[POST GAME THREAD] - Minnesota defeats SDSU 28-21

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scools12 said:
Obviously closer then you.
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“ The Gophers only being 2 TD favorite shows it wasn’t going to be easy. “

Sure you do. And you tell others they are posting nonsense. Priceless.

Have you found other preseason polls yet?


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GopherWeatherGuy said:
He did play the last two plays so that's a good sign at least.
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Thanks. That is a good sign. Hard to always find guys on TV so maybe he was out there more then I am thinking and I just missed it.


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Sounds like the team was looking past SDSU to Fresno State. Better hope they aren't looking past Fresno to Georgia Southern.
 

EG#9 said:
The decision to punt on 4th and medium from the 36 yard line to start the game was bad, the decision to waste a timeout to punt the ball from near midfield on 4th and 2 late was even worse.
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+1000. Both of those were AWFUL decisions.
 

Broken record here, but the line play is most concerning. Wow, was that bad.

Now on offense, I can attribute that somewhat to very stubborn and predictable play-calling. RUTM seems to be most of the playbook so far, regardless of how stacked the defense is on the line. Why does it seem that it is always the other team with creative misdirection plays that open large holes? One might also argue that RUTM was the safer bet because the pass protection was mostly awful. Good thing Tanner can scramble. On the bright side, Tanner was mostly good, and we have solid backs and very good wideouts.

Now on defense, biggest concern is D-line. Really awful lack of penetration. Their QB mostly could just stand there and pick his target with nobody near him. Also gaping holes on run plays. Is what we’ve read about our improved D-lineman all bunk? That was a scary bad performance. Secondary played well I thought. I will defer on the linebackers, as I spent most of my angst glaring at the bad D-line play. I sure hope coaching can improve this bunch.

Special teams really bad

We won the game, so I’m happy... sort of.


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I am happy that we won first and foremost. The game gave me me some flashbacks to the Illinois game last year. They seemed to be able to break out contain very easily and run outside at will. Defensive line needs to step up and get more consistent pressure and shed blocks. The offense had some sparks, but seemed very vanilla. I thought we could have been a lot more creative in the run game for one. Pretty much every run was a handoff out of the shotgun up the middle. Need to to attack the edges more and get more variation. I think Bateman can have a huge year if teams are going to continue to focus on stopping Tyler Johnson.
 

I think people are overreacting (as usual on Gopherhole). Save the outrage for when they actually lose a game they should have won.

I saw a reminder on Twitter that Iowa needed two blocked field goals to beat UNI by 1 point in 2009, yet finished the season ranked #7 in the country.

I’m sure we’ll see some more games like this tomorrow, and probably even some massive upsets.

R-E-L-A-X


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Not inspiring, but we won despite all issues.


Will need better effort next week
 

My takes;

Not a great outing but they found a way to win.
Defensive lapses were concerning. Line play on both side of the ball was disappointing.
Secondary had some nice plays, nice to have AW back.
Bateman was awesome!
With college ball there is no preseason so it's harder to prepare for the first game. Usually the most improvement occurs from week 1 to week 2, let's hope that's definitely the case here. They have a lot of tape to dissect and work with now.

RTB, Go Gophs!!
 



PitinoFan said:
I think people are overreacting (as usual on Gopherhole). Save the outrage for when they actually lose a game they should have won.

I saw a reminder on Twitter that Iowa needed two blocked field goals to beat UNI by 1 point in 2009, yet finished the season ranked #7 in the country.

I’m sure we’ll see some more games like this tomorrow, and probably even some massive upsets.

R-E-L-A-X


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+1

Only two things can happen in a football game, and after our first, we are one and oh. There is nothing that we could have changed that would have our record any better than it is now.

When all is said and done, either we win enough games to make me happy, and I wont give a lick that our first win was only by one touchdown, or we dont win enough games to make me happy and I'll be anyone by the ones we lost, not the ones we won.
 

