Tag: Minnesota Golden Gophers

Saturday is a moment of truth for Wisconsin and Jim Leonhard

A few thoughts on Wisconsin Badgers defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard before Saturday’s game against the Minnesota Golden Gophers.

If this particular subplot to the game between the Wisconsin Badgers and the Minnesota Golden Gophers did not exist, Jim Leonhard wouldn’t coach less vigorously. He wouldn’t care less passionately. He wouldn’t focus less intensely. Yet, the subplot exists, and it is fascinating: Two Broyles Award semifinalists will coach against each other:

The battle lines have been drawn even more sharply before Saturday’s kickoff in Minneapolis. The offensive coordinator for Minnesota and the defensive coordinator for Wisconsin are both on the Broyles Award semifinal list. The Gophers dutifully promoted the achievement of offensive coordinator Kirk Ciarrocca, who has worked seamlessly with head coach P.J. Fleck to transform the Minnesota offense in a relatively short period of time:

The battle is fascinating enough on its own terms and merits. The Wisconsin defense versus the Minnesota offense is the heavyweight matchup in this game, given that Wisconsin roared to the top of the Big Ten on the strength of its defense in the first half of this season. That first half is what put Leonhard on the Broyles semifinalist list. It certainly hasn’t been the past four weeks.

Minnesota’s defense has played a part in the Gophers rising to the top tier of the Big Ten, but the offense is the main engine of Minnesota’s rise. The Gophers haven’t been winning slugfests; they have been winning with big numbers. When they contained Iowa’s offense, they still lost because their own offense had a miserable day in the red zone. Minnesota is the team which would like a 42-35 game. Wisconsin would prefer a 27-24 or 23-20 game. If that lower score is going to emerge, it is up to Leonhard to not only find the right plan for Minnesota; Leonhard needs to find a way to get this defense — especially the back seven — to defend the pass with a lot more consistency than the Badgers have shown in November.

The last truly great half of defense Wisconsin played — when adjusted for the quality of opponent — was the first half against Ohio State. Minnesota isn’t as good a team as Ohio State, but its offense certainly deserves to be taken seriously. Jim Leonhard and Kirk Ciarrocca are both Broyles semifinalists; Leonhard needs to show that his status has been fully deserved. If he shuts down Ciarrocca’s attack on Saturday, no one will question Leonhard’s Broyles credentials.

1962 Wisconsin-Minnesota was biggest Axe game ever

Reflections on the 1962 game between the Wisconsin Badgers and the Minnesota Golden Gophers.

If this Saturday’s 2019 edition of the Paul Bunyan’s Axe game between the Wisconsin Badgers and the Minnesota Golden Gophers can be compared to any game in UW-U of M history, it would be the 1962 game between the two teams. The game was for the Big Ten championship. Minnesota had just made consecutive Rose Bowls under head coach Murray Warmath, the last great coach in Minnesota history. Wisconsin was gunning for its second Rose Bowl in four seasons.

Heading into the 1962 edition of Badgers-Gophers, the two schools had made the last three Rose Bowls: Wisconsin under coach Milt Bruhn in 1959, Minnesota in 1960 and 1961. Moreover, if you look into these schools’ histories, some fascinating “crossover” details emerge. When you read this Sports Illustrated account of the 1962 game, you will note that Bruhn — a legitimately great coach at Wisconsin — played for Minnesota in the mid-1930s, when the Gophers became a national power under then-coach Bernie Bierman.

When Bierman was coaching Minnesota to prominence in the mid-1930s, Clarence Spears coached Wisconsin. This is the same Clarence Spears who coached at Minnesota in the late 1920s and guided a man you might have heard of: Bronko Nagurski, one of the greatest football players of all time. The Bierman era at Minnesota carried all the way through 1950. After three brief years of mediocrity, Warmath took over in 1954 and began another storied chapter of Minnesota history.

