Posts tagged Big Ten Football

Home teams are listed in BOLD. Lines taken from VegasInsider.com and broadcast information courtesy of AwfulAnnouncing.com. This was originally posted at FringeBowlTeamBlog.com.

Minnesota, 4-2, 0-2 in Big Ten, (+17.5) over WISCONSIN, 5-2, 2-1 // 11 a.m., ESPNU, Tom Hart, John Congemi.

Last year, Nick Toon, Russell Wilson and the bulk of the Wisconsin Badgers paraded around TCF Bank Stadium with Paul Bunyan’s Axe, eventually running to the end zone where they pretended to chop down the goal post in front of the Pride of Minnesota.

Most of the fans had already exited out the stadium, choosing not to punish themselves further by watching the Wisconsin players celebrate. I stayed until the Badgers went into the locker room, I wish Jerry Kill would have kept this team on the field, too. I wish those players would have watched one of their rivals galavanting across the field, swinging around a trophy that the Gophers last held when the team’s current seniors were in seventh grade. (Eighth grade if they had a redshirt year.)

Last week, I sat on the couch with my newborn son and we watched his first Gopher football game. I should qualify that. At the time he was all of four days old and he really can’t see much of anything, so saying, “We sat down to watch the game” is painting the scene with a bit of Rockwell-ian brush, as if we had some moment that we will both remember for the rest of our lives. In reality, I held him while he slept, cried a bit and eventually pooped in his pants. He will hold no memory of the Gophers fumbling the opening kickoff, giving up 77 yards in the first quarter to Venric Mark and, well, collectively pooping their own pants on their way to loss against Northwestern. (In my son’s defense, at least he was wearing a diaper.)

In consecutive weeks, the Gophers have lost seemingly winnable games, all but flushing down the toilet any hopes of a fringe bowl game at the end of the year. As much as the Gopher defense couldn’t stop Venric Mark, the Wildcats only scored 21 points. As many times as the offense handed the ball back to Northwestern – here, you take it, we don’t really want to score anyway – the Gophers nearly had a chance to tie up the game with a two-point conversion in the fourth quarter, at least until an off-target pass merged with a receiver who fell down on a rain-soaked turf.

Jerry Kill was supposed to win these games by putting a team on the field that minimized mistakes and overachieved. In 18 games, that hasn’t happened yet. It’s still far too early to call his tenure a failure, but the Gophers will likely be double digit underdogs in every remaining game this year except one.*

This Saturday is not that game. The Maroon and Gold are 17.5-point underdogs.

Read more …

1. MarQueis Gray | QB | Senior | 6'4” 245 lbs.
Passing: CMP    YDS    YPA   TD  INT
         50.7   1,495  7.02  8   8
Rushing: ATT    YDS    AVG   TD
         199    966    4.9   6
Photo credit: Chris Polydoroff/Pioneer Press 

If the Golden Gophers reach a bowl this year, it will be because MarQueis Gray lead them to one. Plain and simple, he’s the centerpiece of the offense, the team’s most talented player and starts at the most important position in all of football. Likewise, if he gets hurt, the reigns are thrown to sophomore Max Shortell, who still needs time to develop into a Division I starting quarterback. Ranking Gray at No. 1 should be a surprise to no one. We don’t advocate violence, but we surely don’t endorse abject stupidity: If someone says the Gophers should move Gray to wide receiver or just bench him outright, go punch them in the face. Here’s why.

There’s no doubt that Gray needs to improve his accuracy – likewise, his receivers will have to make the most of their chances – but once Gray decides to tuck the ball and run, there aren’t many other quarterbacks who can match his mix of speed and power. His 174 rushing yards against Illinois set the school’s single game rushing record for quarterbacks and, even with missing a game, his 966 rushing yards last year set the team’s single-season record for quarterbacks, as well.

Gray rushed for the third-most yards among quarterbacks at the FBS-level last year, although Jerry Kill and Co. would like for the team’s running backs to contribute more to the running game in 2012. Gray was forced into often fleeing the pocket in 2011 due to little protection from a young offensive line that was also battered by injuries. Those absences up front caused several untested and undersized underclassmen into playing time, negatively impacting the running game, leaving Gray as the team’s only real rushing threat. As I wrote in James Gillum’s write-up, the rushing game needs to take a step forward, which in turn should help Gray’s passing and allow him to pick his spots in rushing the ball. Last year’s “scrambling for your life” approach wasn’t exactly by design. Although Denard Robinson and Gray are very different types of mobile quarterbacks, a more ideal situation would be like at Michigan in 2011, where running back Fitzgerald Toussaint complimented Robinson.

