The Gophers suffered their third successive defeat with a close-run 17-10 loss at the hands of bitter rivals, the Iowa Hawkeyes. Minnesota had numerous opportunities to get a foothold in the contest; they wasted a host of red zone trips and were eventually made to pay by a clinical Hawkeyes offense.
The defeat for the Gophers was also their eighth consecutive loss in Iowa City, which certainly does not prove to be a happy hunting ground for P.J. Fleck’s men. The Hawkeyes were largely indebted to some immense throwing from quarterback Nate Stanley, who threw 190 yards at the packed Kinnick Stadium to help his team lift the Floyd of Rosedale trophy.
In a partisan atmosphere that saw gold fireworks greet the two teams for this intense rivalry match, it was the Hawkeyes who drew first blood. The Gophers’ defense was caught napping, allowing an 80-yard drive and subsequent touchdown before waking up and competing. In fact, the Gophers’ defense tightened up so impressively that it only conceded 78 yards in the Hawkeyes’ next seven offense drives.
Despite failing to score in the first half of the game, the Gophers were still well and truly in the contest, despite the fact that quarterback, Demry Croft, was left ruing a string of drops by his receivers, as well as a last-gasp interception in the red zone. However, it took until the final quarter for the Gophers to change tactics, and it was eventually their slick ground game that earnt them their first touchdown of the match to set up an intriguing finale.
Nevertheless, despite retrieving possession with 90 seconds remaining on the clock, the Gophers failed to do anything other than turn the ball over on downs. The end result was that the Floyd of Rosedale trophy remains in Iowa for a third straight season, with Kirk Ferentz’s reign at Iowa yielding 13 victories over the Gophers in their last 19 meetings.
“I apologized to the seniors that we couldn’t get them a pig for their senior year, but they did everything they could to get it,” said Gophers coach, P.J. Fleck.
“They are hurt. They are emotional. They should be. I’m hurt, I’m emotional. When the plays were there to be made, we just didn’t execute them.”
With a pretty middle-of-the-road record so far this campaign — with four wins and four defeats to the Gophers’ name — the race for the Big Ten Western Conference title looks to be a one-team race, with Wisconsin still enjoying an undefeated record this season. This is very much unlike the NFL, where BetStars has priced five teams in as having a genuine shot of making the Super Bowl (the Patriots are currently 7/2 outright favorites).
For the Gophers, they still have Wisconsin to face, along with clashes with Michigan, Northwestern and Nebraska, which will require Fleck’s men to “do it all” in order to achieve a bowl game. As for the Hawkeyes, this rivalry game victory has put them within one win of bowl eligibility, and with lowly Purdue and Nebraska as the final two match-ups for Ferentz’ men, it’s possible that they will be the ones with something to play for at the end of the regular season.