Bruhn began his tenure at Wisconsin in 1956. He won only one game his first season. In Year 2, he won six games. In Year 3, he went 7-1-1. In Year 4, he reached the Rose Bowl and began that glorious four-year period in which either Wisconsin or Minnesota represented the Big Ten in Pasadena. The 1962 game wasn’t just the height of a special season for Wisconsin and Minnesota, who both ended that regular season in the Associated Press Top 10; it was the last year in which Warmath and Bruhn both fielded great teams in the same season.

Warmath and Minnesota shared the Big Ten title in 1967 with Indiana and Purdue. (Indiana went to the Rose Bowl.) That was Warmath’s last hurrah. Bruhn never got back to the Granddaddy. No one could have known in 1962 that the flame would flicker and then die for Wisconsin football after the unforgettable 1963 Rose Bowl against USC.

Wisconsin won that 1962 game, 14-9, on a late 80-yard touchdown drive marked by a roughing-the-passer call which kept alive the Badgers’ march and wiped out a Minnesota interception. Minnesota fumed about the call, but the Golden Gophers failed to observe a longstanding principle about sports: Always be significantly better than your opponent, to the extent that one call can’t ruin your day. Minnesota failed to put away Wisconsin at earlier points in the game; it paid a price for its inefficiency against Ron Vander Kelen, Pat Richter, and the other great players on the 1962 Wisconsin team.

As the scene shifts to Saturday and the new “mountaintop” moment in the history of Wisconsin-Minnesota football, the Badgers and Gophers need to heed that advice: Be up by nine points, not two, so that if a bad call happens in the final minutes of the fourth quarter, it will have relevance only in relationship to Las Vegas… and not Pasadena.

Week 14 College Football Playoff Bubble Watch: Who’s No. 4?

As the college football season winds down, let’s look at the resumes of the remaining contenders for the College Football Playoff.

Welcome back to the Bubble Watch. If you’ve been reading through my Eliminator articles, you’d know that I still count 11 teams with a shot at reaching the College Football Playoff. (And if you haven’t been reading them, please feel free to go back to them.)

Now that teams have played enough games, we can get a real look at every team’s resume. So, for the 11 teams still alive, I am going to present all of the resumes to you (plus one extra). We’re going to look at every resume so that we can compare what positives and negatives each team has. It’s the easiest and best way to understand what each team is bringing to the table in the College Football Playoff discussion.

Right now, it looks like Ohio State, LSU, and Clemson have the top three spots locked down. Looking at the resumes will show why Ohio State and LSU can easily survive a loss this week. Clemson with a loss, though, is a bit more iffy. And, of course, the resumes will tell us who has the best shot at finishing No. 4.

How this works

Let’s go over what I’m looking at and why.

Quality of wins

For the purposes of determining quality wins, things like Top 10 and Top 25 are arbitrary numbers that do more harm than good. There is no reason the gap between No. 25 and No. 26 is considered significantly larger than the gap between No. 24 and No. 25. Therefore, to counteract this, I am being very lenient as to who is considered Top 10 or Top 25. Any team in the Top 25 of one of the major polls (CFP, AP, or Amway Coaches), or in a significant number of the accepted computer rankings, will be considered in the Top 25 for resume purposes. This leads to the awkwardness of having more than 25 “Top 25″ teams, but it presents a more accurate picture of the overall resume. Moreover, it just makes sense. The committee is aware of who is a good team and what counts as a win of decent quality, even if that team didn’t quite make it into the rankings.

I also split up every game each team has played into different groups. The groupings are important. First of all, I focus on Top 10 and Top 25 wins. These are, obviously, the quality wins. Next, I’m looking for teams in the Top 40. These are solid wins and deserve respect. The next group is teams somewhere between 41st and 80th in FBS. These are mediocre teams–they are games that any Playoff contender should win, but could in theory lose on an off day. Everyone outside the Top 80 is a complete cupcake game, and should be valued as a negative. To determine where each team is and who is outside the Top 80, I use a collection of computer rankings that focus on different things (e.g. Sagarin and Anderson) to get broad perspectives on who is a cupcake and who isn’t.

