Those who said bowl games don't matter...

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RememberMurray said:
Again, I ask the simple question: how are you certain that if Team A loses to Team B, it's a matter of poor motivation... rather than Team B being the better team?
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Certain? OK, I see what you are getting at. You are right. I can’t be certain on any one specific game. As a whole I would say my opinion is it happens quite a bit and so I believe that to be true even if I am wrong on one here or there. I think Miami mailed it in against WI. I didn’t get that impression from GT and think we just pounded them. Could I be wrong on either of these? Sure. Maybe not on the Miami one tho - that was really bad.


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Spoofin said:
Certain? OK, I see what you are getting at. You are right. I can’t be certain on any one specific game. As a whole I would say my opinion is it happens quite a bit and so I believe that to be true even if I am wrong on one here or there. I think Miami mailed it in against WI. I didn’t get that impression from GT and think we just pounded them. Could I be wrong on either of these? Sure. Maybe not on the Miami one tho - that was really bad.


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You're right; it's hard to know why one team dominates another team in any given game.

I'm sure Badger fans are 100% positive that their team is far superior to Minnesota, and that the Gophers manhandling them in Madison was due to poor play selection, or poor coaching, or lack of motivation, or... name the excuse.

But I look at that game and I see the possibility — just a possibility, not a certainty — that the balance of power between Minnesota and Wisconsin may finally be shifting.

Granted, I have a bias.
 

RememberMurray said:
So all the talk we heard and read before the game, about Georgia Tech wanting to send Paul Johnson out with a win on a big performance, was just hooey?
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I heard more about them being disappointed in the bowl they got.

I heard the other story line but the media and folks are going to talk about that no matter what.....and nobody is going to deny it even if they weren't very excited.
 

A_Slab_of_Bacon said:
I heard more about them being disappointed in the bowl they got.

I heard the other story line but the media and folks are going to talk about that no matter what.....and nobody is going to deny it even if they weren't very excited.
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But if they saw the Detroit bowl assignment as an insult, wouldn't that motivate them to destroy the Gophers in order to prove the bowl selectors wrong?
 

Rescooter said:
Ok, I'll bite. Their final 8 games (not including the bowl), they were 6-2. That along with winning one for the gipper. Also, not trying in front of a national audience in a bowl game just doesn't add up in a team taking a dive. I'm calling BS on your "hooey".
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I'm calling flim flam on your BS of the hooey.

(I actually agree with you, just wanted to say that)
 


As a Gophers fan, I think it's funny that we're trying to discredit their accomplishment over the last couple of games. The only fact is that they opened a can on Wisconsin and Georgia Tech in their last two games...utter domination.
 

When overrated teams lose bowl games, eg Georgia, the motivation card comes out. Bull****. You’re just not that good.
 

die hard gopher said:
I agree completely. I would personally rather have a bowl win than a win against a middle of the road Big Ten team like Maryland, Illinois, Purdue etc. I think it does more for the program.
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Don’t agree with this at all.

The majority of the bowl games other then the NYD6 are meaningless.

Any win against a B1G team is a whole lot better than winning one of the many meaningless bowl games.


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Fleck has coached 25 games with us.
We won 12.

In those 12 we won by double digits in 9
In 8 of those we won by 22 points or more.

2018
In our 7 wins this year, we had an average margin of victory of 21.

We had 6 losses this year.
In three of the losses we scored 28 points or more and allowed an average of 52.

If you believe defense was an issue during the first half of the year when we had those three losses, you have room to be optimistic that it is being (or has been) corrected.



One more note, in the Indiana win, which was a win by 7 while we had Robb Smith, we had the ball at the Indiana 2 yd line up 31-9 when Shannon Brooks fumbled. Just prior to this point in the game it looked like Minnesota would get to 38-9 and add on 14 more points running it down the defense's throat. Looked like it could be a 50-something to 16 type score. But our defense allowed 22 and changed the game in the final quarter.

So you don't have to take anything from this, but I think it shows the team was pretty good when the defense played well and if gives reason to be optimistic about 2019.



Oh, and I don't think GA-Tech was mailing it in. I think they just got beat badly by a better team (and were out-coached).
 

As for the bowl game itself, spent a lot of time on the GT Swarm site and the fan-posters gave the Gophers a lot of credit for all phases of game preparation as well as the Gophers just being the more physical team.