Football is a team sport and no one player can be completely responsible for the result of an entire game, but the fact of the matter is that when Gray played well, the team played well and when Gray left the game, the Gophers ended up playing poorly on offense. Without breaking things down to a play-by-play basis and citing somewhat generalities, the one game Gray completely missed ended horribly, a 58-0 drubbing at the hands of Michigan. On the flip side, when Gray played well, the Gophers beat Iowa and Illinois. (Somehow, the Hawkeyes beat the Wolverines. Conventional wisdom and the Sid Hartman Transitive Property of Sports suggested that any team the Gophers beat would have lost to Michigan by an amount somewhere between 50 and 3,000 points.)

Gray also needs to have his hands all over 2012’s offensive game plan because his backups are untested. Max Shortell moved the ball well at first in the season opener against USC, but as the season went on, he was just as inconsistent throwing the ball as Gray and he wasn’t nearly the running threat. When the coach is brand new you can’t necessarily call for his head without sounding completely ridiculous, so the lazy fans’ onus falls onto to the QB when things are going right.  As a true freshman, Shortell ended up compiling a passer efficiency rating and completion percentage that were both worse than Gray’s numbers. Kill likes to switch up his quarterbacks at times and Shortell has the tools to be a decent quarterback eventually, but at this point, he should be no more than a solid backup who only sees the field due to injury.

In 2011, the Gophers were a football team with many issues and several major issues. Gray’s passing accuracy was an issue, but major issues were things like defensive back play, the performance of the offensive line and little help from the running game. Gray has the tools and talent to be the most dynamic quarterback the Gophers have had in at least 20 years.

He will need to be if the maroon and gold hope to reach a bowl in 2012.

9. Brandon Green | WR | Senior | 6'0” 190 lbs.
G   REC  YDS   AVG.   TD
12  15   190   12.7   1
Photo courtesy of the University of Minnesota Athletic Department

With Da’Jon McKnight moving on to the NFL, Brandon Green becomes the longest tenured Gopher wide receiver. However, that’s a loaded statement like being named the smartest kid in remedial math class.

Green was the team’s third leading receiver last year by one catch, but again, that’s another loaded statement; if Marcus Jones doesn’t have a knee injury, Jones would have likely passed Green’s receiving total of 15 catches. Although Green is a senior, he has totaled only 56 catches in three years of action.

Caption Obvious alert: The Gophers receiving corps is shallow and unproven. I’m currently writing about the most experienced receiver on the team and he had only 15 catches in his junior year.

Still, Green has potential. A four-star recruit who was part of former coach Tim Brewster’s vaunted 2008 class, Green has had a mostly underwhelming career at Minnesota. As a true freshman in 2008, Green tallied 261 yards in a four game stretch against Purdue, Northwestern, Michigan and Wisconsin. During the same stretch, future Denver Bronco receiver Eric Decker, who was the team’s main source of offense, had 110 yards and missed one game with an injury.

So Green had a great freshman year, right? Well, not exactly.

He ended the season with only 298 yards, only 37 more than that four-game outburst. He had a nondescript sophomore year in 2009 and then suffered a knee injury that caused him to sit out much of the 2010 year. Last year, Green caught one ball in every game, but only added a second when it was a deep pass, like during the Michigan and Northwestern games.

Injuries have robbed some of Green’s explosiveness, offensive coordinator Matt Limegrover told 1500ESPN’s Nate Sandell this spring.

“I feel bad for Brandon,” Limegrover told Sandell. “He was a phenomenal high school player. The injuries have taken some of that away from him. That’s frustrating. It’s frustrating for anybody, any player who has that ability and their body just won’t let them do what they know in their mind and have that mental picture of what they’ve done in the past.”

Quarterback MarQueis Gray’s accuracy is still a large concern, so the receivers need to make the most of their chances. The Gophers simply don’t have the luxury of dropping open passes. Green demonstrated good hands last year in delivering the team’s second highest catch rate with 71.4 percent, but it’s hard to extrapolate that much from a sample size of 21 targets. (In comparison, leading receiver Da’Jon McKnight caught 54.3 percent of his 94 targets. These stats come from the brilliant Bill Connelly of Football Outsiders and Football Study Hall.)

It’s reasonable to expect Green to step up to McKnight’s departed spot, although Marcus Jones’s return from last year’s knee injury makes a murky depth chart more cloudy. Although Jones’s ceiling is much higher at this point, Green has displayed more consistent hands. With the same number of targets, Jones’s catch rate was 42.9 percent. Again, it’s a small sample size.

