The Weekly Minnesota Sports Survey

#-1: Gopher volleyball (Re-Entry!).  This team began play this past weekend with The Big Ten/ACC Challenge, both a season-opening showcase event for the sport (even though I don't think more than a thousand people attending the matches I attended) and a dress rehearsal for Target Center, which hosted the four games consisting of the U., Wisconsin, Florida St. and North Carolina and will host the championship in December.  And I can tell you now that, by watching both Gophers matches (the one Friday vs. the Seminoles in-person, the end of the one Saturday versus UNC on the TV while I was exercising), I know that these women don't have it this year.

Sure, they won both games.  But for some odd goddamn reason, after the U. was cruising in Set 3, Florida St. started to come back.  The 'Noles scored three in a row to know up the game at 18 before the squad finally put them away at 21.  And they actually dropped a set to the Tar Heels.  Albeit that Set 3 was won 30-28, Carolina only lost Set 2 26-24 and Set 4 25-23.  Championship clubs beat down their opponents, no matter what.  It would have been a fairy tale to see the U. finally win the big one for the first time in their hometown.  But it ain't gonna happen, no sirree.

They go back to the Sports ... er, Maturi Pavilion for the Diet Coke Classic next weekend.  The most notable opponent is Arkansas.  In other words, this should be nine Sets.  Will it?  We'll see what happens.

#-2: Twins (Last Week: -1).  Lost a make-up game to the White Sox at Target Monday; split a two-game series against the ChiSox at Comiskey mid-week; then dropped three-of-four at home to Oakland, a team that, despite a really shitty home venue and one of the most meager bankrolls in baseball, still manage to overperform year in and year out.  Maybe the Twinks could learn a thing or two from them.

They have two maximum road trips (ones versus three teams) left to go.  The first one starts this week with a three-game series at Cleveland starting on Tuesday and three in Texas beginning on Friday.

#-3: Gopher soccer (Last Week: Positive Numbers).  Inclement weather played havoc this weekend.  Friday's match against Ole Miss, where Megan Gray deposited the game-ender in the 109th minute/Double Overtime, kicked off as scheduled, at 7:30.  But there were thunderstorms forecast all day.  The Gophers' match was supposed to be the back end of a doubleheader, but because of the potential lightning, the first match, between Iowa and Washington St., was moved up to 11 a.m., then moved down as the rain poured in.  Finally, and for some reason, they cancelled the match -- which really sucked for the Hawkeyes, who had no other game to play in the Twin Cities and had to hightail it down to Iowa City for a game yesterday (Sunday) afternoon.

And then, due to storms which actually did not come at all, the match versus the Cougars was moved up Sunday from 1 p.m. to 11 a.m.  I was going to go to that game immediate after watching the EPL at The Local, but I decided not to go after the time of the game changed.  (I did plan on going to Friday's DH as well, but once I saw that the Hawks-Cougs match was moved up to the afternoon, there was no two-fer I would have wanted to go for, and so I went to the volleyball double-header in downtown Minneapolis ... where I would have gone for Saturday's matches instead of I took in the DH at Robbie Stadium on Friday.  See, my life is ruled by if/then cases.)  And I'm glad I missed it, because the Gophs suffered their first defeat of the year, and a convincing on at that: 2-0 to Washington St., which is ranked 22nd in at least one poll.  So maybe the U. aren't so special after all.

They continued their homestand this weekend.  They host DePaul Thursday; I should be going to that match-up.  And Sunday afternoon nationally-ranked Stanford come to town.  I would have gone to this game, but dammit, I already made plans at the State Fair.

#-4: United FC (Last Week: -2).  No Darwin Quintero, no chance as the Looons turned in a disinterested, somnambulistic 2-0 loss at Kansas City Saturday.  (This weekend was coined Rivalry Week by Major League Soccer.  What rivalry?)  Don't tell me Christian Ramirez would have done worse.  Don't tell me that at least they would have gotten more chances with Superman as Striker.  Still can't fucking believe this trade.

The only saving grace to this lost season is that they are on break until September 12.

#-Infinity: Lynx (Re-Entry!).  I admit that I have been a dick when it comes to foretelling the end of The Lynx Dynasty.  I also admit that, in the past, I have been mostly wrong.  I have been wrong since 2011 and 2012, when I first didn't believe the Jynx would win their first title, and once they did, didn't believe they would ever reach that success ever again.

But let me say this time, and with no joy in my heart, that his truly feels like The End Of An Era For The Minnesota Lynx.

Now, talking about this squad in these terms is unfair.  It probably is a symptom of the "patriarchy" that rules this world.  It manifests itself in many ways, including from me.  For example, I don't know how the Jynx went from world champions to the seventh-best record in the WNBA and a one-and-done road loss to L.A. (the team the Lynx beat last year who apparently also has fallen on black days).  I didn't go to one game this year and I don't think I saw more than, oh, five minutes of their season on TV.  Yet I feel the need to talk about them.  Looking at it from a different angle, I am about to go on and on about a club I didn't even watch this year, and I am only doing so because they were so bad this year.  Did I wax rhapsodically about them when they won the whole shebang last year?  No.  I'm only talking about them when they lose.  I admit that, too.  Finally -- and this includes the whole culture and not just me -- whereby a lot of the media talked up the Lynx last year, and I don't see a whole lot of teeth-gnashing about the team, not even sports-talk-heavy "Cheryl Reeve should be fucking fired!!!" hot takes.  They lost and they are forgotten, quickly.  Such is the case with a women's team, I hate to admit.

With that being said, I'll voice my faults, as filtered through the patriarchy as they might be.  I thought that the Jynx's 18-16 regular-season record was the worst by a defending WNBA champion in league history.  But I just did some quirk research through Wikipedia and it turns out that that is not the case.  In fact, they're not really close; three defending champs finished below .500 the following season.  (The Phoenix Mercury did it twice, for some reason.)  So at least they avoided that ignominy.  But still the question remains: Why?  Well, I still stand by that old chestnut that veteran teams (and despite a young bench the starting five is real, real old) can get very gold very quickly, and I think that's what happened here.  Also, the Point Guard situation was in flux the whole year.  Lindsay Whalen, in retrospect, could not handle being the starting PG for the Lynx as well as prepare for her new role as Head Coach of the University of Minnesota women's program.  (I say retrospect even though everyone knew juggling both plates was impossible.)  Reeve just never found a suitable replacement for Whalen, and that was the hole through which the water ultimately sank the Jynx ship.  (I must also pause and say that I had been slagging on Whalen on the team for a long time.  That her sharp decline in production was predicted by me gives me no solace, especially since I have been predicting her sharp decline in production for years now and was only lucky to be right in her last year playing as a pro.)

So, what now?  It feels as though the band finally is breaking up.  Maya Moore is still in her prime, Sylvia Fowles is still a prime force on the down-low and I would like to think Rebekkah Brunson is ageless.  Does Seimone Augustus think it's time to finally hang it up?  Meanwhile, is the franchise's worst season this decade a one-time blip, and they'll continue to accumulate 'ships in odd years?  Or is this ... The End Of An Era?  Who knows, but whatever happens, these players are back on The Weekly Minnesota Sports Survey until they lift a trophy.