The Weekly Minnesota Sports Survey

#0: United FC (Last Week: -3).  People were playing up MNUFC's showdown at St. Louis City SC as a clash between two undefeated sides.  That's a little misleading; the Loons are undefeated, but while they've won twice, they've tied twice, too.  I'm still figuring out how to say a soccer club has won every Game they've played in, say, a winning streak.  City, for example; are they 5-for-5?  Are they perfect through five Matches?  (Saying "15 Points through 5 Matches," like it seems every English play-by-play person says when describing that, is a mouthful, and I'm trying to find something more brief.)

Anyway, regardless, last/Saturday night's tilt was a big early-season one, and I'll be goddamned, the Loons pulled off the 1-0 Win!  It didn't start out promising.  Both teams apparently thrive on the counter-attack, so one team had to possess the ball out of character.  That team was City, and it looked like it was going to stomp through United FC.  But the team, missing a couple people due to injury and illness, bowed up on Defense and got to the Half scoreless.  Then, somehow, Minnesota asserted its will in the Game.  St. Louis is scary good, very imposing and tough in getting the ball back by pressing high, but they continued to not back down.  Finally, St. Louis Defender Kyle Hiebert committed a foul in the box on the Loons' ... well, I don't know, but Minnesota got a Penalty Kick from it, and Luis Amarilla slotted it home for the only Goal of the Game.

Like I said, the Loo is a really good team.  But while I admire their early success in their expansion Year, I still have reservations about them being so good in their expansion Year.  I think any team's first Year in existence in a league should be like an internship, or probation, you know?  I'm still incensed that the Las Vegas Golden Knights went to the Stanley Cup Finals in their first Year.  They were given as good a squad as any playoff contender could wish to assemble, and the NHL was in on getting that club's owner as good an outfit from the start to ensure success in a city that had never had a major league franchise.  That's not fair.  City's origins are different -- they had to bring in a lot of their own guys, and I presume without the input of MLS -- but it still wouldn't sit well with me if they make a postseason run.  So chalk me up to really, really liking City losing fucking finally.  It puts them in their rightful place.  That my team was the one to give that side their first-ever Loss, and at their pitch, no less?  *Chef's kiss*  That's why not only is United FC in the top spot this survey, they're above negative numbers.

They remain on the road, playing at Soldier Field versus The Chicago Fire.  Remember, they are perfect on the road, winning 3-of-3.

#-1: Twins (New Season!).  So far, so good.  They're perfect on the road as well, winning 2-of-2 at Kansas City to start the Year.  But you've got to admit that it's Kansas City, after all, and while winning both clashes 2-0, the reconstituted Lineup without American League batting champ Luis Arraez has yet to pop.  Fortunately, the Starting Pitching is looking promising.  The main piece for which Arraez was traded to Miami, SP Pablo Lopez, struck out eight Royals in 5+ Innings, and Sonny Gray also did his job, albeit also only getting into the Sixth Inning.

One more in K. C. this/Sunday afternoon, then they go visit Arraez and Miami for three starting on Monday.  They finally open up home play Thursday and Saturday vs. the defending World Series champion Houston Asterisks Astros.

#-2: Wild (Last Week: 0).  Don't want to be a buzzkill.  They faced a buzzsaw this past screening Week, facing three teams that probably are going to reach the playoffs.  On Monday they whipped The Seattle Kraken, 5-1.  Then, on Wednesday, they went to Denver and doubled up The Bastard Quebec Nordiques, 4-2, in a very important meeting that might set up further meetings in the postseason.  (Colorado might not have been motivated to win this Game as much as Minnesota was, but I will ignore that possibility.)  But last/Saturday night, they got blitzed by the (Las) Vegas Golden Knights, 4-1.  It was the first time in 22 Games they've lost in regulation, meaning for each of the past 21 Games before last/Saturday night they won at least one Point.  That's how they went from the playoff bubble to the top of the Central Division.  But as of press time they're on top only by one Point, and that drubbing by The Team That Was Born On Third Base And Thought It Hit A Triple, even though it's the Wild's first defeat by that type in Weeks, could push them back into third a proverbial series where they don't have home-ice advantage.  The margin for error is that razor-thin, even though it always seems to be the case for Twin Cities teams.

Six Games and two Weeks left in the regular season.  They complete a home-and-home with Las Vegas as they host the Golden Knights Monday.  They then play in Pittsburgh Thursday, then come back to the X to play St. Louis Saturday.

#-3: Gopher baseball (Last Week: -2).  They might be only 6-20, but I want to think this is the best squad this program has had since the beginning of the pandemic.  They started Big Ten play coming back from a 2-0 in the top of the Ninth Inning to defeat Ohio St. in Columbus, 3-2.  Sure, they lost yesterday/Saturday afternoon, 6-2, but I don't remember comebacks of any kind from this Nine last season, or the season before that.

