The Weekly Minnesota Sports Survey

Positive Numbers: Lynx (Two Weeks Ago: -1).

This state has not had a professional team win a world championship since the Twins in 1991, so I don't know how to commemorate it on The Weekly Minnesota Sports Survey. The best thing I could do is to put their name in team colors, blow it up as big as Blogger allows me to, and just bolden and italicize and center the hell out of it. Whatever I do, it's not going to come close to rightly giving this team the congratulations, thanks and respect it deserves.

My friend got me tickets to Game 1 of the WNBA Finals. He didn't have enough money for Game 2, so I thought I wouldn't go. Besides, I was scared the Lynx would lose because the Atlanta Dream was getting back Erick da Souza, the Center that had been playing for the Brazilian National Team. With her back in the pivot, the rebounding edge the Lynx enjoyed on their way to a runaway victory in Game 1 Sunday would have been gone.

But my parents, for some inexplicable reason, came home very early that day. I took that as a sign that I should go. I was done for dinner well in time to drive down to Target Center and scalp a ticket below face (ten bucks!). What I feared would happen did happen: The Dream more than held their own in the paint, at the end of the game they had a few more rebounds than the Lynx.

They were trailing the whole game. Once it reached the fourth quarter, I had to get down from my seat and stand at the vomitorium so I could pace back and forth. My heart was in my throat the whole quarter.

I could only relax in the last minute, but I remember the one play that turned the tide in Game 2. With time running out, Lindsay Whalen danced from the three-point line to just outside of the lane. She threw up the ball, laid it in, and somehow drew a foul. That made a tight three-point lead into a less-tight six-point one, but this was in the middle of a 10-0 run and the Dream were in no danger of coming back.

I was supposed to meet my friend, this same friend, at Hubert's last night to catch the second half of Game 3. I got there late because Mother was fighting with me, and when I got there about halfway through the fourth quarter, I saw his roommate but not him; apparently he didn't see me and just left. Well. ...

Atlanta had played well enough Sunday and Wednesday for me to believe they'd just blow the doors off the Lynx. But I saw Minnesota fight hard -- a key component to this team -- and that grit served them well in Game 3. They managed to overcome a halftime deficit -- they were behind at the half all three games -- to take the lead midway through the third.

The Lynx hung tough in a sludgy, low-scoring game for both teams. I thought that Maya Moore's desperation three-pointer to beat the shot clock, which made the score 64-56 with two-and-a-half minutes left, was very important. But then the Dream put on the press and the Lynx did not respond well. Atlanta actually cut it to a single point with 1:17 left.

But the Dream then fouled the Lynx, and the team salted the game, and the title, away from the charity stripe. Five straight free throws expanded the lead back to six. And when Angel McCoughtry missed yet another shot, in a game where she uncharacteristically could not find the bottom of the net (9-for-25 from the field), the Lynx got the rebound and Atlanta chose not to foul with about eight seconds left, everybody in Hubert's went electric. It's the first time any team in the Twin Cities area has won a championship since the University of Minnesota wrestling team won the NCAAs in 2007, and of course, it's the first pro team to win a title since the Twinks two decades ago.

Yes, it's the WNBA. It's either this or rooting for two underachieving teams last in their divisions or two teams starting over with new coaches this year. I will accept the Lynx, and if you were smart you would, too.

Overall, this is a great story -- and a good lesson for other teams in the state, too. Remember that the Lynx were the Jynx just a year ago. Man, they were terrible. But they put all the pieces together, they found a coach in Cheryl Reeve who instilled defense and late-game toughness (stat: Atlanta outscored the Lynx 66-53 in the first quarter of all three games, but the Lynx outscored the Dream in the second half by a combined score of 143-102), and most important of all, they remained injury-free (the only starter to miss a start was Taj McWilliams-Franklin, and she wound up playing 25+ minutes that one game). A team that should have made the playoffs two years ago finally reversed its sorry postseason history (two playoff appearances, one playoff win, zero series victories) to win it all. Thank God.

For that, I can now institute a rule I've had in my mind for some time: Any team that wins a championship will be exempted from the WMNSS for ... oh ... three years. It really doesn't matter if the Lynx lose every game the next three seasons. How can I be mad now that they have given this state a championship? So that's what you get for winning the WNBA title, ladies: You don't have to show up on my survey till 2015. Congratulations!

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And now onto the other losers in the area:

#-1: Gopher women's hockey (Re-Entry!). Kind of surprised that college hockey season starts in mid-October. Maybe I'm surprised because the weather continues to be so hot outside. Anyway, they have blitzed through their first three opponents (Union, Syracuse and St. Cloud St.) by a combined score of 16-1. Great start ... but of course they should off to a great start because they're Minnesota. Now how about a championship? Are they going to bring home an NCAA title that they're so often deficient of earning? Let's see them beat UMD, or Wisconsin, or Boston College, or even Mercyhurst. Till then, same old, same old. The Lady Goofs finish their home series against the Huskies this afternoon, then begin a two-game set at Wisconsin Friday.

#-2: Gopher men's hockey (Re-Entry!). They no longer can beat the Michigans and North Dakotas of top-flight men's hockey, so they began their season last (Friday) night with a game against low-major Sacred Heart. At least they won, although they beat the living shit out of the Pioneers 9-0.

In other news, Head Coach Don Lucia's son, Mario Lucia, second-round draftee of the Minnesota Wild, decided he will go to Notre Dame. Mario said he wanted to get out from under his dad's shadow -- which is totally understandable, but since Don Lucia's alma mater is Notre Dame, how far out from under his shadow can he go? Wouldn't you want to go to, say, Michigan instead?