As I wrote earlier about Jones and Devin Crawford-Tufts, the Gophers need a consistent deep threat or two to emerge. Green isn’t going to suddenly morph into Eric Decker or Ernie Wheelwright, but he has shown glimpses of ability to at least provide sure hands on a deep fade route. If Green doesn’t prove himself in fall practice, he could watch his job slip away to one of the other underclassmen that are now on campus, but the best scenario would be if Green finally delivers on his promise and becomes dependable in 2012.

10. Jimmy Gjere | RT | Sophomore | 6'7” 325 lbs.
G   ST
5   5

Jimmy Gjere might be the most well-regarded offensive lineman on the Gophers roster; however, he hasn’t been able to fully deliver on the field in his young career. By the same point, it’s important to remember that he’s only entering his redshirt sophomore year. Ideally, Gjere* wouldn’t have taken the field at all last year, instead waiting until his pass protection skills developed.

* - Everyone refers to Gjere as “Jimmy,” although his personal Twitter account says his name is “Jim Gjere.” I feel like we should be calling him “Jim” if that’s what he really wants. Then again, he’s 6-foot, 7-inches tall and weighs more than 300 pounds. Maybe we should call him “Mr. Gjere.”

After starting five games at right tackle last year, Gjere suffered a concussion and missed the rest of the season. Although he was held out of contact during spring practices, Gjere received full medical clearance July 2 to return to the field. He’s expected to start at right tackle and continue to emerge as an an anchor on the offensive line.

As Big Ten blogger Adam Jacobi wrote this spring, “Gjere is, quite simply, the type of player you build an offensive line around.” Gjere came to Minnesota as a four-star recruit out of Irondale High, spurning reported interest from more established Big Ten programs like Ohio State, Iowa and Wisconsin. When Gjere was a high school prospect, Rivals.com Recuriting Analyst Barry Every wrote that Gjere needed to improve his pass protection skills and that could cause his career to start off slowly. Every continued that Gjere “could become a beast” down the line, though, due to his intelligence, quick feet and imposing size.

So far in Gjere’s young career, Every has nailed it.

Gjere performed well in run blocking situations last year, but his lack of experience came to light as more seasoned pass rushers were able to dominate him in pass protection. But those skills should still develop. He is likely the most agile lineman in the Gophers program and his combination of size and speed is exceptional. Gjere has already gained about 30 pounds of good weight since his freshman year and has demonstrated his intelligence in the classroom – he was named Academic All-Big Ten.

A pessimistic outlook is that Gjere is a major question mark entering this year, due to his raw inexperience and injury issues. An optimistic outlook is that Gjere was pressed into action far too early in his career and that he has recovered from his injury – as much as a person can “recover” from a concussion.

Call me an optimist. I fully expect Gjere to continue to develop as a pass blocker and eventually become a mainstay of an offensive line that could become one of the conference’s best in a few years.

12. Ben Perry | DE | Sophomore (RS) | 6'5” 241 lbs.
G   TK  SOLO TFL   SK
12  15   6   2.5   1.0

When a team unveils new jerseys, the stars are obviously going to be those modeling the new threads. If the Twins were to show off new uniforms, they wouldn’t trot out Matt Capps. Well, the Twins probably would trot out Capps, because they’ve pretty much shown an inability to un-invite him from everything including spring training, high leverage pitching situations and the bullpen as a whole. They are willing to trot him out for everything. OK, bad example, but the point still resonates. A team isn’t going to bring out a journeyman back-up to drum up goodwill at what is essentially an expansive dog and pony show.

When the Gophers went through those motions earlier this year, quarterback MarQueis Gray was obviously front and center. Ed Olson, leader of the offensive line, was there. Troy Stoudermire, who had recently been awarded a fifth-year of eligibility, was another one of the players, as well were other defensive leaders and seniors Keanon Cooper and Mike Rallis. Senior receiver Brandon Green and senior tight end John Rabe rounded out the group.

Oh, and on the far right, stood sophomore defensive end Ben Perry.

Feel free to tell me that I’m reading too much into Perry’s inclusion – by all means, I likely am – but Coach Jerry Kill could have gone with senior D.L. Wilhite to keep the upperclassmen theme going, he could have tabbed Michael Amaefula if he wanted a more heralded, young defensive end.

But he picked Perry.

