Would you view 8-4 or 7-5 as a successful season at this point?

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My expectations at the beginning of the season were that: Tracy Claeys would be a step down in head-coaching abilities; but, with the relatively low turnover in coaching staff (and the fact that I didn't view Limegrover as an above-average OC), I thought the downward slide would be very gradual and maybe not even perceptible during this season. I thought that Mitch would be slightly improved and that our offense would be a lot better (especially at running) because we wouldn't be so depleted by injury. I also thought that this was our easiest schedule in years. With all that said, my expectations at the beginning of the season were that this team would get 7-9 wins.
Now, my expectation is that they will win 2 or 3 versus Illinois, Purdue and Rutgers and maybe pull out a win against either Maryland or Northwestern. That would put us at 5-7 to 7-5. I would be extremely disappointed in 5-7 and would expect a coaching change. 6-6 won't excite anyone. 7-5 with a good bowl performance will likely mean that Claeys keeps his job (albeit with his low buyout remaining intact).
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
Right, but my point is there is no reason Minnesota can't compete at the same level as Wisconsin. Coaches have come and gone, injuries happen, but they keep winning.

Meanwhile we're trying to pump ourselves up over the possibility of winning 7 or 8 games on our way to a 3rd or 4th place B1G West finish with our softest schedule ever.
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I agree with you but apparently many here have set the bar for success at eight or even seven wins when at Nebraska nine wins get you fired. It looks like we're okay with repeating the last 50-years of successful football. Great Expectations!
 

Only if that record includes a win over Nebraska or Wisconsin, otherwise no.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
No I would not consider a 3rd or 4th place finish in the B1G west a successful season when you were expected to compete for a west title.
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I would be satisfied with 8-4 had Claeys not blathered about how this is the best team we have had since he's been here. Add to that they way we've played and it's difficult to be satisfied at all.
 

50PoundHead said:
I would be satisfied with 8-4 had Claeys not blathered about how this is the best team we have had since he's been here. Add to that they way we've played and it's difficult to be satisfied at all.
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Oops read this wrong originally. 8-4 as a ceiling just is not good enough no matter what the coach says.
 



I was expecting to lose these two in close games and go 8-4 before the season started anyways.
 


Before the season I felt 9-3 or better was an A. 8-4 B, 7-5 C, 6-6 D and 5-7 or worse an F. Nothing has happened to justify changing expectations (i.e. Leidner injury etc.)

If Clayes can still get this team to 8 wins, he should be back. 7-5 is 50/50. Anything worse, he's out, IMO.
 



I actually don't care about our win total as much. I care about playing like a competent team and playing like you have a 5th year senior QB. We don't have that, and that's been terribly disappointing. I expected the team, win or lose, to play with a purpose. I don't think they have a purpose, I don't think they play disciplined and I don't think they play like they want to win. Teams can grow as the season does and they are in terrible need of that.
 

howeda7 said:
Before the season I felt 10-2 or better was an A. 9-3 B, 8-4 C, 7-5 D and 6-6 or worse an F. Nothing has happened to justify changing expectations (i.e. Leidner injury etc.)

If Clayes can still get this team to 8 wins, he should be back. 7-5 is 50/50. Anything worse, he's out, IMO.
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If that were to happen, I went ahead and adjusted your expectations for you.
 

8-4 yes, 7-5 no. I don't think Claeys should keep his job at 7-5. As an AD I would need to see a ton of improvement from now to the end of the season combined with 8 wins to keep Claeys. These requirements are in line with what Claeys himself was saying before the season. I would need to see a bowl win as well. The point is, this year should be the pinnacle for the Gophers under this coaching staff. If they can't get to 9 wins this season, what do you expect in subsequent seasons? It's year 6, and it's called meeting expectations. Claeys has already proven he can't get his team ready to play and that they lack discipline. His changes on offense have proven to have done nothing, possibly have made the offense worse (if that's even imaginable).
 

