Post Game Thread

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oak_street1981 said:
I guess I really do not understand what a 2012 or 2013 Northern Illinois Team losing a bowl game has to do with Limegrover/ Kill play calling and offensive play calling at Minnesota in 2013.

Rod Carey probably is not digging through old file cabinets looking for Kill era secret files to run his team and micromanage his OC.

Please
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Same scheme, I think. I could be wrong but regardless I'm not sold on our scheme. I think the big boys eat it up.
 

why is nobody blaming Peter Mortell, he didn't lose the game and had some nice punts previously but that return late is on him
 

Bad Gopher said:
I'm encouraged to hear how discouraged people are. It means we have standards and ambitions. I hope Kill doesn't go Mason on us and start hinting that this is as good as it gets - that the best Minnesota should aspire to is this sort of borderline relevance.

An 8-win session is a nice step forward, but this game is a small step backwards in the wrong direction. It's important to keep the momentum going forward. It's disappointing that the coaches and players let this setback occur.
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I agree a little disappointing tonight. However, Syracuse is now 7-4 with #10 at QB. He did not play much in their losses to Penn State and a healthy Northwestern. Their defense did not give up a 100 yd rusher game this year. Our weakness, passing, is the way to beat them.
 

die hard gopher said:
why is nobody blaming Peter Mortell, he didn't lose the game and had some nice punts previously but that return late is on him
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I think five of our guys had a crack at the returner within 15 yards of their guy catching the punt. Make a tackle. The kid rocketed the punt I put no responsibity on him but I could be wrong.
 

I thought the Gopher offense looked not ready to play and it took half the game to wake them up. Liked Leidner's passion - and he had a nice touch on some long passes (even the Hail Mary at the end - first one- was on the mark). Both he and Nelson will develop with more experience, but obviously we can't be 105th in passing, 12th in the B1G and expect to win more than five or six games. Syracuse was every bit as tough as I expected, with a QB and running back better than ours and with a lot of spirit. They outplayed and out-coached the Gophers
 


dboy said:
they had a great D line... very quick.. held Cobb down for 3 1/2 quarters by putting us in 2nd and 3rd and long

we had a chance late to run it down their throats.. cobb goes for 12 but then it is called back because of holding..

ballgame.
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Agree - that holding penalty was a killer, and seemed so at the time.
 

Some Day...Is Coming! said:
WOW! So obvious they were NOT ready to play and did not match Syracuse's intensity. No fire, no enthusiasm. I'm guessing that Kill figured this team was mature enough and on the right path that he didn't have to do much to get them amped up for the game.

I thought the stupid chain issue right before Syracuse's first snap helped Syracuse and stole some momentum from the Gophers pinning them deep.

I thought it was stupid to pull Nelson that early. At the same time, I thought Leidner was the only one who showed any enthusiasm or fire and looked like the only one that was trying to wake the team up!

For me, this was one of the two worst games of the Kill era. The home loss to New Mexico State being the other.

Absolutely agonizing to watch.

The penalty on Campion was awful, that officiating crew seemed clueless from the start (ex. the Syracuse fumble review - has there ever been a more obvious/routine fumble and recovery?) I think without that penalty we run out the clock or at least pin them team on a punt. But that's what can happen when you don't even try to show up until the 2nd half and you have the kind of offense we do.

I put most of this on the coaching staff and the head coach. Not having the team ready to play, not looking like they had a very good game plan or that they were prepared as well as they should be. Also, not giving your starting quarterback enough of a chance before yanking him. Our blitzes were terrible (see their last TD), and our blitz protection was terrible. I guess credit Syracuse's O line.

The performance tonight can't help recruiting. Play like we can and we probably pick up one or a few possible difference makers. Just makes it harder if we can't get a few difference makers that may be persuaded by this game like Kill said last year's game helped him get 6 or 7 guys.

