#0: Gopher women's basketball (Last Week: -2). I do not want to say that Lindsay Whalen has rolled to a 9-0 start with smoke and mirrors. I fear there will be a rude awakening as soon as the Golden Gophers begin B1G play. There will be no Incarnate Words then; the U. won't be beating the shit out of anybody like the Cardinals, which they did Wednesday, 75-39. (Incarnate Word, by the way, is a Roman Catholic university in San Antonio.)
But it's awesome to see this team rocket into, and then up, the Top 25. Starting off unranked, they then grasped onto the poll at #25, and then has gone up to #23, #20, and for this week, #14. They should be going higher for the poll that comes out tonight (Monday night), for they followed up their almost doubling of the Cards with their second road win of the season, 77-69 over Boston College yesterday (Sunday) afternoon. The Eagles are no slouches; it's only their second loss of the season. And so I am curious. I look back to the other true road game, and win, the U. has. Xavier currently sits at 7-1. Yep, their only loss so far in their year was to the Gophers, and it was at their place.
Again, maybe Xavier and Boston College are nowhere close to the caliber of what this team will face. But I do know that Minnesota entered the Fourth Quarter of their match vs. BC down by two and survived a three-minute stretch where neither team scored before Taiye Bello sank a jump shot to tie the game at 60. That was quickly followed by a Steal by Destiny Pitts (who led all scorers with 35!!), which Jasmine Brunson converted to a bunny in the paint to take the lead, and the U. never looked back. That shows heart -- which another women's team in Dinkytown refused to use Friday (see below). And for all of that, the University of Minnesota women's b-ball team takes the top spot in this week's WMNSS and grabs a #0, too.
The club begins a three-game homestand Wednesday against Coppin St. They head into an abbreviated Winter Break after that.
#-1: Gopher men's basketball (Last Week: -6). This squad's loss to Ohio St. to start Big Ten play was the wake-up call their analogues on the female side has not yet received. It looked as though these guys would be exposed as frauds in front of the home crowd Wednesday as Nebraska led by as much as 13 in the Second Half.
However, starting halfway through the half, when the Cornhuskers led by 11, the U. outscored them the rest of the way, 29-11. The guys finally took the lead with three Minutes left to play on a pair of Free Throws by, who else, Jordan Murphy. Now, Nebraska has been picked as a darkhorse candidate for the league this year, but maybe Minnesota exposed them as frauds. At the very least, the Gophers won't go winless in conference play.
With league shenanigans over, it was back to bodybag games. There are four left, and Minnesota dispatched the first one, Arkansas St., easily Saturday afternoon, 72-56. They next host North Florida Tuesday before taking an abbreviated Winter Break for finals.
#-2: Gopher women's hockey (Last Week: -3). Oh, I had mused in last week's survey about whether I should go see Robert Morris over the weekend at Ridder. I don't think I reasoned enough; I worked all day Saturday, and Saturday's match was at 1. I also got lucky; due to my laziness and forgetfulness, I completely forgot about the Robert Morris series. I went to a dinner Friday night even though I could have blown that off and gone to the game instead. But that game dropped at 7, and there would have been a pall all over Dinkytown because of The Choke Job (see below). I dodged a bullet Friday.
Nevertheless, the U. crushed the Colonials, 6-1 Friday, 5-0 Saturday. So the squad goes into the end of the year and its extended Winter Break with a 17-2-1 record overall, 9-2-1 in the Western Collegiate Hockey Association. They play in the "Minnesota Cup" (whatever that is) early in 2019.
#-3: Gopher wrestling (Last Week: -4). Went to Fresno St. and crushed the Bulldogs Saturday night, 31-6. Three notable things. First, at 149 lbs., unranked Tommy Thorn beat #23 Khristian Olivas, 3-1. Second, the U. got Technical Falls at 125 (Sean Russell) and 197 (Brandon Krone). Third and finally, the Bulldogs either were short or quit, because for the last match, Heavyweight, they did not offer an opponent for Gable Stevenson (ranked second amongst all Heavyweights), and so Minnesota won by forfeit. (A forfeit is worth six Points; I did not know that!)
Hey, at least the U. can still beat tomato cans. And they have a sizable Winter Break before going to Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., just before the New Year to participate in the South Beach Duals.
#-4: Timberwolves (Last Week: -5). For the third week in a row, the T-Wolves go 2-1. They held serve at home, roaring back from Halftime tight ones to beat Houston Monday (what happened to the Rockets?!) and Charlotte Wednesday, and they had their chances to beat the Trail Blazers in Portland, but couldn't close the deal Saturday. Karl-Anthony Towns continues to grow into the leadership role a man with a supermax contract should want to have. They currently sit at 13-13, and even though the conferences are a tad more balanced these days, the Wolves are tenth in the West. But hey, the bully's gone, right?