7 regular season is not a success, but Tracy does keep his job

8 regular season wins is a nice year. Not spectacular, but solid. Tracy would get an extension.
 



I finally found why we are not winning when we should. The players don't have to carry Clays off the field when we win a big one.
 

Studwell55 said:
7 regular season is not a success, but Tracy does keep his job

8 regular season wins is a nice year. Not spectacular, but solid. Tracy would get an extension.
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I put feelers out for home run coaches with either of these records.


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I would not view it as success but it would be the status quo. I thought with a senior QB and our defense versus a pretty weak schedule we could do better. If we win all of the next 4 games I would consider that a minor success because we would have come back from two disappointing losses to take down 4 would-be weaker opponents.
 


8-4 would be terrific, given we are 0-2 in the conference now. 7-5 and a bowl would be a welcome rescue from we might have, which could be 6-6 or even 5-7. Only Rutgers looks like a real underdog to the Gophers at this point.
 

No; I don't believe we will be able to reach a winning record that I qualify as a successful season at this point; however, if we can defeat Wisconsin, the season will be a success for me. Gotta have something.
 

Great Plains Gopher said:
8-4 would be terrific, given we are 0-2 in the conference now. 7-5 and a bowl would be a welcome rescue from we might have, which could be 6-6 or even 5-7. Only Rutgers looks like a real underdog to the Gophers at this point.
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How do you figure? We'd be favored by about two TDs if we hosted Purdue right now.
 

They key part of this question is "at this point". At this time, yes I would be happy with qualifying for a bowl game based off of our record and finishing above .500. At the beginning of the year, no. But as of right now, I would consider it a success that we bounced back after 2 heart breakers to win 4-5 B1G games.
 

This schedule is the easiest it will EVER be. Three wins in hand and four crap teams left on schedule plus NW. Anything less than 8 wins this year is a borderline disaster and Claeys should go.
 

8-4 yes. 7-5 no.


7-5 means you lose to one of these teams:
Northwestern
Illinois
Purdue
Maryland
Rutgers

With a 5th year senior QB that's not successful. We've already lost our two 50/50 games that make the year acceptable still.
 

Based on my expectations this year, 6 or less is catastrophic, 7 would be a bad year, 8 would be somewhere between mildly disappointing and what I expected. I don't adjust expectations down mid-season, because I feel like that rewards poor early performance with a lower bar. My expectations stay where they started, so early bad losses reduce the margin for error.
 

Some guy said:
8-4 yes. 7-5 no.


7-5 means you lose to one of these teams:
Northwestern
Illinois
Purdue
Maryland
Rutgers

With a 5th year senior QB that's not successful. We've already lost our two 50/50 games that make the year acceptable still.
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With the coaching staff doing what they have been doing, they will lose one of those games for sure. Let's hope they get their s**t together quick.
 

SelectionSunday said:
Next 4 games are vs. arguably the 4 worst teams in the B1G. Even after stinking it up vs. Iowa, I don't know how anyone could look at those 4 opponents (Maryland, Rutgers, Illinois, Purdue) and say they wouldn't be disappointed if the Gophers don't win all 4.

My expectation (read: minimum acceptable) before the season was 8-4. Anything worse than that is an underachievement given the conference schedule.
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You do understand that in the last 11 Big Ten games, the Gophers are 2-9 and over the last 14 Power 5 games they are 3-11? And the three wins were against a terrible Purdue team in 2015 and just barely beating Illinois and Oregon State at home??

If they win all four they would be doubling their Big Ten win total over that time period. When you are on a bad streak like they are, be happy if they just win a game. Any game.
 

If they actually can turn this team around I'll be kinda impressed. At this point I wonder if they're able to get the team back up on their feet emotionally even.
 

Good thing Tracy didn't tell us that we'd win 9 or 10 games or anything.
 

mnsportsgeek said:
Good thing Tracy didn't tell us that we'd win 9 or 10 games or anything.
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Good thing no one would base expectations off what a coach says preseason.


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