I only saw it mentioned one other time but Fleck running it on 3rd and 2 from mid field on a crucial drive...then calling a timeout and punting. You have to have a plan there. If you aren't going for it on 4th down don't run the ball on 3rd. Coaching was below average last night as well.
 

tmvander said:
I only saw it mentioned one other time but Fleck running it on 3rd and 2 from mid field on a crucial drive...then calling a timeout and punting. You have to have a plan there. If you aren't going for it on 4th down don't run the ball on 3rd. Coaching was below average last night as well.
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The timeout was bad, but given the opponent, I would have hoped that we could count on our line getting two yards of push, and I'm ok with Fleck setting that expectation by sending them out there to do it.
 

GoGophersUMN said:
It was an ugly win but it was still a win. I'd prefer to play a solid team in week 1 than bring in a bad team to crush where you don't learn anything from the game.

Line play on both sides was horrible. I have more confidence in the offensive line but the defensive line was concerning. They need to find a way to get pressure on the QB and stop the outside run or it's going to be a long season.

The offense frequently had little change on 3rd down. They'd waste the first two downs with incomplete passes or runs for minimal gains and then get stuck on 3rd and medium to long.

Special teams was rough. Poor kick coverage and the missed extra point hurt. At one point it seemed like the extra point could have decided the game. The Gophers don't have many games where they should win by a bunch. Special teams blunders could be the difference in most games this season and they're going to need to play better if they want to win games.

In the long run this could be a very nice game to have played. It counts as a win and gives the team confidence and experience being successful in close games. It exposed quite a few weaknesses early enough to do something about them. Better to have a game like this now than with 3 games left in the season.
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Well said. It was not the start to the season we were all hoping for but the important part is they got the win. The big test now is to see how we respond in the weeks ahead.

SDSU is probably at a similar level as a mid to upper tier Mac team right now. I won't be surprised if they justify their #3 ranking and have a very strong season. Games like this can be dangerous early in the season, thankfully the team pulled out the victory and now you move on to Fresno State.

Going to be interesting to see how they look against USC, should give us a pretty good idea of what to expect next weekend.
 



bleedsmaroonandgold said:
The timeout was bad, but given the opponent, I would have hoped that we could count on our line getting two yards of push, and I'm ok with Fleck setting that expectation by sending them out there to do it.
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You'd hope so but man all game we way were not able to count on them for that.

At some point you challenge them and others ... you have to call plays for what your team CAN do.

Kirk likes to say that he's not gonna call plays if they can't make the play.
 

I don't know if it got mentioned among all the rest of this but special teams was stinky too...
 

For fans, the weather was perfect. Beautiful night to be out there.
 


If you're interested, below is a link to SDSU Coach John Stiegelmeier's immediate post-game interview with SDSU's media guy.

We knew going into the game that our lack of experience at QB was going to be a big factor. Our QB is certain to improve quickly with the game experience so Jacks fans have some high expectations. But, damn, you just can't have two big turnovers like that.

Both teams have some valuable game video to study...quite a few learning moments for both teams.

Stig interview:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLS_xV9L3AM

And, since I've been reading too many "ya gotta give them credit" comments -- here's comedian Brian Regan's routine on Letterman from a few years ago. He finishes with "Ya gotta give them credit" -- pretty funny stuff.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBndmwvYxyI

The Minnesota fans at the game last night were good people. Ya gotta give them credit....

Good luck out West.
 
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PitinoFan said:
I think people are overreacting (as usual on Gopherhole). Save the outrage for when they actually lose a game they should have won.

I saw a reminder on Twitter that Iowa needed two blocked field goals to beat UNI by 1 point in 2009, yet finished the season ranked #7 in the country.

I’m sure we’ll see some more games like this tomorrow, and probably even some massive upsets.

R-E-L-A-X


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I will relax when I‘m convinced the defensive staff does something about perimeter defense. It seemed like no one had containment. I’ll relax when I see our CB‘s using far more press coverage. Once again when you play 8/9 off, it is pretty much pitch and catch. Several times last night we had 6 defensive people 3/5 off, then the others 9/11 off. As was evident, our 6 couldn’t handle their 7. i‘ll relax when I see our tight end get involved in the passing game. I‘ll relax when we run some kind of mis-direction on first down.
 