The game versus Portland started a four-game West Coast swing which lasts through this screening week: Golden State Monday (and BTW, the Dubs aren't really clicking right now, either), Sacramento Wednesday and Phoenix Saturday. Hey, this is also the third week in a row where they play games Monday, Wednesday and Saturday!
#-5: Gopher men's hockey (Last Week: -7). Friday's match at Michigan was the third game in a row where 1) the game went into Double Overtime 2) tied at two 3) before the opponent (which in this case is Michigan) scored to win. But at least the Goofs came back in Saturday's tilt with two Goals in the Third Period to win, 4-3, to salvage a split.
They are now off on a sizable Winter Break before they close out their non-conference schedule with a two-game stint at Mariucci vs. Ferris St. I have tickets to the Saturday night match, which I bought at the Minnesota State Fair.
#-6: Wild (Last Week: -9). The freefall continues. In their Prairie Provinces swing, they outlasted Vancouver, but got shut out against Calgary (2-0) and then got their asses kicked in Edmonton (7-2). That defeat to the Oilers helped in vaulted them past the Mild for the final spot in the West. Yep: Minnesota, which once had the third-best record in the National Hockey League, is now out of playoff position. They get to turn the arc of their season away from suck with a four-game homestand -- with contests vs. Montreal, Florida and the aforementioned Bastard Atlanta Flames this screening week -- but the Mild are where we thought they would be, and that's not good for Bruce Boudreau.
#-Infinity: Gopher volleyball (Last Week: -1). No. Just no. Un-fucking-acceptable.
I was bitching in last week's survey about not being able to watch the Sweet Sixteen matches at Maturi Friday because of work. Now? Now, I'm glad I wasn't able to. Otherwise I would be fucking scarred for life.
I don't know the details, obviously. I don't really care to know. But I saw the box score, and I caught on Twitter the now-fateful Second Set, where Oregon took them the distance and, despite, staving off nine Set Points, lost 41-39. I am familiar enough with the sport where, if a team pours all of its effort into a Set that they eventually lose, their heart basically goes out.
And that's what happened in the ensuing Set, where they got blasted by the Ducks by a score of I Don't Give A Fuck. But then they realized they were the goddamn 2-seed in the NCAA Tournament -- a tournament whose Final Four will be played in their fucking hometown -- and regrouped ... but against a poised school from an above-average volleyball conference, they went down in the Fourth, and for good, 26-24.
Here might be a good time to point out that of the four clubs that will be at Target Center Thursday and possibly Saturday, three of them, by seed, are supposed to be there: Top seed Stanford, 3-seed Illinois, and 4-seed BYU. I will also add that of the eight squads to reach the Elite Eight, seven of them were, by seed, supposed to be there: The aforementioned plus 5-seed Texas, 6-seed Wisconsin, 7-seed Nebraska (which beat Oregon Saturday to get to the Final Four) and 8-seed Penn St. The one team that got upset, the one team that did not hold up its end of the bargain, was the 2-seed. The hosts of the final weekend of this year's tournament. Minnesota.
Us.
I understand that the team and the staff probably are still in mourning. I don't give a rat's ass how they feel. Because I am beyond angry. Title contenders -- champions -- do not do what they did in the Third Set -- expose themselves as spent and weak. What happened during that game showed a frightening lack of resilience. I don't know if these players ever had to rally like this during the regular season, but I know the stakes had not been higher until Friday. Looking at it like that, these Goofers wilted at the first sign of significant adversity. And that will forever be on those players -- and, frankly, on Hugh McCutcheon and the rest of the coaching staff.
This program, which has fielded team after team that rolled through the regular season, only for those editions to excuse themselves quietly without even sniffing the championship game, was gifted a once-in-a-generation chance to play for its first NCAA championship in their hometown. These players responded, at least, with a conference championship ... and then not only failed to reach their sport's showcase weekend, they didn't even fucking get close. Let's be brutally honest about this: They pissed down their legs. They choked. This program will never get a chance like this ever again. And therefore these players, and these coaches, will not, and should not, ever live down the shame of what they allowed to happen in front of their home crowd.
This is not just an embarrassing upset. This isn't just an utter humiliation. It's not even an epic failure. This upset loss, when that team ostensibly demonstrated they were one of the best in the country, with a chance to get home-court advantage for the two most important matches of the season in order to play for the school's first volleyball title, is an absolute disgrace. And because of that, I cannot support this program anymore. I can't. I'm done. This is too much. You fuckers win a title and I'll jump back on the bandwagon. But I'm not going to be suckered by you underachieving chumps ever again. Fuck all of this and fuck all y'all.
(My God, I bought tickets to the Final Four for this weekend and I really, really don't want to go. But maybe, just maybe I'll look back on this and, if I decide not to go, I'll truly regret it. GODDAMMIT, MINNESOTA, WHY THE FUCK COULDN'T YOU WIN TWO MORE FUCKING GAMES?!?!?!)
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