If the Gophers had beat Illinois and Bowling Green...

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I really don't think there is a wide talent gap between Illinois and Iowa towards the end of the year. The Illinois defense, offensive line, and running game were all very strong. The Illinois receivers are a big drop off from Iowa.
Bottom line to me is the Gophers were the most talented team in the West this year. They would have matched up well against Michigan and it is a bummer that we are not all excited for what would have been a really exciting game this Saturday.
 

If the Gophers had Cincinnati's schedule, they'd be 11-1 and highly ranked. W-L is still foolishly more important than SOS. Cincinnati victories included wins over Murray State, Temple, Tulane, South Florida and Tulsa, among others. The only tough teams they played were Notre Dame and SMU. In the B10 or SEC they'd have three or four losses. Gophers should be in the top 25 at least with their 8-4 record.
 

Great Plains Gopher said:
If the Gophers had Cincinnati's schedule, they'd be 11-1 and highly ranked. W-L is still foolishly more important than SOS. Cincinnati victories included wins over Murray State, Temple, Tulane, South Florida and Tulsa, among others. The only tough teams they played were Notre Dame and SMU. In the B10 or SEC they'd have three or four losses. Gophers should be in the top 25 at least with their 8-4 record.
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You just named at least 3 teams I consider better than Bowling Green so I’m not sure how you can say with such certainty the gophers would be 11-1
 


Nebraska is saying if our running back didn't trip over himself on the one yard line.

Purdue is saying if only Autmann-Bell's td that hit the ground wasn't called a td. They'd be playing this Saturday night.

It's all relative.
 

If IFS count, I’d be a multimillionaire.

I certainly can’t use a Heimlic Maneuver on these chokes.
 

dumbgoph said:
We'd almost certainly be headed to the Citrus Bowl with a 10-2 record
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I don’t think so.
Outback would be a certainty because I still think Iowa goes to citrus in that scenario
 




The OP is another way of saying "even if we had won one more Big Ten game, we would've been tied with Iowa in conf record and they had the head-to-head over us".

The only way to beat them, was to drag them down by hoping they'd lose and then drop into the 4-way tie with Purdue, who we had beaten but they had lost to.
 

kg21 said:
In both of these seasons, we were better than Iowa, but they just have our number.

Much like we have Purdue's number.
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Agree we’re better than Iowa this year, and should have won in Iowa City, but disagree on 2019. Iowa won both lines of scrimmage in 2019 (won neither in 2021). Epenesa was a beast in 2019 (Iowa had 6 sacks), and Iowa scored touchdowns on its first three possessions. That was not a fluke loss, like this year’s game.
 

BigTenGuy said:
Agree we’re better than Iowa this year, and should have won in Iowa City, but disagree on 2019. Iowa won both lines of scrimmage in 2019 (won neither in 2021). Epenesa was a beast in 2019 (Iowa had 6 sacks), and Iowa scored touchdowns on its first three possessions. That was not a fluke loss, like this year’s game.
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Yeah. Iowa and wisconsin both beat the gophers up front in 2019

we almost beat Iowa anyways because Morgan and the wideouts played pretty well.
 

BigTenGuy said:
Agree we’re better than Iowa this year, and should have won in Iowa City, but disagree on 2019. Iowa won both lines of scrimmage in 2019 (won neither in 2021). Epenesa was a beast in 2019 (Iowa had 6 sacks), and Iowa scored touchdowns on its first three possessions. That was not a fluke loss, like this year’s game.
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In my opinion, the gophers were still drunk from beating Penn State the previous week. Iowa jumped out with 3 touchdowns and we owned them the rest of the game. We came out stoned from the week before. Tyler drops an easy walk in touchdown and we are in the Rose Bowl. That Tyler drop is the one I always think about. Tyler dropping that easy walk in is why I say that they have our number. We had 440 yards to their 290. Damn, that loss still pisses me off.
 



MaxyJR1 said:
Had we beat Bowling Green we may not have made the changes to beat Purdue. Teams learn more in losses unfortunately.
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The BG loss was the stunner that showed just how EFFECTIVE our head coach & his assistant coaches are. That loss sent this Gopher team on a mission and they won four BT games in succession. And, other than in the haphazardly constructed unscientific polls,really didn’t hurt the BT outcome for this team. It was the single loss that provided the spark for a very successful BT season. The Ohio State, Illinois & Iowa losses hurt, the way any and all BT losses hurt the Gopher as a member of the BT Conference. The incredibly beautiful wins against Indiana and especially Wisconsin made this a GREAT season to be a Big Ten Golden Gopher fan. The bowl game will help keep Gopher Football trending in a very positive direction. A win in the bowl will help keep momentum moving the needle on Gopher Football interest and passion driving toward the 2022 Big Ten season!
 
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At the end of the day--and this is nothing new--it still comes down to out-competing our rivals head to head on the field. There's no way around it: the West championship goes through either Iowa City or Madison or both.
 

"If the Gophers had beat Illinois and Bowling Green.."

Would we still have a thread with about 300 replies and over 12,400 views about a Coach that left here 6 years ago? :unsure:
 

Iceland12 said:
"If the Gophers had beat Illinois and Bowling Green.."

Would we still have a thread with about 300 replies and over 12,400 views about a Coach that left here 6 years ago? :unsure:
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Absolutely...just like we'd have a similar thread if Mitch Leidner threw a piece of paper into the garbage.
 



Some guy said:
You just named at least 3 teams I consider better than Bowling Green so I’m not sure how you can say with such certainty the gophers would be 11-1
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Bowling Green was an outlier. With all the publicity of early victories and high rank (and not playing Ohio State in the opener) the Gophers would have swept through Cincinnati's schedule, with 11-1, 10-2, maybe even 12-0 results.
 

Great Plains Gopher said:
Bowling Green was an outlier. With all the publicity of early victories and high rank (and not playing Ohio State in the opener) the Gophers would have swept through Cincinnati's schedule, with 11-1, 10-2, maybe even 12-0 results.
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Maybe. Or maybe 9-3 or 8-4.
 

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