I think there’s something to that, or at least something beyond “Well, Ben was in town at the time, a couple of the d-line guys were sick and then the equipment guys misspelled ‘Amaefula,’ so Ben was up there.”

Perry and his fellow freshman defensive end Amaefula emerged from fall practice last year at the top of the depth chart, thereby earning the chance to be thrown directly into the fire of Division I college football. Perry played through a wrist injury and improved as the year continued, as did the defensive line as a whole. Some faint praise exists in that though, because the line had an awful start to the season. During a three game stretch against New Mexico State, Miami (Ohio) and North Dakota State, the Gophers registered one sack for a loss of four yards.

Perry ended the season with only one sack, so there’s obviously room to improve, and as things stand, it seems that the Gophers coaching staff is expecting him to do just that. Again, he was pushed into Big Ten play before he was completely ready and should gain another 10 to 15 pounds of muscle.

While Kill didn’t recruit Perry to Minnesota, Perry seemingly fits the profile of what Kill and defensive coordinator Tracy Claeys like to do at defensive end – rush the passer. A two-star recruit out of Texas, Perry resembles the build of six-foot, five-inches tall Jake Coffman, six-foot, three-inches tall Sean Progar and six-foot, four-inches tall Stephen Neal, defensive ends who played for Kill and Claeys at Northern Illinois. It’s worth noting that Kill’s good friend and coaching mentor Gary Patterson also routinely employs tall, speedy defensive ends; Patterson famously moved high school running backs Jerry Hughes and Tommy Blake over to defensive end.

Since Willie VanDeSteeg totaled 10.5 sacks in 2008, the Gophers haven’t had a defensive lineman tally more than three sacks in a season. (There is an exception among linebackers; the late Gary Tinsley had four sacks last year.) Perry has been tabbed as a pass rushing specialist, now he will need to deliver. At 241 pounds, he’s going to be undersized in run coverage, giving up some 60 pounds to most Big Ten offensive linemen.

Much is being expected of defensive tackles Ra’Shede Hageman and junior college transfer Roland Johnson, but there’s little room for ineptitude among the group. Run defense will be an issue for the Gophers in 2012 and if Perry is earning his spot, he will need to prove it through his pass rush, while he gradually learns the art of identifying the run.  

13. Dan Orseske | P | Junior (RS) | 6'3” 205 lbs
G   PT   YDS    AVG   IN20YD 
12  57   2,111  37.0  12

Don’t x-out the window! Listen to me first.

I know, it’s hard to get too hyped-up about a punter, especially on a team with glaring questions on defense and offense. (For example, Minnesota’s top returning players at running back and wide receiver totaled 229 yards and 190 yards last year, respectively.) But if the Gophers are going to succeed, they need to be a team that minimizes mistakes and takes advantage of field position. Yes, that’s much more boring than relying on spectacular 65-yard touchdown runs from the likes of Denard Robinson or Braxton Miller.

But plainly stated, the Gophers simply aren’t good enough to overcome punts like this:

Orseske has a powerful leg, but for whatever reason, he’s been inconsistent to the point of being ineffective. After a 9-yard punt – with the wind – he was benched against Northwestern. That came a week after the above 4-yarder, which he downed himself.

Here’s the Cliff Notes of Orseske’s career: He had a few good kicks as a freshman, but then came down with mononucleosis and was redshirted. In 2010, then-coach Tim Brewster and his staff changed Orseske’s kicking form to a rugby style. If you watched a game, you noticed the difference, not only as Orseske took a few steps to the left and then kicked, but also in the lack of distance the kicks sailed.

It wasn’t something the kicker had done previously, which showed.

Call it a microcosm of Brewster’s coaching strategy, but the Gophers ranked 120th, dead last in Division I football, in punting average that year.

Before last season, Coach Jerry Kill talked to the Star-Tribune about Orseske needing more confidence and needing to provide him with better coaching. Gone, for example, were the rugby-style punts. Still, there was virtually no improvement in 2011 as Orseske’s average punt improved by less than a yard. Once again, the punter was learning different footwork, but it’s hard to blame all of his struggles on coaching turnover.

He kicked into the wind a few times with disastrous results; he had several games with punts that didn’t pass 10 yards. There was a six-yard punt against Illinois (along with three kicks between 20 and 30 yards that day) and against the wind in Michigan, he had a 14-yard kick and a 7-yard kick. The Michigan game showed the punter’s inconsistency, too, as he started the game with a 64-yarder along with four other punts that game of more than 40 yards.