Bottom line - Missed Opportunity. Very good year that the coaching staff and the team didn't finish. I think when it's all said and done Coach Kill will take a lot of the blame for this loss and hopefully he'll learn from it. I think even he assumed. It seems like the Gophers came into this game soft, and without an edge, and I've almost never seen that in the Kill era.

On the earlier Nelson comment, they just pulled him too early. He's been their guy all year, even to a fault earlier in the season, and they've usually been way too late to make a QB change, but this time, it was too early. Made no sense whatsoever based on everything that has transpired to date. Not saying Leidner didn't do well at the end of the 3rd qtr and the 4th qtr, but he didn't do squat until he had several series under his belt and a half time for the team to refocus/rejuvenate. I thought they should have put Leidner in way earlier in the Iowa game and I'm a big believer in yanking a QB if they're not doing the job and I've always thought Kill has waited too long to do that and so for them to do it too early in my opinion, doesn't make sense. Oh well.
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Well said. I kept thinking that Nelson had to be injured for them to pull him that early. A QB that helps you win 4 B1G games for the first time in 40 years should have got more than 2 series to start the game. I would have preferred for them to have started Leidner and then brought in Nelson depending on how Mitch was performing. It seems like Nelson plays better when he can start the game on the sideline.
 

Liked Leidner's passion - and he had a nice touch on some long passes (even the Hail Mary at the end - first one- was on the mark). Both he and Nelson will develop with more experience, but obviously we can't be 105th in passing, 12th in the B1G and expect to win more than five or six games. b

my comments on the post above


Please stop lumping Nelson and Leidner together. Nelson has received many more chances both in practice and games to get it done and he has failed. He consistantly misses open receivers and makes poor decisions.

Leidner has shown a an ability to fit the ball into tight spaces and keep his head, with fewer opportunities given to shine. Leidner is more accurate, throws a better and more predictable deep ball, stronger and has a cooler head.

It is Nelson's time to ride the pine or transfer to Gustavus or NDSU. I do respect what he has done for the program and hope he stays to help support his teammates and build depth. A lot of the unproductive offense of the last few quarters is all on Nelson, though.
 




RolGnav said:
You can't blame the loss on Wolitarsky. The Gophers should have not been in that situation in the first place. You could just as easily say... Why didn't the coaches coach and tell our Punter to kick towards the sideline, or to hang the kick so they wouldn't be able to return the kick. Or why didn't the coaches tell the defensive players to watch out for the QB scramble and not be so aggressive on that TD play. Or why we couldn't get any offense at all in the first half? Why nothing was called for Jones (who is probably our best WR not named Engel.) Where was Maye? Why did we open up the Offense only after we were down 10+ points? If you want to blame anyone, I'd blame the whole coaching staff.
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Punting out of bounds deliberately - part of the art of kicking, but you don't see it much anymore. If ever a situation called for angling a punt out of bounds, that was it.
 

oak_street1981;822893 Please stop lumping Nelson and Leidner together. Nelson has received many more chances both in practice and games to get it done and he has failed. .[/QUOTE said:
Kind of like he failed to win 4 Big Ten games in a row and beat Nebraska, like so many other MN QB's have done over the last 40 to 60 years?
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It was like watching the old gophers play tonight not the ones we saw starting with NW. Penalties, giving up 3rd and longs, poor offense, etc... The last 3 minutes were tough to watch. Holding penalty, poor kick coverage, letting the QB run it in on 3rd down and long... Hopefully next year we ='ll see the new gophers...
 

I read that Kerry King was watching the game and has taken an interest in the gophers. He's looking to announce a few games next year.

We have the same lepidopterist, so that would be interesting.
 



Some Day...Is Coming! said:
Kind of like he failed to win 4 Big Ten games in a row and beat Nebraska, like so many other MN QB's have done over the last 40 to 60 years?
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I'll give the running game, O Line, overall Defense, and even Leidner as much credit as I'll give to #9 for those four wins. if you want to blame anyone for not grabbing the chance to win the UW or MSU games though, then I have a candidate who really stood out.
 