After finishing up with the Buckeyes, they begin a ten-Game homestand.  They play St. Thomas Tuesday, South Dakota St. Wednesday, then Purdue for a three-Game series beginning Friday.

#-4: Gopher softball (Last Week: -4).  I'm beginning to think these players are going to struggle getting into the NCAA Tournament this Year as well.  They started off the Week getting swept by Northwestern with a Doubleheader Loss, 9-1 in 5 Innings (this was delayed from the day before, presumably due to the weather) and 5-1.  They started home league play with a dramatic 2-0 win over Penn St. on Friday afternoon on a Game-ending, two-Run Home Run by Kayla Chavez in the bottom of the Seventh Inning.  That Match was pushed up from the planned evening date because of the goddamn blizzard that assailed the Twin Cities -- or at least that's what I thought I saw on the athletic department website last week.  Anyway, yesterday/Saturday's originally scheduled Game was pushed to today/Sunday, and will thus be played as an afternoon DH.  They'll then host Indiana the following weekend; presumably, they'll be able to play Friday's Game at 5 and Saturday's Game on, you know, Saturday.

#-5: Timberwolves (Last Week: -1).  Shit, man, things are falling apart for the Timberwolves at the worst time.  The Week starting out so promising.  They went to San Francisco and, in a battle of teams right around Play-In territory, outlasted Golden State last Sunday, 99-96.  They then went up California and denied Sacramento a victory that would have given them their first postseason birth in, like, a long time by beating them, 119-115.  (The Kings won their next Game; their clinching of a playoff spot broke the active franchise record for longest playoff drought from organizations in The Four Major Sports.  That record now goes to the New York Jets.)

But Kevin Durant decided to come back from injury Wednesday, just in time to hand the visiting Wolves a 107-100 defeat, breaking their winning streak at four.  And then the roof really caved in.  First it was revealed that key reserve Naz Reid broke his wrist and will be out for six Weeks.  And then, apparently, a flu bug of some sort began infecting the whole team, just as The Bastard Minneapolis Lakers came to town on Friday.  And as they are fighting for their playoff lives, they handed the Woofie Dogs a 123-111 setback.

For all their good fortune to start the screening Week, they now sit, as of press time, ninth in the Western Conference.  And they have only four Games and eight Days left in their regular season.  The saving grace for them is that two of their remaining opponents are just playing out the string, and Minnesota faces them this Week: Portland at home this/Sunday afternoon, San Antonio on the road Saturday afternoon.  But they also visit playoff-bound Brooklyn Tuesday.  And, by the way, they are only two Games ahead of Dallas for 11th and being out of the playoff race altogether ... although they're only two Games behind Golden State for fifth, too.  Man, I've never seen such a compressed conference standings before in my life.

#-Infinity: Whitecaps (Re-Entry!).  And the wait for a local championship continues.  They fought in the PHF Isobel Cup Final in Arizona Sunday, tying up the score at 1- and 2-all vs. The Toronto Six.  They even took the lead in the Third Period before the Six tied it up.

I was at my alumni club's watering hole in downtown Minneapolis sorta watching the Game.  The big TV in front of me (I was sitting at the bar) was showing the Timberwolves contest, and then I had the bartender switch it over to the Regional Final featuring Caitlin Clark and the Iowa Hawkeyes (and by the way, her and their win over South Carolina in the National Semifinal Friday night will be seen as a milestone moment for women's basketball).  I couldn't watch the Isobel Cup Final even though I wanted to watch it, you know?  It was on on a TV behind me, and that was OK by me; I would just look over my shoulder to check on the score.  That way, if the Whitecaps were closing in on the title, I would just get up and walk over to see the end.  If they were about to lose, I could keep my back to it and ignore it completely.

But no, this Match had to be tied at the end of regulation, just as I had my fill of food and really had no reason left to stay.  That's when the broadcast, as it came back from break, detailed the rules for Overtime.  I assumed it was your usual 5-on-5, 20-Minute OT Periods, sudden death.  Oh, no.  It was one 20-Minute Period of Overtime, but only 3-on-3.  They listed that if the Game were still tied after that, then they would go to a Shootout, but who are they fucking fooling, they wouldn't get to a Shootout under that format.  It was going to end in OT.

And it did, and of fucking course the Minnesota team fell short.  I don't know the details nor seen the Championship-winning Goal, but I heard it was a real bad fucking turnover, and I can die believing that happened.

Hey, these Whitecaps came in on an eight-Game losing streak, the first of which I saw in person.  They were listing bad, and then they up and stunned the best team in the league and the most accomplished squad in league history, The Boston Pride, winning two straight Games in Boston.  And like I said, they came back from two deficits.  But that's not the same as winning.  And they didn't.  They're losers.  We Minnesotans are losers.  And it's a stain we will keep as we hope the Gopher men's hockey team can win the Frozen Four.  I won't be holding my breath.