Positive Numbers: Gopher soccer (Last Week: Positive Numbers). No team locally or in women's college soccer is hotter than the University of Minnesota footy side. A pair of 3-1 wins over the two Indiana schools (featuring April Bockin, named this week's conference Freshman Of The Week) means they have now won six in a row and are undefeated in their last eight.
They currently stand atop the B1G -- the first time since their title-winning season in 2008 -- and even though I didn't think they were given short shrift for their upset wins at Ohio St. and Penn St. the week before, the even bigger jumps they took in this week's polls as a result of beating a pair of unranked teams at home suggests people were one week late in paying attention to Minnesota. But Women's College Soccer Nation is paying attention now; they are 11th in the NSCAA coaches' poll, 15th according to Top Drawer Soccer, and jumped 20 spots to 10th in BennettRank (the explanation for that is here, and by the way, Hero Sports has become an indispensable resource to follow the sport, if only because they are the only website I know that compiles the rankings of all the sport's polls). I don't know the last time they've been ranked so high -- if ever. So that's why they no longer take the top spot in the WMNSS for a second straight week but they also escape the clutches of negative numbers for a second straight week.
And so I'm now afraid that the correction is going to come. I said last week that their run out on the eastern edges of the conference was the hardest part of their season. I am going to take that back. They have a three-game road trip that extends these two weeks, and it begins Friday night in Madison against Wisconsin. I went to Friday's win against Purdue, and I kind of think the Boilermakers more lost than Minnesota won, if that makes any sense. I'm not saying the Gophers are not for real, but if they can go through these three games unbeaten (a win would be great, but I don't think that's necessary), then I'll say that this is a really good team.
#0: Lynx (Last Week: -5). OK, so I admit I was wrong, and I admit I am so, so happy that I was wrong. They didn't get swept by the Phoenix Mercury in the WNBA Western Conference Finals. In fact, it was the Lynx that swept the Mercury, thus reaching the WNBA Finals for the fourth time in past five years.
But they got a huge gift in winning Game 2 Sunday afternoon in Phoenix. Maya Moore, who dropped a career-high 40 points in the game, stole the inbounds pass intended for Brittney Griner and was ticky-tack fouled by Noelle Quinn (incorrectly, according to the WNBA). Moore drained the first free throw to break a 71-all tie, then missed the second on purpose to run out the final 1.5 seconds on the clock to seal the game and the series.
This clearly is Maya Moore's team, and it might be Maya Moore's moment right now. Check the box score; no other Lynx player scored double digits. I mean, this is like LeBron James in that Eastern Conference Finals game against the Detroit Pistons. So now I'm worried that the Jynx are now too over-reliant on one player -- one player that can do it all, and could probably negotiate through a double-team just fine, but still, it's one player.
The Lynx got another break, sort of, when the New York Liberty, the top seed in the Eastern Conference and the team that held home-court advantage throughout the WNBA Playoffs, got upset in a 2-1 series loss to the surprising third-seeded Indiana Fever. That means that it's the Lynx that will have home-court when the Finals begin Sunday afternoon. I was sure that Minnesota would lose if they had to play at Madison Square Garden for a potential three games. Now? Well ... don't think that having home-court over the third seed in the East means this is a slam dunk. Far from it.
First of all, they have Tamika Catchings, who is an older version of Maya Moore and can similarly do it all. Second of all, these two franchises met in 2012 in similar circumstances, and the Fever stole home-court advantage and upset the Jynx to win their first WNBA title. Third of all, experts and journalists believe that this year's Indiana team is much better than the 2012 Fever club that upset the Jynx, so this will be a tall order for the team.
The one advantage that can't be quantified by any advanced statistician is that there are several players on the squad that still remember that upset loss three seasons ago, and they'll should be damned if they let that happen again. But I've been portending doom for this team for some time, and it'd be dishonest of me to turn my frown upside-down now. Prediction here is Indiana beats Minnesota for the championship this year. And I'll pray to Buddha and God that I'm wrong one last time.
#-1: Vikings (Last Week: -1). Don't want to pump your brakes, but that's what some good home cookin' can do for a team smarting from a demoralizing Week 1 loss to what is turning out to be a horrible San Francisco team. After playing much better than Detroit last week (without playing all that well), for the parts of the game I was able to watch during down time from work on Sunday they thoroughly dismantled the San Diego Chargers in their 31-14 win. I do have to say that there's a huge possibility that the victory was more of a matter of the Chargers' decimated offensive line -- by the end of the game they were down to five healthy o-linemen, and I think they asked players on the defensive side of the ball to rotate in during some plays in the second half -- than anything the Vikes did. The passing game isn't blazin', although the return of Teddy Bridgewater's accuracy (without any power) was a welcome sight.
Another welcome sight, at least on the football field, was Adrian Peterson running for over 100 yards and scoring his first touchdown(s) in over a season and more than 600 carries. That ridiculous second TD was a combination of veteran experience, vision and shitty San Diego tackling. But what I didn't see on that zigzag run, and all of his other rushes, was the burst of speed that made the Adrian Peterson Of Old so dangerous and so amazing. Even with a season of rest/rust, that man is gone forever ... replaced by a guy who became a father to another son Sunday morning.