The gophers were outplayed and out coached. The Defense wasn't great and until Leidner had to throw the ball in the fourth quarter, the offense was really bad. The worst part of all, I don't recall a single screen play or quick slant. Nothing to upset a defense that pinned its ears back. A power running team? Give me a break, when you come out and throw on the first O play of the game we were telling everyone that we really don't believe what we say.

That we were in it till the end said to me that we should start thinking of ourselves as a passing team not a running team. It was our only offensive success.
 

Guys, guys, guys. A mediocre ACC team beat a mediocre Big Ten team. Bowl games are a crap shoot. Good for them not so good for us but not a big deal for either.

Next year is more important than the Texas Bowl. Loosen up- unless you went down to Houston this is no big deal.
 

As for me, I'll back the damn coach and the damn coache's staff to run the show...

ncgo4 said:
The gophers were outplayed and out coached. The Defense wasn't great and until Leidner had to throw the ball in the fourth quarter, the offense was really bad. The worst part of all, I don't recall a single screen play or quick slant. Nothing to upset a defense that pinned its ears back. A power running team? Give me a break, when you come out and throw on the first O play of the game we were telling everyone that we really don't believe what we say.



to keep the players in school and attending classes, to win as many conference games as they can, to get invitations to bowl games...even if they lose them.

None of you young whipper-snappers, know it all types and chowder-heads have ever shown me a damn thing on Game Day Saturdays. You people have NEVER won a single game for my Golden Gopher Football Team. You guys sure don't sign contracts worth millions of dollars. Why should I EVER listen to any of your complaints or your attacks on the young college-aged players or any of your bright, hair-brained ideas? You aren't even PAID to run the show the way the head coach is paid to run the show.

Nope, you people can't convince me that you know diddly squat...I'm sticking to the coaches! I think they know a hell of a lot more than all of you people put together...

; 0 )

Never let the bashers get you down players OR coaches...
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Naive overseas rookie fan alert - but just an opinion. Not wanting to upset anyone.

I was disappointed to lose but I think you have to congratulate the Texas Bowl selection committee on choosing an even matchup from the teams that had left to select from - haven't seen game stats but guessing similar turnovers, total yards, first downs and obviously the score. Although our overall win/loss credentials are better then theirs, they finished the season strong and the weakness they have in the secondary we can't quite exploit yet ( a fit Engel gets 150 yards and 2 TDs tonight IMHO). Give us a 6-6 AQ team with a comparatively weaker run defense/stronger pass defense and we control the game - I don't think tonight tells us anything we didn't already know or makes us a badly coached team - it just confirmed our current limitations.

Thing that disappointed me more than result was how flat the game was until the last quarter. To use an NFL comparison, I was hoping for playoffs but it felt more preseason. I don't necessarily mean the players or coaches by this either, While I felt the matchup was close, the whole concept of this type of Bowl seemed flawed to me.

To explain (probably very naively) - A good Gopher following all things considered, but I just don't think asking two Northern universities to travel this far south on a weekday for a mid tier bowl works. I'm not saying there are too many bowl games or anything like that, but using the Tulane ULL bowl as a comparison, that seemed to be absolutely fabulous from what I could see on the TV, why on earth was our matchup with Syracuse in Texas? I know it is all about sponsorship and is meant to be Big 12 big 10 etc but switch tonight to a mutually closer venue and I think the game experience is 10 times better. I am not knocking Texas here, lovely people, fantastic state, football hotbed - which is why the way Bowls are organised should not allow this to happen.

If that not possible, could we do something to concentrate the fans a little more within the stadium e.g. Restrict the sections more or seat the band (who were fantastic) in the middle of the areas seated behind the bench?It is really hard to get any noise going when there are empty seats, neutrals and fans from both teams all sat together.