The selection committee has consistently mentioned “wins over teams with winning records” as an important metric over the past few years, so I’m going to show that to you. It is a less detailed way to view a win than looking at where each win is ranked, but the committee seems to care about it so we have to. I will not count a win over an FCS team as a +.500 win, regardless of record. Again, even though the metric is a stupid one–there are cupcakes with +.500 records (for example, Buffalo or Western Kentucky)–the committee cares about it, so we have to as well.

Offensive and defensive performance

I include the rankings in yards per play of each team. On one hand, the resume focuses on which teams you have beaten, so I stick to only identifying the quality of wins and losses and show you each contender’s remaining games. On the other hand, the committee “watches teams play,” which is really not a quantifiable statistic, but something that we can at least try to get a bearing on. Still, it’s hard to find an offensive or defensive metric that accurately represents all teams and styles of play.
Some metrics will over-value “air raid” type offenses while some will prefer more consistent, but less explosive, gameplans. The rank in offensive and defensive yards per play gives a basic metric of how efficient and/or consistent a team is on both sides of the ball.

SOS range

The SOS range is taken from numerous computer rankings. Ranges can be quite large, especially as different rankings favor different things. They do, however, give a decent picture of the possibilities of how strong the schedule actually is. SOS Ranges could still be wide in some cases, but in general they should narrow a bit over the next few weeks. Still, different methodologies can lead to some very different types of SOS numbers, and getting the full range presents a more accurate picture.

Next… Teams that control their own destinies

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Five Minnesota players who Badger fans need to know

Here are five Minnesota Gophers who Badger fans should keep a close eye on throughout Saturday’s matchup between Wisconsin and Minnesota.

The matchup Badger fans have been eagerly anticipating all season is finally upon us, as No. 12 Wisconsin will look to take back Paul Bunyan’s Axe from No.10 Minnesota in the Twin Cities on Saturday afternoon in this year’s rendition of one of college football’s most heated rivalries. As if the game was in need of any more hype, this year’s showdown between these two bitter foes will also serve as a Big Ten West championship game, with the winner destined for a berth in the conference title game in Indianapolis.

It’s been a dream season for head coach P.J. Fleck’s Golden Gophers, whose only loss of the season to this point came a couple of weeks ago against Iowa in a thriller at Kinnick Stadium. Fleck has clearly elevated his program to new heights, and after Minnesota’s beatdown of the Badgers at Camp Randall at the end of last season, it appears as though the days of Wisconsin’s consistent dominance over its border rival are over.

It was a bit of a surprise to find the Badgers listed as 3-point favorites in this one as of Wednesday morning, but after getting embarrassed by the Gophers last season, it would be shocking if they don’t come to play on Saturday. However, make no mistake, it will be an uphill battle for Wisconsin to slow down this Minnesota squad in what is sure to be a hostile atmosphere on the road. These aren’t the Gophers Badger fans have grown accustomed to routinely pounding anymore, as Fleck has a squad loaded with talent, especially on offense.

Here are five players on the opposing sideline who Badger fans should keep a close eye on throughout the game.

Tanner Morgan – Quarterback

2019 stats: 67.9% passing, 2,679 yds, 26 TD, 5 INT

Morgan has been a revelation under center for the Gophers this season, emerging as one of the Big Ten’s top quarterbacks seemingly out of nowhere after not even serving as Minnesota’s full-time starter last year. His production has been key to the program’s shocking level of success in 2019.

The Davey O’Brien Award semifinalist is the conference’s leader in passing yards and trails only Ohio State’s Justin Fields in passing touchdowns and passing efficiency rating. Morgan is a good bet to throw for at least 200 yards each time out, reaching that benchmark in seven of Minnesota’s 11 games this season.

Wisconsin’s secondary struggled yet again against Purdue last weekend, which isn’t great news for the Badgers as they prepare to stifle the most potent aerial attack they have seen all season aside from Ohio State. If defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard doesn’t come up with some effective schematic changes to bolster the passing defense, Morgan and his talented wide receiver corps are going to shred the Badgers all afternoon.

