Gophers Click, Dismantle St. Francis

The 9,330 Minnesota fans who braved the cold and ventured to Williams Arena Wednesday night were rewarded. They were able to watch the Gophers put together their most complete and most dominating performance of the season against a St. Francis team that (despite how they looked tonight) isn’t too bad. The Red Flash simply caught Minnesota on the wrong night.

I was expecting a somewhat low-scoring game, judging by St. Francis’ 65-41 road loss to #10 Pittsburgh, but it actually began as a shootout. The Gophers went inside to Jeff Hagen on their first five possessions, and he responded with 6 points and 2 assists. That got the Red Flash’s attention, and their resulting focus on Jeff really opened things up. The Gopher offense was sharp and unselfish and scored 18 points in the game’s first 6-1/2 minutes.

Problem was, either the St. Francis offense was also sharp, or else the Gopher ‘D’ was a step slow, because the Red Flash were also scoring at will to start the game. With 9 minutes to play, Minnesota led just 23-19. That’s when the Gopher ‘D’ became just as sharp as the Gopher ‘O’. Minnesota took absolute control of the game by ending the half with a 26-5 run to take a 49-24 lead into the locker room. Now that was impressive.

Best of all, the Gophers maintained that domination through halftime and stretched their lead to 75-42 at the 9:30 mark. Exactly how sharp was the Minnesota offense? At this point in time, they were shooting 76% from the field and had just 5 turnovers. They were led by Aaron Robinson‘s 6 for 6 three-point shooting (he did eventually miss his 7th attempt) from the outside and Jeff Hagen‘s 8 for 9 shooting from the inside, but it was their passing and movement without the ball that really broke down the Red Flash. The Gophers had a season-high 23 assists and had a 48-20 scoring advantage in the paint (due more to layups and interior passing then to Hagen, who actually had a few buckets from outside the paint).

Another reward for the fans was a chance to see the deep Gopher reserves get their first action of the regular season. Jordan Nuness, Alex Popp, Ryan Saunders, Miles Webb, Jonathan Williams (his new knee brace didn’t seem to hamper him when he threw down a monster dunk), and Kerry Wooldridge all played 3+ minutes at the end. While that may have been part of the reason why St. Francis was able to get the final score within 85-67, that experience could be beneficial at some point this season.

Thanks mostly to his six 3-pointers, Aaron Robinson led the Gophers with a career-high 20 points. He also has 3 assists, 2 rebounds, and zero turnovers. Fellow senior Jeff Hagen also had a great game. He finished with 16 points and also had 6 blocks and 5 assists (he was very impressive with the ball in his hands) while also playing a turnover-free game.

Vincent Grier finished with 12 points, a game-high 6 rebounds, a career-high-tying 5 assists, and 2 steals. Rico Tucker was the fourth Gopher in double figures, finishing with 11 points, 3 assists, and just one turnover. J’son Stamper scored 8 points; Brent Lawson had an impressive 5 rebounds, 4 assists, 3 steals, and a block (and zero turnovers) to go with his 4 points; Dan Coleman had a nice game with 4 points, 3 rebounds, and an assist; and Spencer Tollackson again made some tremendous passes (although he passed too much and should have taken a couple more shots) and finished with 5 points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists, and a block.

Here’s the box score.

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