#-1: Gopher women's hockey (Re-Entry!). In a week that was as demoralizing as last week was (temporarily) uplifting, we have to give the catbird seat this week to the University of Minnesota women's hockey program, which kicked off its season with convincing wins over Penn St. (8-0) and Boston University (5-2). This team's still got it ... although that don't mean shit considering they shit the bed in last year's embarrassing championship game defeat to Clarkson. (Clarkson!) Sophomore Defenseman Lee Stecklein is the reigning WCHA Defensive Player Of The Week. They remain #1; the salient question is, will they be #1 at the end? They are #-1 here. They visit UMD for a pair this weekend.
#-2: Gopher soccer (Last Week: -2). The bottom falls out in the survey at this point. The footballers suffered a loss to then-#7 Penn St. Worse yet, it came on an own goal. It's funny; when you look at the U.'s recap of the loss, the Minnesota player that last touched the ball on its way to the Gopher goal is not named; the goal is simply listed as "OWN GOAL." And her name shall never be mentioned.
I was at Sunday afternoon's tilt versus Ohio St. Guess I could've cleaned out the gutters, but fuck it. Got there late because the spaghetti I ate late the night before gave me the shits, so I got out of the house a little too late. The public address announcer was aggravating enough (and by the way, "Sweet Caroline" has become such a fucking cliche at games that if I never hear it again it'll be too soon) that I have decided to skip tomorrow (Thursday) night's "Rock The Robbie" match against Nebraska. Didn't miss much; Olivia Schultz kind of lucked into kicking a feed from Haley Helverson into the upper right, but Alexis Degler tied it up on an attempt that ping-ponged off a Gopher (who also shall remain nameless).
After the Cornhuskers, they travel to Illinois and face the Illini Sunday afternoon.
#-3: Vikings (Last Week: -3). So all the promise we saw as they outlasted Atlanta the previous went into the shitter in Thursday's 42-10 dicksmack at the hands of Green Bay (yet another Thursday Night Football blowout, by the way; that none of the games have been even mildly intriguing is a huge surprise). The aspirations probably shriveled when Teddy Bridgewater was ruled out for the game. And no, Christian Ponder didn't prove he could remain a starting Quarterback in the NFL, but that offensive line did him absolutely no favors. It is astonishing how awful that line looked. Matt Kalil, in particular, has been a disappointment. I thought that offensive lineman picked high are set-it-and-forget-it draft picks, but it looks like, sadly, that he too often is a liability, and a problem that the Vikes cannot forget.
It's important to note that this is Mike Zimmer's first year, and I don't think you can expect anything, even an improvement on the year before. Basically this year's a mulligan. So let's see how they fare back at TCF Bank Sunday afternoon as they face the Detroit Lions -- possibly without The Greatest Wide Receiver In The NFL, Calvin Johnson, who is dealing with a high ankle sprain, the worst kind of nagging injury a WR has to deal with.
#-Infinity: Gopher volleyball (Last Week: -4). Wow. I don't think I have ever seen this team, this program, as bad as it is right now. In what may be the worst week the U. volleyers have had in decades, they not only lost but were swept in a pair of games on the road, first against ranked Illinois, then against unranked Northwestern. That means that, for the first time since I don't know when, is unranked in the AVC ... wait a second, they're still ranked??? They're still fucking ranked?!?!?! How? Oh, I know -- reputation. At least this isn't college football during the BcS Era, where narrative dictated who got to play for the Mythical National Championship.
Nevertheless this team still blows. And going through this volleyball chat board, I still am not seeing anyone who's, well, upset that this team blows. There are a lot of people trying to calmly diagnose what troubles this team, but it's very surprising that no one's pissed off about this tailspin. I mean, it's a chat board for God's sake. Hell, it's the Internet for God's sake -- you're supposed to have hot takes and strong opinions about why your team sucks.
I wonder if either newspaper ran a front-page story of the Minnesota volleyball team's struggles. If so, I expect this weekend's games against Big Ten newcomers Maryland (Friday) and Rutgers (Saturday) to be packed to the gills filled with casual fans who have come over to the Sports Pavilion for the first time in maybe years to dote after the players and ask, "Honey, are you OK? What's wrong?"
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