But now to hit the road, where they will face the Denver Broncos at Mile High Stadium for one of the Sunday late games. They will play with nosebleeds (maybe, I don't know) against a team that has a ferocious defense. The Broncos also have Peyton Manning, but even though I've seen him throw with enough arm strength to overshoot his receivers regularly, the offense remains oddly stuck in low gear. That kind of describes the Vikings now, doesn't it? Should I be cautiously optimistic that these guys could pull off the upset and go to 3-1, or should we just expect that they'll lose by at least two touchdowns?
#-2: Gopher volleyball (Last Week: 0). A 1-1 screening week, but that loss was Saturday night in Penn St., which is currently ranked #1 (surprise, surprise) in the AVCA Top 25. Also -- and this will count as a moral victory even though in general I don't like moral victories -- the Gophers were about to get swept before they stood tall and took sets 3 and 4 (at the healthy loser scores of 19 and 20, respectively). The U. managed to keep up with the Nittany Lions to 9-9 before Penn St. took the fifth set and the match, 15-12. Better to battle back from two sets down and then to win the first two sets and then choke.
Minnesota, with the help of Big Ten Defensive Player Of The Week Paige Tapp, opened up the home part of their conference schedule by sweeping Northwestern Wednesday, 16-23-21. Their recent return to the being one of the great programs in women's volleyball has vaulted them back into and up the AVCA poll; they jumped five spots over the weekend to #16. Great to see them back where they belong after last year's abortion. But whether they can be a contender this year depends on if they can defeat anyone at home. And they'll find that out Saturday at 7, when Illinois, ranked seventh in the AVCA Top 25, comes to the Sports Pavilion. I will be there to see how good this team really is.
#-3: Gopher football (Last Week: -2). Yes, technically the football team is undefeated, and they did show gumption in coming back with a touchdown in a late-game drive to win. And yes, they now have won three games in a row. But they have won each of those three games by three points. And last Saturday's opponent was not Ohio St., but Ohio, a solid Mid-American Conference team, but still a non-BcS school. That was a team that the Goofers had trouble all game putting away, the team they had to rally back from to avoid an embarrassing defeat at home ... for Homecoming. So yes, that is why I slipped this team behind the Gopher volleyball team that actually lost a game this screening week.
Look, this is not what I expected a Jerry Kill-run club to be doing. I don't think any fan expected this, and I hope Jerry Kill didn't expect this. The defense I think remains unproven but they have done OK against substandard competition. Mitch Leidner remains a game manager at best, and even though he went 22-for-31 for 264 yards, he won't be a difference-maker now that the B1G sched starts. The path to scoring, it appears, remains on the ground, where, at least for last week, they found a 1-2 punch of Rodney Smith and Shannon Brooks that were able to gash the Bobcats for 176 of Minnesota's 204 yards. (The Gophers D allowed 151 yards rushing, but still.) That may be the path to victory at Northwestern -- surprising, #16/#17 Northwestern -- this Saturday at 11. Either the U. shows us something different or this program, and us fans, are in for a very rude awakening.
#-4: Twins (Last Week: -3). A 4-3 week leaves them 1 1/2 games behind the Houston Astros and a game behind The Anaheim Angels of Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim Angels Of ... for American League Wild Card 2. Look, I keep saying that the goal is to avoid 90 losses, and they've done that. So once this season is over, whether it be after this (Thursday) evening's series-ending game at Cleveland and the final series against Kansas City this weekend at Target Center or in the playoffs, this season has already been a success. Meaningful games in September is just a cherry on top.
That doesn't mean, however, that I can't lament blown chances, such as Friday's loss at Detroit, where the Twinks had a 4-1 lead into the bottom of the seventh inning but Casey Fien and Glen Perkins both got shaken down for five runs total and an excruciating 6-4 loss. Or last (Wednesday) night's back end of a real doubleheader (where, after Minnesota won the rained-out first game [which started at 3 Central] 7-1, they stretched out for half an hour before playing again ... so old-school!), which was a 10-2 rout (thank you for your 1 2/3 innings, Mike Pelfrey), thereby blowing a chance to make a big jump in one day. They can't say they didn't have their chances. And now they come home against a team that is really good, but (because they probably will lose out to Toronto for home-field advantage throughout the playoffs) have no motivation to win beyond crushing the Twins' dreams.
One thing to point out: Starting this year, and in a nod the final round of group play in the World Cup, the last matchday of soccer league seasons, and the first round of the men's basketball tournament until they fucked it up with this new contract with CBS and Turner, every single game on Sunday, the last regular season game of the year, will be played at virtually the same time: 2:05 or 2:10 Central Time. So that means that the Twins, the Astros and the Angels will have no idea how the other teams fared before they take the field themselves. Making them all play at the same time introduces an element of the unknown that ensures teams will go all out for that game and injects both intrigue and a ping-pong excitement for fans. This is such a great idea, I wonder why no one thought of it sooner.
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