Nevada Sports Net's Chris Murray: Three Keys to Victory - Minnesota’s run game has been in shambles

GopherMarroon

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LINK: Nevada Sports Net's Chris Murray: Three Keys to Victory

"Nevada has generally played well against the Big Ten over the years, and this Wolf Pack team seems capable of matching the physical play the Gophers want to establish. It helps that Minnesota’s run game has been in shambles in the first two weeks."


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LINK: Nevada Sports Net's Chris Murray: Three Keys to Victory

"Minnesota’s run game has been in shambles in the first two weeks."






North Carolina stacked the box and penetrated into the backfield. Dared the Gophers to pass.

I would love for the Gophers to pass on teams like that. I like what we saw last week against Rhode Island and even against North Carolina that had lots of mistakes but the plays were there.

Offensive line is a work in progress. Bottom line, excited that the Gophers could be a passing team if the run is stopped.

Except let's get the run game going too.
 

By the standards of non-conference blogger analysis this is very good.

It identifies that our team is weak this season in an area we're traditionally thought to be strong in, and cites statistics.

Gophers are going to pass the most this year since '93, I think. But the running game needs to get sorted, starting today.
 

Tough (unnecessary?) to concentrate too much on the running game if Nevada stacks the box AND Brosmer and his receivers are on game. Might as well fine-tune a passing game ("what the defense gives us") one more time before Iowa. With RBs we have, and the experience we have on the OL, I suspect the running game will come around just fine once opponents start to run defenses that respect our passing game. I'm eager to see this game: not the opponent that UNC was, but still a darn good team, with lots of P5 transfer talent. Can we defense Nevada's running QB?
 


A shambles? Apparently we’re unable to understand early season football, strategy, or a balanced offense. Real football isn’t EA football.
 

a lot of this "analysis" is based on very superficial viewing of stats and scores.

the thought process goes like this:

"MN is always a strong running team. MN averaged over 190-yds a game running in 2020, '21 & '22 (207.3). last year 158 yds/gm. so far this year, 97.5 yds/gm. the run game is producing less than half of what it did 2 years ago."

everything in that statement is accurate. it just excludes any context or nuance.
 





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