Tyler Johnson – Wide Receiver

2019 stats: 66 rec, 1,025 yds (15.5 avg), 10 TD

Nov 9, 2019; Minneapolis, MN, USA; Minnesota Golden Gophers wide receiver Tyler Johnson (6) catches a one handed touchdown pass over Penn State Nittany Lions cornerback Keaton Ellis (2) in the first half at TCF Bank Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jesse Johnson-USA TODAY Sports

Minnesota could have the two best wide receivers in the conference, and there’s a case to be made that Johnson is at the top of the list.

The senior is putting the finishing touches on a marvelous career in the Twin Cities, and he’s doing so with a bang. Johnson is already over 1,000 receiving yards for the second year in a row, leading the conference in that category as well as receiving touchdowns. The only player he trails in receptions is the next one on this list.

Johnson had a solid outing in Minnesota’s victory over Wisconsin last season (four catches for 76 yards), and he enters Saturday’s matchup on a bit of a hot streak, having gone over 100 receiving yards in the Gophers’ last three games.

NEXT: Rashod Bateman/Antoine Winfield Jr./Carter Coughlin

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Jeff Brohm of Purdue sizes up Wisconsin versus Minnesota

Jeff Brohm of the Purdue Boilermakers commented on the game between the Wisconsin Badgers and the Minnesota Golden Gophers.

Jeff Brohm of the Purdue Boilermakers has now coached against both the Wisconsin Badgers and the Minnesota Golden Gophers. It is true that in a 40-second audio clip, one can’t learn everything one needs to know about the Badgers and Golden Gophers, but it is nevertheless interesting to hear what Brohm had to say.

You can watch and listen to the clip and see for yourself:

What is notable in the clip:

1) “Minnesota’s a big, physical team.” The Gophers play with pace have fast receivers, but Brohm focused first on Minnesota’s physicality, and how the offensive line sets up everything for P.J. Fleck’s attack. Wisconsin and Minnesota offer two very different offensive styles, but they can both be rooted in the same principles, line play being number one. Brohm could have said that Minnesota is a fast, versatile team (and it is), but he led with its physical nature instead. That gets one’s attention.

2) “Their run-pass play-action stuff has been very effective for them, with two outstanding receivers.” Hmmm. Was this intentional? I doubt it. It was probably an innocent and perfectly earnest way of praising Rashod Bateman and Tyler Johnson, Minnesota’s two best receivers. I don’t think there was some deeper, hidden intent on Brohm’s part. Nevertheless, Minnesota has more than two outstanding receivers. Chris Autman-Bell has made acrobatic and important plays for the Gophers this season. He is no slouch as a third option. Brohm might be saying, though, that dealing with Bateman and Johnson clearly takes precedence in trying to contain the Minnesota passing attack, which is a reasonable-enough statement to make (or imply).

3) “Who can get out to a lead first and control the tempo will definitely help their chances of winning.” I think this is spot-on from Purdue’s head coach. Once Wisconsin established its offense against Purdue, the Boilermakers couldn’t stop it. Minnesota also scored 38 points against Purdue and was difficult for the Boilers to defend. More relevant to the upcoming game between Wisconsin and Minnesota is the simple reality that Wisconsin’s offense is not built to come back from a 14-point deficit. A one-score deficit isn’t cause for (excessive) concern, but yes, if one team gets a multi-score lead, that team has to love its chances.

This isn’t the Big 12, you know.

Week 13 CFP Implications: We know our contenders

With our Week 13 CFP Implications, we are able to look at the College Football Playoff picture with just two weeks to go.

With just two weeks left in the college football season, we usually have a small list of contenders remaining in the College Football Playoff race. The list of contenders is currently at 11, which is slightly above average.

We have 11 contenders for the next two weeks because there are so many teams with one or fewer losses. Two teams with two losses are still in the picture–Wisconsin and Oregon. Oregon essentially needs a miracle to get into the picture, while Wisconsin could have an incredible resume with two more wins.