From the Glass Half Full Perspective:

-- We won
-- We got a "wake-up" call game. That's gotta help focus team prep for Fresno.
-- We seemed to have come out of the game injury free (hope that's right).
-- The game was on a Thursday, giving us a couple extra days to use the lessons to prep for Fresno.
-- Defense showed they can make big plays when needed.
-- Bateman showed he's living up to the hype.
-- Nobody mentioned it, but our long-snapper looked great (I gotta admit, that ball really had some zip on it).
-- Kamal Martin will be back next week
 

Line play on both sides of the ball is a big time concern after that game. Both lines need to get much better.

Lack of depth at linebacker is a major concern. #14 had flashes but 55 and 8 did not look good.

I thought Morgan did great. RB’s and WR’s will be fine. Need an O line though.

I think the defensive backfield will be fine and has some depth.

Really need d line to step up and be better.

Nice thing is extra days until next game and Fresno has to play Saturday at USC. 8 full days to change their best. Fresno will be a very good challenge and a win there will would do a lot to erase some of last nights concerns.


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disappointed by both lines
disappointed that we didn't try to put more pressure on the RS freshman QB early and often. our dline was a no show last night
disappointed by the call to punt at our own 35 on the first drive
disappointed by the corners playing 10 yards off the ball....they exposed that and used quick hitch passes on 1st down to give them 2nd and 5 or less basically at will last night

pumped for Bateman! if teams are going to take away Johnson its so nice to have a guy like Bateman to turn to....and add in Bell as well
Winfield is just a fun player to watch! glad he is back in the mix

play that stood out that kept this game close....after we had the pick six, had the momentum....had them pinned deep...and Renner gets called for the defensive holding penalty on 2nd down on a play that we not only blew up there run play but they were also called for a holding penalty....flags off set....have to redo the down and they proceed to march down the field for a score


a win is a win! we are 1-0! lots to work on but also lots to like.
 

It was a beautiful night and was great to be back watching Gopher football.
I wonder how much the Gophers missed OJ Smith and Cashman on defense and Jared Weyler on offense? Only three players but they were all key down the stretch last year. I am confident other players will step into fill those shoes.
Bateman, Williamson, and Morgan all played well. Morgan had a great throw running to his right and fired a strike to Bateman on the sideline. Plus the touchdown pass to Bateman was nicely thrown over the safety (maybe just a foot too much juice but he put it where only Bateman could catch it). Williamson just looks good out there on coverage and brings some size and leadership to the secondary.
 

I noticed Terell Smith was out of the game a good amount. Or at least it seemed that way. Not sure if it was just the rotation they are going to use, if he is dinged up or if he just wasn't playing well.
 

What were we doing with Seth Green? He was constantly lined up as a receiver. Our defense seemed to be chasing after their RBs. No tackling. I miss the days of having a consistent, dependable defense (and kicking game).
 


My bad! I'm used to seeing him used more in the wildcat formation.
 

MirandaB said:
My bad! I'm used to seeing him used more in the wildcat formation.
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Understandable considering his role.

It was strange, there were a couple Seth Green moments when .... Seth didn't come out.
 

Some Day...Maybe said:
Line play on both sides of the ball is a big time concern after that game. Both lines need to get much better.

Lack of depth at linebacker is a major concern. #14 had flashes but 55 and 8 did not look good.

I thought Morgan did great. RB’s and WR’s will be fine. Need an O line though.

I think the defensive backfield will be fine and has some depth.

Really need d line to step up and be better.

Nice thing is extra days until next game and Fresno has to play Saturday at USC. 8 full days to change their best. Fresno will be a very good challenge and a win there will would do a lot to erase some of last nights concerns.


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14 is Oliver
8 is Rush
55 is Sori-Marin

I know this because I had to look them all up last night (among others). I know I'm fighting a losing battle here, but I dislike the "MINNESOTA" on the back of the jerseys, especially early in the season.
 


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