years.

1630936257317.png
 

cjbfbp said:
Of course the rankings are wrong. Why would you expect them to be right after the first game?
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I wouldn't, necessarily. I was simply hoping you'd elaborate on your thoughts that the rankings are wrong. Which teams seem to you to be ranked too high or low, specifically?
 

KFAN’s Paul Allen said the gophs might win 5 games this year. He couched his statement mentioning he doesn’t follow the local football team.
 

RememberMurray said:
I wouldn't, necessarily. I was simply hoping you'd elaborate on your thoughts that the rankings are wrong. Which teams seem to you to be ranked too high or low, specifically?
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Why would I presume to know that after one game? If you expected me to behave like a schmuck who believes he already knows all he needs to know, then I guess you don't have much respect for me.
 

cjbfbp said:
Why would I presume to know that after one game? If you expected me to behave like a schmuck who believes he already knows all he needs to know, then I guess you don't have much respect for me.
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Easy, Big Fella. No offense intended.
 


Colorado and Purdue on the road are 50/50....If we had a better defense I would be more confident but our safeties are not B10 level as is Sori-Marin.
 

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