The GT fans were disappointed...as we would have been if the reverse occurred...but also realized it was a complex set of variables in play for their side that made it an uphill go from the first whistle if they were not ready...for whatever reason.

As our own D-players said they were battered and bruised the first two weeks of bowl preparation as they were taught how to defend the flexbone-option employed by Tech. The game finally slowed down for them in the last half of bowl prep and they were firing on all cylinders when gameday arrived. Great work by Rossi. Period.

No doubt though for the Gophers it was a solid W to cap off the season. i do believe in program momentum coming out of a bowl game and we got some this year. It does feel good.
 





Somehow I came back to the board and my mid afternoon inebriated thought (yay severance) turned into a 3 page beeyotch session about how our good vibes were actually from Georgia Tech sandbagging.

Giving a crap when others (may) not -- rowing the boat -- is a sign of good coaching and playing.
 

fmlizard said:
Somehow I came back to the board and my mid afternoon inebriated thought (yay severance) turned into a 3 page beeyotch session about how our good vibes were actually from Georgia Tech sandbagging.

Giving a crap when others (may) not -- rowing the boat -- is a sign of good coaching and playing.
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You can still like the win and think GT wasn't all there.
 

RememberMurray said:
Really? They "made it clear and public" that they had "no interest"?

Hmmmm... I don't remember it exactly that way.

I know they said they thought they deserved to play in a more prestigious bowl. But it seemed like they were careful to add, "no disrespect to Minnesota". And I never heard anyone say they had "no interest".

Must have missed it.
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I know. Typical Minnesota "fan" response. The only way Minnesota one is that GT didn't want to be there. The fact that we were bigger, stronger, faster, and more talented couldn't have possibly come into it.
 

highwayman said:
I know. Typical Minnesota "fan" response. The only way Minnesota one is that GT didn't want to be there. The fact that we were bigger, stronger, faster, and more talented couldn't have possibly come into it.
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I will say GT looked shell shocked. I think they were surprised how well our defense hung with their running game and their defensive line was manhandled by our o-line. Hard to say how much of that was bad coaching on their part. Bowl games are weird though. I can say with certainty it looked like the gophers were engaged and ready to play.

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I just rewatched highlights of the game.

On scoring plays by us, it appeared the defense for GT was trying.

When we were on defense, it looked like GT was trying as well. In fact, in some plays it looked like it would have been dangerous to not try. A few of there guys were getting hit around pretty good. Even if they weren't trying, don't you try a little bit just to protect yourself and teammates?
 

Word said:
I will say GT looked shell shocked. I think they were surprised how well our defense hung with their running game and their defensive line was manhandled by our o-line. Hard to say how much of that was bad coaching on their part. Bowl games are weird though. I can say with certainty it looked like the gophers were engaged and ready to play.

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Well part of that is the triple option is all or nothing. If you can't get the runs going ... it's just OVER.
 

Face The Facts said:
I just rewatched highlights of the game.

On scoring plays by us, it appeared the defense for GT was trying.

When we were on defense, it looked like GT was trying as well. In fact, in some plays it looked like it would have been dangerous to not try. A few of there guys were getting hit around pretty good. Even if they weren't trying, don't you try a little bit just to protect yourself and teammates?
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I think this whole debate is kinda like that old quote "The harder I work, the luckier I get"....in this case "The better I get, the crappier my opponents seem"

Many people were saying Wisconsin didn't care either when Gophers wrecked them. Perhaps the Gophers getting better suddenly makes our opponents look like hot garbage. No team looks all that good when losing by 3+ touchdowns.
 

A_Slab_of_Bacon said:
Well part of that is the triple option is all or nothing. If you can't get the runs going ... it's just OVER.
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A number of Tech posters posited that the Jackets would not have to attempt any passes at all to beat the Gophers...which would be the capstone statistic of the flexbone under Coach Paul Johnson.

This of course did not unfold...the rest is history.
 

BilldGopher said:
A number of Tech posters posited that the Jackets would not have to attempt any passes at all to beat the Gophers...which would be the capstone statistic of the flexbone under Coach Paul Johnson.

This of course did not unfold...the rest is history.
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Well not have to... they also just plain can't pass at any volume or they are sure to lose. ;)

Really unfortunate as our weakness is arguably the pass, and they had no will or ability to exploit that. Kinda surprising their fans wouldn't consider that.