So, that brings us to where we are now. 11 teams–three from the Big Ten, three from the SEC, two from the Big 12, two from the Pac 12, and Clemson. Wisconsin and Minnesota play an elimination game this week, with the winner moving on to the Big Ten Championship Game. LSU and Georgia will meet in the SEC Championship Game, while Alabama needs a win and then some help to get in. Utah looks in decent position now. And Oklahoma and Baylor can just win and hope the committee starts to like the Big 12 again.

The stage is very clearly set for what should be an intense final two weeks to the college football season. With that said, let’s look at the current Playoff pecking order, and what scenarios could possibly throw things out of whack. What teams are locks if they win out, who needs a little help, who is on the bubble, and who is officially a member of Team Chaos? Let’s look at as many of the potential scenarios as we can.

Next…Current Playoff Picture

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The biggest reason Wisconsin should be confident versus Minnesota

Another look at the game we’re all waiting for: the Wisconsin Badgers versus the Minnesota Golden Gophers.

There are certainly reasons for the Wisconsin Badgers to be worried about the Minnesota Golden Gophers, but what is their main reason to feel confident on Saturday? One could come up with several legitimate answers. This is not a “there’s only one right answer” kind of question. However, I do feel that one answer stands out more than others.

You will recall how poorly Wisconsin played against Illinois. That was a distracted, uneven, emotionally subdued game the week before a big clash against Ohio State. Would that loss to Illinois lead to a dispirited, disjointed Wisconsin team in Columbus? No, it did not. Wisconsin lost to a better team that day, but the Badgers’ defense played its best 25 minutes of the season at the start of that game.

Yes, Wisconsin thrashed Michigan and casually brushed aside Michigan State. The statistics looked better and the thrill of emphatic wins certainly felt better. Yet, when adjusted for the caliber of opposition, Wisconsin standing up to Ohio State’s loaded offense in the first 25 minutes of play — allowing a measly field goal to a juggernaut — strikes me as UW’s best 25 minutes of defense this season.

The key point is that UW played elite defense one week after playing subpar defense. That tells me Wisconsin can put ordinary performances in the rearview mirror; adjust; and learn from mistakes. That first half against Ohio State told me that Jim Leonhard can — and probably WILL — have his group ready to handle what P.J. Fleck has in mind for the Badgers.

Yes, without question, a big reason for Wisconsin to be confident against Minnesota is the play of the offensive line in tandem with Jonathan Taylor. That running game can win in Minneapolis. That offense can control the ball and keep the Gophers’ offense off the field. Yes, it is painfully clear that the defense’s difficult second half against Ohio State was a product of the offense not keeping the ball as much as anything else. Wisconsin is in better position to help its defense in this game against Minnesota. If you want to cite that reason as the main source of confidence for UW against the U of M, I wouldn’t really argue with that.

I would only emphasize that even if Wisconsin’s offense helps the defense in this game, there will be moments when the Badgers’ defense will have to be self-sufficient. I don’t see Wisconsin scoring every time it touches the ball. I also don’t see UW completely shutting down Minnesota, either. My more precise point is that the Badgers will need to go through a 10- or 15-minute period in this game when their offense isn’t clicking, and they need to hunker down and thwart Minnesota’s offense. No, that dynamic probably can’t be sustained for 45 minutes. No, that dynamic definitely won’t be sustained for the full 60 minutes. It CAN be sustained for 10 to 15, and even for 25… as we saw against Ohio State, before the Buckeyes finally scored a touchdown late in the first half and then gained momentum after halftime.

Wisconsin’s defense slept against Illinois and then awakened in a magnificent first-half performance against an elite offense in Columbus. That is the foremost reason for the Badgers to expect success — and conquest — against Minnesota in the game of the year for both sides.

Wisconsin must tune in, turn on, and drop Minnesota out

One of several perspectives on the upcoming game between the Wisconsin Badgers and Minnesota Golden Gophers.