Anyway, I know this line of conversation perhaps pointless but I love this team and I love the Minnesota people. My experience of Minnesota earlier this year was fantastic - busy parking lots, Buffalo Wild Wings crammed to the rafters pre-game, rowdy crowd, great atmosphere. If something different happens so we win tonight (Drew makes the catch, The Defense make the sack, the punt coverage holds up, or the offense make the 3rd and 6 with 2 mins to go) I probably don't submit this post but I'd still be thinking the TCF experience is 100 times better than the Bowl game. With a prize at stake I think logically it should be the other way around.
 

Just like your same old know it all rants about how great bowl games are and how only Big 10 wins matter. The coaches are fine, the blowl game was a dud, big deal. Gophers will be better and we have the right coaches in place. You could see it in the players faces tonight, Houston did not interest them all that much and they still nearly won the game.
No matter how much you pat yourself on the back Wren your no better a fan then the rest of us even if you think so. We all buy tickets, a lot of us season tickets, contribute to goal line club and do just about as much as you do. I give a contribution to the U every year to give back for what they did for me.
Gophers will be better next year. The program is on the right track, just need to find a quarterback to lead the charge. Some of us were disappointed in the outcome of the game and thought the team was further along. Wolitarsky has his hands in the right place and the Gophers win, that was a nice pass by Leidner, could not have thrown it any better. 8-5 was a good season.
Go Gophers.
 

Some Day...Is Coming! said:
WOW! So obvious they were NOT ready to play and did not match Syracuse's intensity. No fire, no enthusiasm. I'm guessing that Kill figured this team was mature enough and on the right path that he didn't have to do much to get them amped up for the game. I thought the stupid chain issue right before Syracuse's first snap helped Syracuse and stole some momentum from the Gophers pinning them deep. I thought it was stupid to pull Nelson that early. At the same time, I thought Leidner was the only one who showed any enthusiasm or fire and looked like the only one that was trying to wake the team up! For me, this was one of the two worst games of the Kill era. The home loss to New Mexico State being the other. Absolutely agonizing to watch. The penalty on Campion was awful, that officiating crew seemed clueless from the start (ex. the Syracuse fumble review - has there ever been a more obvious/routine fumble and recovery?) I think without that penalty we run out the clock or at least pin them deep on a punt. But that's what can happen when you don't even try to show up until the 2nd half and you have the kind of offense we do. I put most of this on the coaching staff and the head coach. Not having the team ready to play, not looking like they had a very good game plan or that they were prepared as well as they should be. Also, not giving your starting quarterback enough of a chance before yanking him. Our blitzes were terrible (see their last TD), and our blitz protection was terrible. I guess credit Syracuse's O line. The performance tonight can't help recruiting. Play like we can and we probably pick up one or a few possible difference makers. Just makes it harder if we can't get a few difference makers that may be persuaded by this game, like Kill said last year's game helped him get 6 or 7 guys. Bottom line - Missed Opportunity. Very good year that the coaching staff and the team didn't finish. I think when it's all said and done Coach Kill will take a lot of the blame for this loss and hopefully he'll learn from it. I think even he assumed. It seems like the Gophers came into this game soft, and without an edge, and I've almost never seen that in the Kill era. On the earlier Nelson comment, they just pulled him too early. He's been their guy all year, even to a fault earlier in the season, and they've usually been way too late to make a QB change, but this time, it was too early. Made no sense whatsoever based on everything that has transpired to date. Not saying Leidner didn't do well at the end of the 3rd qtr and the 4th qtr, but he didn't do squat until he had several series under his belt and a half time for the team to refocus/rejuvenate. I thought they should have put Leidner in way earlier in the Iowa game and I'm a big believer in yanking a QB if they're not doing the job and I've always thought Kill has waited too long to do that and so for them to do it too early in my opinion, doesn't make sense. Oh well.
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I agree with pretty much all of this. +1.
 

1) I thought Wolitarsky played really well (with the obvious and very painful exception of the hail mary drop, which I do not excuse); he was open on a consistent basis, and I thought that PI against him was ticky-tack. Excited to see him play next year.

