Why The Gophers Win On Saturday Was Impressive And Important?

The Minnesota Golden Gophers won an important game on Saturday afternoon when they held on to beat Rutgers 31-28. Fans may ask, why is beating Rutgers so important, well, let’s look at that a little deeper. 

First, the Gophers held serve on their home field. Last year Minnesota was 4-3 in home games. Getting wins in college football is hard, but if you can deliver victories, especially against teams you are considered to be even with or a little better than, that will keep home fans happy and coming back.  

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Losing games you should win has been a bit of a knock-on Coach PJ Fleck, so this helps quite some of the naysayers. Plus, Rutgers won at their place last year with a former Gophers Quarterback and Offensive Coordinator, so a little redemption goes a long way.  

Also, it was Minnesota’s third win, that’s halfway to bowl eligibility with eight games left. 

Let’s Go Inside The Numbers 

Minnesota had 9 less first downs than Rutgers (29-20) and ran 17 less plays than the Scarlet Knights. Typically, when a team is short in first downs and total plays, they either lose, or they have a ton of big plays. That really wasn’t the case for the Gophers. 

Starting Quarterback Drake Lindsey did have a long pass of 78 yards to Jalen Smith, but outside of that he only had two other passes that were longer than 20 yards. Lindsey did spread the ball around to 8 different receivers and 5 of those had four catches or more. 

You might be thinking to yourself, well the run game must have been on point for the Gophers. Nope, practically non-existent, with only 35 yards on 18 carries. That’s less than 2 yards per carry. 

The pass game was the weapon on Saturday as Lindsey threw for 324 yards on 31 of 41 passing. He had three touchdown passes and was only sacked twice.  

Rutgers had more total yards, 387-359, so it wasn’t like they didn’t move the football.  

Minnesota also lost the battle of time of possession. If you don’t have the ball as much, you better "make hay" when you do have it, and Minnesota did just enough. Rutgers held a slight advantage on 3rd down conversions, 50% to 45% and the Gophers also had one unsuccessful try on 4th down as well. 

What Was The Difference? 

The Gophers produced a key interception that led to a quick touchdown and sacked the Rutgers quarterback 7 times which are both key statistics in getting the three-point win. Plus, the Scarlett Knights missed both of their field goal attempts, including a game-tying 56-yard attempt with 17 seconds left.  

So back to when I said it was an important win for Coach Fleck and his crew, they didn’t have their best game, but they did just enough, and sometimes that’s all you need. Before average teams can become good teams, they have to learn how to win games like Saturday’s game.  

It’s a process for sure, and you can almost bet your paycheck that it will take a lot better execution and some more luck this week on the road at defending National Champion Ohio State.