Timothy Leary never could have known he would establish the framework for the upcoming showdown between the Wisconsin Badgers and the Minnesota Golden Gophers. The 1960s counterculture guru coined the expression, “Turn on, tune in, drop out,” to neatly summarize the larger themes and messages he wanted to convey to his audience.

“Turn on” meant gaining a higher and sharper consciousness, enabling a person to be more connected with the inner self. “Tune in” meant establishing harmony with the world and creation, aware of one’s surroundings. “Drop out” meant shedding personal baggage and detaching from a cluttered cultural mindset which prevented one from gaining clear insights into the nature of life. Say this much for Wisconsin: That last emphasis on greater clarity certainly applies to this game against Minnesota. Coach Leary might actually have known what he was talking about.

In the title of this piece, I switched the order of the first two Leary commandments for a simple reason: Turning it on against the Golden Gophers — elevating the Badgers’ level of play from the previous several weeks — won’t happen unless or until Wisconsin tunes in and blocks out the noise and the distractions provided by College GameDay and the media spotlight which will greet this game, arguably the biggest in the entire history of the Badgers-Gophers football series, and certainly the biggest game since 1962. Wisconsin has to be tuned in for the “turning on” and “dropping Minnesota out” of the Rose Bowl to happen. Focus is the first point of emphasis.

This point is obvious enough, but it merits a little more explanation. I wrote last week about why Wisconsin fans shouldn’t be too worried about the uneven performance against Nebraska. I will briefly reiterate that point after another ragged and choppy display against Purdue: This team took a few powerful punches in Champaign and Columbus. Many teams need time to recover from a few significant emotional blows. Wisconsin had been roaring through its season until the fourth-quarter stumble against Illinois. Then, Ohio State did what Ohio State has been doing to every opponent this season: It bludgeoned an opponent into submission. Wisconsin had to take its lumps. Players have been less certain about themselves. The injuries in the secondary certainly haven’t helped, but the level of play isn’t nearly as crisp or as confident on defense as it was for the first several weeks of the season.

Yet, beneath the struggles lies an elemental reality: With Minnesota surprisingly rising to the top tier of the Big Ten, the Badgers knew — when they lost in Columbus — that the Gophers provided the “circle in red” game in November. Iowa was a task to be handled. Nebraska and Purdue were games to get through and check off on a box. No one was going to remember those games unless Wisconsin lost them. Those were the “take care of business” games in which even the most impressive 59-0 victory really wouldn’t have proved much. The other side of the coin is that Wisconsin’s sloppy displays against the Huskers and Boilermakers ALSO don’t prove very much.

It was always Minnesota. The Golden Gophers, once they announced themselves as contenders this season, were always going to be the team by which Wisconsin measured the success of its 2019 journey. Does Wisconsin want a rematch with Ohio State? Sure it does… but even if the matchup happens and Ohio State thumps the Badgers again, Wisconsin won’t suffer in the realm of national perception. Everyone knows Ohio State is an elite team. There is absolutely no shame in losing big to the 2019 Buckeyes, who had Dwayne Haskins last year and somehow got BETTER at quarterback this year. That’s just unfair. If Wisconsin loses to OSU a second time, no one will hold it against the Badgers.

It’s all about Minnesota. If Wisconsin — after living in an emotionally diminished world the past few weeks, in games which felt like burdens more than opportunities and offered very little upside beyond the bottom-line value of winning and staying in the Big Ten West race — can tune in and turn it on against the Gophers, Madison will be euphoric. The UW community will party deep into the night next Saturday and early Sunday.

If Wisconsin — struggling to play its best football for roughly a full month — answers the bell with a top-tier effort and ruins P.J. Fleck’s season on the road, claiming back Paul Bunyan’s Axe while winning the Big Ten West, nothing else will matter as much as that. Penn State might get the Rose Bowl bid (even though it might not deserve it, but that’s a separate conversation). Ohio State might go to the playoff. The Badgers might finish 10-3 after the flawless first several games of the season, which could be seen as a disappointment by college football fans in other regions of the country. Yet, for Wisconsin to take some punches and then rise to a high level in the spotlight — against Minnesota, in a high-stakes game in the larger history of this rivalry — would give Badger fans one of the more satisfying feelings they have ever experienced.