Anyway, after they finish their home series against Sacred Heart the team immediately gets a tough test: They begin a two-game set at defending national champion Minnesota-Duluth.

#-3: Gopher women's volleyball (Two Weeks Ago: -4). What I'm afraid was going to happen to this program I have a soft spot for seems to be happening: They seem lost now that Dr. Mike Hebert is no longer the coach of the team. Two-Year Interim Coach Laura Bush has returned most of the talent that went to the Sweet Sixteen last year and the Final Four two years ago, but they finished 2-2 these past two screening weeks. They won in four sets over Northwestern before embarking on a four-game, two-week road trip. They still can't win at Penn St. (getting swept there), but the surprising thing is also getting swept at Ohio St.

However, in their last game, the Goofs came back from two sets down to defeat Michigan in five sets. It's the first time they've won in Ann Arbor since 2005. Maybe this is will be the game that turns their season around; they are now 2-3 in the B-1-G and 9-5 overall. They finish their road trip at Michigan St. tonight (Saturday night), then host Iowa Friday.

#-4: Gopher women's soccer (Two Weeks Ago: -2). This team will not repeat their tournament appearance. Not after their 0-2-1 weeks. Worst of all: They begin a three-game road trip tonight at Iowa. They then visit Illinois Friday.

#-5: Vikings (Two Weeks Ago: -5). It was very difficult to decide between the Gopher football team and the ViQueens. There's a lot of evidence to put the Purple below: Another come-from-ahead defeat followed by a turgid loss at Kansas City, a game against a team they could have won. But now they stand at 0-4, with ever-growing chances that they'll go winless this season. They are fighting with Seattle for worst team in the National Football Conference.

Donovan McNabb no longer has an arm. It's not only his fault that they're losing; the offensive line is getting mighty old, and the defense just does not have the talent to compete. But in today's National Football League, you need a Quarterback that can lead a team down the field and score some points. He can't do that. He can't even throw 30 yards unless he two-hops it. It's sad, but it's the truth.

What is maddening is that Head Coach Leslie Frazier is resolute in keeping McNabb as his starter. Why? What the fuck is the point? Do you think he can turn it around? Do you think there's nobody else on the Vikes who can turn around the season?? He doesn't have it anymore, and all you're doing sticking by him is putting your credibility in doubt. How many losses does it take before you realize a) the season's lost and b) McNabb should retire? I liked Frazier; now, I doubt his competence and leadership. (And by the way, everybody keeps talking about Christian Ponder. I say, why not give the ball to Joe Webb? He directed the team to a win at Philadelphia last year.) Can they beat the visiting Bastard Chicago/St. Louis Cardinals tomorrow (Sunday) afternoon?

#-6: Gopher football (Two Weeks Ago: -3). In the end, I made the Goof Gridironers catchers because of three things: 1) Since I am completing this Saturday afternoon and just after their loss to Purdue, they have lost three games since the last WMNSS compared to the Vikes' two; 2) they suffered their third-worst margin of defeat at Michigan; and 3) they lost to second-division North Dakota St. -- and it wasn't even that close. Today (Saturday) the Boilermakers scored 28 points in the first quarter with the help of three Goof turnovers. And I thought they had a good chance of winning this game.

Meanwhile, Head Coach Jerry Kill is still suffering from seizures. Is he still coaching from the sideline, or is one of his assistants heading the team for the time being?

Doesn't matter, I guess. Thing is, I was going to give this team a pass this year. New coach, new system, they're trying to pick up the pieces of the Tim Brewster Era -- how can anybody expect even a medicore season? But if this is the way of clearing out the bad mojo from this program, shit, maybe they should just gas this team. And what's with TCF Bank Stadium? I thought it was going to be a game-changer and that it would equalize the recruiting wars. We suck. They could suck at the Dome and they would've saved us Minnesotans so much money.

They host Nebraska on the 22nd. They are 10 1/2-point underdogs against the bye next week.

#-Infinity: Twins (Two Weeks Ago: -6). Well, they avoided losing 100 games for the second time in franchise history. Yet it was touch-and-go there; they had to wait until the bottom of the ninth in the last game of the season on Wednesday to score for a 1-0 victory over Kansas City, the second of two consecutive games they had to win to avoid the century mark. How sad that Twinks fans were reduced to losing their shit over a team losing only 99 games. I hope they were being sarcastic.

Sadly, the joke's now on us. This franchise promised that if we built and bought them a stadium, they would compete. Well, we taxpayers footed two-thirds of a $545 million ballpark, and now we have a team that finished 63-99 in a season most of us believed they would be in the playoffs again. And what a difference a season makes: What was once a team chock full of potential now looks like a bunch of sad sacks so untalented that it might take a decade to clear them all out. (Like the Gopher football team, they could suck this bad at the Dome and save us taxpayers money we could use somewhere else.)

The injuries this team suffered through this year has exposed us fans to a series of AAA schmucks that have no business of being in the bigs. If this is the next generation, we might as well call them the lost generation.

The players that will put the Twinks back to baseball contention may not even be a part of the organization yet. Hell, they might be 15 years old right now. And this is baseball, where a very slow development cycle means there could be a decade before good players show up in Minnesota. And since there is no salary cap, there is no guarantee that the players General Manager Bill Smith -- or his replacement -- will be any good.

The good luck this franchise picked up a decade ago, with drafting Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau and Michael Cuddyer (the last of which will be gone, sadly, even though he should be resigned because he's the only character guy this team has and they'll need guys like him to keep fan interest), is now gone. If the Twinks select the wrong players, they could join the Kansas City Royals and Oakland Athletics as teams continually at the bottom of the league, fucking up what little control they have to change their fate in a system stacked against teams with limited funds.