2) Cobb had the ball in his hands a total of 19 times. Jones had the ball in his hands 0 times. That. Is inexcusable.

3) Phillip Nelson sucks. Maybe he can improve, but he has been unspeakably bad the last 3 games. As in program-changing bad. As in I-literally-cannot-comprehend-how-you-can-be-this-pathetic bad. As in the QB equivalent of Tim Brewster bad. At least in the last 3 games. I pin this loss on him more than anybody else, as I did Wisconsin, MSU, and Iowa.

4) Seriously, Nelson sucks. Leidner wasn't great either, but he at least made a couple plays and looked competent half the time. We talk about how we have young receivers and all. But guys, those young receivers (with that horrible play calling!) were open or at least had separation over and over against a below average SU secondary, and Nelson (and to a lesser extent, Leidner) repeatedly missed them in dumbfounding fashion.

5) Good to see Kill on the sideline.

6) The defense was disappointing tonight. We bent but didn't break the majority of the game, but I thought we were good enough to not have to bend against a less than stellar offense. And the bending hurt us big time in field position.

7) Did you know that Syracuse hasn't given up a 100 yard rusher all season? Because I didn't know. Especially after the first 8 times the commentators mentioned it, I was still wondering.

8) Why, punt team?

9) I wish we would try to tackle the QB instead of jumping into the air for no apparent reason when we are two feet from him.

10) The team as a whole, including the coaches, performed very badly.
 

John Galt said:
Well said. I kept thinking that Nelson had to be injured for them to pull him that early. A QB that helps you win 4 B1G games for the first time in 40 years should have got more than 2 series to start the game. I would have preferred for them to have started Leidner and then brought in Nelson depending on how Mitch was performing. It seems like Nelson plays better when he can start the game on the sideline.
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They couldn't afford to leave Nelson in any longer. In a game where it was obvious the Gophers had to throw the ball , you can't stick with a QB who is throwing ground balls or air mailing 75% of his passes
 

Johnob2 said:
Naive overseas rookie fan alert - but just an opinion. Not wanting to upset anyone.

I was disappointed to lose but I think you have to congratulate the Texas Bowl selection committee on choosing an even matchup from the teams that had left to select from - haven't seen game stats but guessing similar turnovers, total yards, first downs and obviously the score. Although our overall win/loss credentials are better then theirs, they finished the season strong and the weakness they have in the secondary we can't quite exploit yet ( a fit Engel gets 150 yards and 2 TDs tonight IMHO). Give us a 6-6 AQ team with a comparatively weaker run defense/stronger pass defense and we control the game - I don't think tonight tells us anything we didn't already know or makes us a badly coached team - it just confirmed our current limitations.

Thing that disappointed me more than result was how flat the game was until the last quarter. To use an NFL comparison, I was hoping for playoffs but it felt more preseason. I don't necessarily mean the players or coaches by this either, While I felt the matchup was close, the whole concept of this type of Bowl seemed flawed to me.

To explain (probably very naively) - A good Gopher following all things considered, but I just don't think asking two Northern universities to travel this far south on a weekday for a mid tier bowl works. I'm not saying there are too many bowl games or anything like that, but using the Tulane ULL bowl as a comparison, that seemed to be absolutely fabulous from what I could see on the TV, why on earth was our matchup with Syracuse in Texas? I know it is all about sponsorship and is meant to be Big 12 big 10 etc but switch tonight to a mutually closer venue and I think the game experience is 10 times better. I am not knocking Texas here, lovely people, fantastic state, football hotbed - which is why the way Bowls are organised should not allow this to happen.

If that not possible, could we do something to concentrate the fans a little more within the stadium e.g. Restrict the sections more or seat the band (who were fantastic) in the middle of the areas seated behind the bench?It is really hard to get any noise going when there are empty seats, neutrals and fans from both teams all sat together.