They did have one late long drive in the game that did work the way their system is supposed to work, but it was way to late and because their system eats clock, they again had no chance. I'm sure the Gophers by that time were all "by all means eat up clock while we have the lead".

It's just all or nothing with that system.
 

Just kind of skimmed the last few pages because I noticed the typical pissing match had broken out.

Every game a team plays matters, but in the big picture, if it is not a high profile bowl game then the result of the game means less then a conference game in general.

Having said that, the great thing about the GT game was that it confirmed that what we saw from the team over those last few conference games might just have been for real. In 3 of the final 4 games the Gophers didn't just look good, they looked dominant, and it wasn't like they were beating up on the Little Sisters of the Poor. If we are able to continue dominating the likes of Purdue, Wisconsin and Georgia Tech we are going to be in line for some really special things around here.
 

MNVCGUY said:
Just kind of skimmed the last few pages because I noticed the typical pissing match had broken out.

Every game a team plays matters, but in the big picture, if it is not a high profile bowl game then the result of the game means less then a conference game in general.

Having said that, the great thing about the GT game was that it confirmed that what we saw from the team over those last few conference games might just have been for real. In 3 of the final 4 games the Gophers didn't just look good, they looked dominant, and it wasn't like they were beating up on the Little Sisters of the Poor. If we are able to continue dominating the likes of Purdue, Wisconsin and Georgia Tech we are going to be in line for some really special things around here.
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Dominant, and confidant / disciplined defensively. Really good to see the defense finish strong.

And yeah I'm saying that as someone who thought GT didn't show up.... not everything is all one thing or another.
 

highwayman said:
I know. Typical Minnesota "fan" response. The only way Minnesota one is that GT didn't want to be there. The fact that we were bigger, stronger, faster, and more talented couldn't have possibly come into it.
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Yep. I sort of figured those posts as attempts to start to prop up Ga Southern as a more dangerous opponent...:rolleyes:
 

scools12 said:
Don’t agree with this at all.

The majority of the bowl games other then the NYD6 are meaningless.

Any win against a B1G team is a whole lot better than winning one of the many meaningless bowl games.


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You couldn't get anyone else to bite, so I guess I will. How is a bowl game any more "meaningless" "then" [sic] any other game? They all count as a win or a loss. We weren't winning a championship off the basis of beating Illinois, so how is a bowl game any more meaningless?
 

die hard gopher said:
You know what I mean. Several of their players took to Twitter to voice their displeasure in the fact that they had to play in Detroit while teams they beat got better bowls. So yes, while I do think we played very well in the game, I also think Tech was at least somewhat disinterested and did not play to the best of their abilities.


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I would think the reaction to this would be to want to kick the crap out of your opponent to prove you deserved a better bowl game.
 

highwayman said:
I know. Typical Minnesota "fan" response. The only way Minnesota one is that GT didn't want to be there. The fact that we were bigger, stronger, faster, and more talented couldn't have possibly come into it.
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So there is never a case when a team simply doesn’t “show up”? Was Appalachian State bigger, stronger, faster, or more talented than Michigan in 2007. Some Mountaineer “fans” don’t think so.


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GophersInIowa said:
I would think the reaction to this would be to want to kick the crap out of your opponent to prove you deserved a better bowl game.
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Agree! I also agree with the poster who mentioned that GT looked kind of shell shocked. One thing that kind of surprised me is that they didn't pitch, hand-off to Cottrell more. IIRC The back they had in there earlier in the game was well defensed. With that said, maybe I answered my own question/ thought.
 

dpodoll68 said:
You couldn't get anyone else to bite, so I guess I will. How is a bowl game any more "meaningless" "then" [sic] any other game? They all count as a win or a loss. We weren't winning a championship off the basis of beating Illinois, so how is a bowl game any more meaningless?
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Not every team is motivated for their bowl game. GA Tech made it clear they thought they deserved better. Conference games are more important. I would take any conference win over some lower tier bowl game that has no meaning to the overall season. 7-6 or 6-7 - so what.

Were people on this board going to be less optimistic going into next season if the Gophers lost the bowl game? They still would be pointing to the finish of the regular season as proof for their optimism.







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