Pioneer Press: Freshmen players taking over more roles for Gophers

[BleedGopher]

per Greder:

In the wake of Antoine Winfield Jr.'s season-ending injury, the Gophers will get a lot younger at free safety.

That fits the vision head coach P.J. Fleck expressed overall for his second season, but he hoped it wouldn't include a redshirt sophomore captain and their best defensive player, who exited Saturday's 42-13 loss to Maryland with a left foot injury.

"It's just unfortunate, but it gives a lot of young players an opportunity to play," Fleck said Tuesday on the Big Ten coaches teleconference call. "You are starting to see guys that were there that had experience (on the team), but there is a very thin layer of them and then right behind that is all young kids, and we know that. That is part of this rebuild."

The Gophers (3-1), who have a bye until Iowa comes to TCF Bank Stadium on Oct. 6, will continue to turn to true freshman walk-on Jordan Howden to fill in for Winfield, as he did for the final three-plus quarters at Maryland Stadium. The Las Vegas native finished with three tackles but also had costly miscues on some of the Terrapins' long touchdowns.

True freshman Benny Sapp III didn't make the trip to Maryland, but the namesake son of the former Vikings cornerback should also get some game action at safety going forward. Sapp III has played in all three nonconference games, primarily on special teams. The Eden Prairie graduate has two tackles this season.

"Those guys are definitely taking reps back there," Fleck said of Howden and Sapp. "We have a plan, and it's just an opportunity for some young guys to play."

http://www.dglobe.com/sports/football/4504579-freshmen-players-taking-over-more-roles-gophers

Go Gophers!!

 

[Gophers_4life]

Through the first four games, our starters at any DB position have been K Thomas, T Smith, Winfield, Jacob Huff, Shenault, and Durr (only started the NM St game, when we started with 5 DBs).

Howden isn't mentioned in the PWO release from back in Feb. But he got a lot of playing time vs Maryland.


You look at all our DBs, and with only minor variations, they're all about 5-11/6-0 and 190ish pounds. I'm wondering if we don't just stick the best overall DB we have left as the starter for Winfield. We also have Florida transfer Williamson, who has yet to start, but had been getting rave reviews in fall camp before being injured. And Sapp was mentioned in the article, but didn't travel and so I'm guessing they're planning to redshirt him. Whereas Howden did travel, even though he is also a true freshman.


EDIT: his 247sports profile says Howden committed to the Gophers back in early June. We obviously didn't have a scholarship left to give him at that time, but obviously is a PWO then (in the sense of being invited to fall camp). https://247sports.com/Player/Jordan-Howden-46038277/high-school-189048/

Also this, for a little bit of background on how he got to Minnesota: https://www.recruitingnewsguru.com/...-insight-on-inspiring-signing-with-minnesota/

But doesn't add much illumination on why, seemingly, he was completely unrecruited for college football. If he was good enough for Minnesota, surely other football programs asked about him at least. Even DII or DI-AA programs ...

 

[Pompous Elitist]

Some of our better players over the years have been lightly recruited so not going to make a judgment until we see how he develops. He’s definitely not really under the radar coming out of that school though. Interesting situation. I don’t know what that says about Sapp or if PJ is simply hellbent on redshirting him this year.

 

[#2Gopher]

Wonder why Sapp didn't make it Maryland. Perhaps an issue with the number of players you can take on the road.

 

[Pete smith]

Some of our better players over the years have been lightly recruited so not going to make a judgment until we see how he develops. He’s definitely not really under the radar coming out of that school though. Interesting situation. I don’t know what that says about Sapp or if PJ is simply hellbent on redshirting him this year.

Off title —-but is anyone else having trouble with the Walmart pop ups for their $1000 gift card? If so, tell me how to avoid them.

 

[Pompous Elitist]

This site does have issues with redirections ads.

On an Ipad shut down the internet browser by swiping up from the bottom of the screen or on an older iPad double clicking the round home button and then swipe the browser screen up and away to restart. Or go into settings —> safari—> clear history and website data. Make sure ad blocking is on.

In windows go into setting or tools, clear cookies/data, then X out of the browser and restart.

If you’re on an android tablet get an IPad.




.