Anyway, I know this line of conversation perhaps pointless but I love this team and I love the Minnesota people. My experience of Minnesota earlier this year was fantastic - busy parking lots, Buffalo Wild Wings crammed to the rafters pre-game, rowdy crowd, great atmosphere. If something different happens so we win tonight (Drew makes the catch, The Defense make the sack, the punt coverage holds up, or the offense make the 3rd and 6 with 2 mins to go) I probably don't submit this post but I'd still be thinking the TCF experience is 100 times better than the Bowl game. With a prize at stake I think logically it should be the other way around.
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Good post. Give yourself some credit. Not naive at all. Some very good points.
 

bigticket1 said:
They couldn't afford to leave Nelson in any longer. In a game where it was obvious the Gophers had to throw the ball , you can't stick with a QB who is throwing ground balls or air mailing 75% of his passes
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LOL. I saw Mitch skip a couple passes to the wr too.
 

Many times the bowl game performance is a result of the teams motivation. Yes, the Gophers had the stop the bowl game losing streak and a chance at a 9 win season but that was not enough to get the team inspired.

The athletic department begging the Gator Bowl to take them, the team more than likely satisfied with their season, no one wanting to go to Houston again and end up playing Syracuse leads to the flat performance from the Gophers.
 

Cedric Thompson showed up and played hard and well all game long too.
 


I like our coaching staff. We made progress overall. But golly...someone said Lauer said in a pregame interview it was hard getting up for a bowl game we didn't want to be chosen for against a lesser team, or something similar. This was my biggest fear. That's all I heard: Gophers will win, Syracuse sucks...blah, blah. And I know sometimes kids don't listen but jeepers for a million plus a year...figure it out, get the team ready to play. We were awful. We didn't become efficient by fumbling and getting penalized repeatedly.

Nelson was hideous. Absolutely no problem with how they handled him. He got a second chance and was frighteningly bad.

The o line was not as good without Bak and Christenson. That's disappointing. They were dreadful.
The d line was not good. Did Hageman make the trip? Oh yeah, he got a 15 yard penalty. We tackled poorly. We gave up 3rd and long first downs and a fourth and long first down.

Couldn't we try a screen pass over the 8 guys rushing repeatedly? Couldn't we try a bubble screen to Jones? Couldn't we try quick slants to the left side? Couldn't we run Jones or somebody on the jet sweeps? Nelson fumbles one and we take it out of the playbook?

So frustrating, there are soo many negatives. Who played their best game as a Gopher? Probably Wolitarsky? And he drops the game winner.
Cobb was good but I didn't agree with the sequence/timing/play calling of when he ran or I think he'd have performed better. Our defensive backs pass covered well, I thought. Our punter was excellent imo. Maxx was fine. Anybody else stand out? Did anybody make a big play?
(There were a few nice pass plays by Leidner to receivers.) But I just didn't feel like anybody stepped up and led us...unless it was Leidner, but his sacks usually are very avoidable.

Mostly disappointed in the coaches that they didn't have a pulse on our mindset. We regressed on national tv. This performance can't help recruiting? The bright spot was Jerry did look comfortable and healthy.

Like a lot of you guys, I don't lose well either.
 

Someone asked where was Wells…injured…rumor is Nelson was pulled because of a shoulder injury (which would explain the quick yanking)…may explain those absolutely awful passes…Wolitarsky played well, 91 yards, I'll take that any day. Where were our seniors? It was disappointing but we are a young team. We lose Engel on offense but no one else on the 2-deeps. We lose more on defense but we redshirted a lot of players this year and have a solid group coming in. Great strides this year…unfortunate to end with such a poor effort but it'll leave a bad taste and these kids will learn to get motivated for all games..
 

My guess is that you will see a different energy in the team next year. Players stepping up into leadership roles are different than the Seniors leaving. This was disappointing, but I don't think it is time to completely throw out the enthusiasm everyone showed in early November.

People complaining about the lack of player enthusiasm...think some of that is showing here too.

They have some issues, but there is also some good stuff happening...
 

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