Whether Orseske’s problem is technical or mental is unclear, but he can absolutely boot the football when the planets align. He boomed a kick 68 yards against Iowa last year and had six punts of 50 yards or more in 2011.

Still, if he continues to struggle, look of rsenior David Schwerman and redshirt freshman Peter Mortell to push him out of a starting position.

If the Gophers are going to reach bowl eligibility, they are going to have to overachieve, they are going to have to win some games they shouldn’t and they are going to have to play mistake-free, ball control football. Giving the defense strong field position will be a large part of that and if the Gophers will be successful this year, Orseske will need to minimize his single-digit punts and deliver more consistently.

I recently spent a good 45 minutes looking at the updated numerical roster of the Minnesota Gopher football team. I actually got excited about a photo of Paul Bunyan’s Axe being held by a pixelated video game version of the Gophers. I briefly listened to someone talk about “2013 recruiting cycles” before snapping out of it.

Yes, we’re in the dead period between spring and fall practice.

To bridge the gap to when college football starts again, I’ve broken down the the Gophers’ 15 most important players in 2012. This completely subjective list was created with the following criteria in mind: If player “X” either fulfills his potential or suffers an injury and cannot contribute, how much would that impact the team? Certain players might be more skilled than others listed, the “15 for 2012” mixes talent, position importance and team depth into one ranking. Lastly, I stamped my non-objective bias into it, producing, voila! The Gophers’ 15 Most Important Players in 2012. Or “15 for 2012.”

Each day I’ll update another player, on the countdown from No. 15 to No. 1. We start with freshman (redshirt) center John Christenson.

15. Jon Christenson | OL | Freshman (RS) | 6'4” 290 lbs.
Redshirted - Did not record any statistics.

Photo credit: Chris Polydoroff, Pioneer Press

This may be high for a player who might not even end up earning a starting job. However, this is based on what Jon Christenson represents: The creation and maintenance of a strong walk-on program at the University of Minnesota.

A walk-on from Minnetonka, Christenson figures to battle Zach Mottla and potentially Zac Epping for the team’s starting center spot this year. Working against Christenson is his relative youth, he’s only a redshirt freshman, whereas Mottla –- also a former walk-on — has two more years of experience and served as the backup center last year. Epping could push both at center, but he likely figures more into the team’s plans at right guard.

Christenson’s name likely causes a drawn out, “Whoooo?” from most casual fans, and that’s expected. A workout warrior who has apparently bulked up on Strength and Condition Coach Eric Klein’s offseason program, Christenson came to campus weighing about 265 pounds and has since bulked up another 30 pounds or so. (This came from Fringe Bowl Team’s own fearless leader MV on a podcast earlier this year.)

Christenson has drawn raves from the coaching staff, too. Coach Jerry Kill has continually raved about him on WCCO-AM’s “Sports Huddle with Sid and Dave.” On Nov. 20, 2011, Kill said he was “excited” about Christenson. On Feb. 19, Kill said Christenson he was “pushing people (around) and is athletic” and on March 25 Kill mentioned he will help this year.

Whether Christenson becomes the starter this fall or figures into more of a backup role, his emergence is important because if Minnesota ever re-enters the national consciousness as something other than a once storied program that now loses in spectacular fashion, they are going to need the help of a strong walk-on program. Call it stealing from the old Nebraska model (which Wisconsin also replicated).

In 2011, the Badgers started four solid contributors who were formerly walk-ons: fullback Bradie Ewing, left tackle Ricky Wagner, wide receiver Jared Abbrederis and defensive tackleEthan Hemer.

There are several positions, like offensive line, tight end, fullback/h-back, kicker, punter and linebacker where walk-ons can not only contribute but play extensively large roles. I write later about Mike Rallis in the 15 for 2012, a former walk-on who will start at linebacker again this year. Although opportunities to play locally under a scholarship have grown in recent years with four schools in the Dakotas moving up to the Football Championship Subdivision ranks, Minnesota will need to recruit players with potential who slip through the cracks of traditional recruiting. As much as they will need to land hometown recruits and develop them into big-time talents (think Eric Decker or Matt Spaeth), the coaching staff will need to find solid contributors who can grow along with the program, like former walk-ons Marcus and Mike Sherels.

A theme that runs through these player capsules is that Minnesota will need to overachieve to become successful again. The team will need overachievers who are ready to build themselves into high impact players.

Who is a better example of an overachiever than a walk-on who becomes a full-time contributor? Here’s guessing that Jon Christenson becomes a bit more of a household name to Gopher fans this fall.