All the drift and inconsistency of the past few weeks haven’t felt that great. They haven’t been fun to watch on television or in the stands. Yet, in these three games against Iowa, Nebraska and Purdue, one basic point has remained intact: Wisconsin hasn’t needed to be its very best to handle any of those teams. In a sport where — as we can see — even Ohio State can snooze after taking a 21-0 lead at home, or Oklahoma very nearly blew a 21-point lead at home for the second time in November, we are reminded that college athletes won’t be mentally airtight, impervious to lapses or letdowns, over a full season.

Yes, the past three weeks haven’t shown Wisconsin at its best. So what? If Wisconsin tunes in, turns it on, and drops Minnesota out of the national picture (and the Rose Bowl) this Saturday, no one in Madison will care about those past three weeks. Moreover, no one would have any legitimate reason to do so. Minnesota is here. Wisconsin just has to tune in and let the rest take care of itself.

Big Ten football power rankings after week 13: Solidifying spots

There’s just one more game left in the regular season and after an interesting Saturday, we’ve got the latest in our Big Ten Power Rankings.

There’s now just one week of football to go in the Big Ten, and we are as close to ever at knowing which teams are going to Indy, which are positioning themselves for bowl games, and which one’s are still alive for some pretty big things.

Ohio State clinched its spot in the Big Ten Championship Game after a hard fought win over a top ten Penn State, Michigan keeps winning, and the West now comes down to Wisconsin and Minnesota.

As we do each week, here’s your Big Ten football power rankings after the latest round of games. As always, give me a break on these, I ran across the Donald Trump impeachment hearings and couldn’t turn it off. Shame on me.

14. Rutgers – (Last week 14)

Rutgers has one more shot to get a Big Ten win. It’s against Penn State next week. The Scarlet Knights will finish winless in the conference.

13. Maryland – (Last week 13)

Boy has this team quit on the season. It got blitzed by Nebraska. Literally nobody has gotten blitzed by Nebraska up until now.

12. Northwestern – (Last week 12)

Pat Fitzgerald is going to blow a gasket in one of these press conferences coming up. He’s about had it with this team and you can bet he’s ready to turn the page after yet another loss, this time to Minnesota. In hindsight, it might not be a good idea to play a team that likes to row boats on the shores of Lake Michigan.

11. Nebraska – (Last week 11)

The Cornhuskers looked like the darkhorse we thought in the West Division against Maryland. But, since the Terps aren’t good at the American version of the sport this year, we’ll pause on that. One more win and Scott Frost can take his team to the postseason.

Next … 10 thru 6

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ESPN’s College GameDay to host show in Minneapolis for Badgers-Gophers

ESPN’s major morning kickoff show will be in Minneapolis for the first time ever, as the Badgers come to town.

Next Saturday in Minneapolis, there will be plenty on the line as the No. 12 Badgers travel to face their biggest rival, the No. 10 Gophers, on the road.

As always, it will be a battle for Paul Bunyan’s Axe, one that has been played an incredible 128 times, the most in the nation.

In addition, this year’s matchup will be for a spot in the Big Ten Championship game against Ohio State in Indianapolis.

And for the first time in Minneapolis and the history of the Gophers, ESPN’s College GameDay show will be on hand for the matchup, as announced Saturday evening by the worldwide leader in sports.

Wisconsin had recently dominated the series, but Minnesota beat the Badgers in Madison last season to take back the Axe, and remarkably, tie the series at 60-60-8 through 128 games.

The game will be played at 2:30 on ABC next Saturday, while ESPN’s College GameDay can be seen at 9:00 Eastern time Saturday morning to start the full day of college football.