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I just noticed that Nick Saban is head coach at Alabama.

Okay, game kicks off soon and the Gophers are 7-point dogs to the Auburn Tigers in the Outback Bowl.

The LSU Offensive Line won the Joe Moore award for the best line in the country, and when the defense gets one guy past them Burrow has just enough of the scrambling and escape ability to make the other team pay with big gains on plays where the right defense was called. These kinds of "broken play" situations just kill the spirit of the opposing defense. When he scrambles and his wide receivers break their routes and do the scramble drill they just always seem to get open just enough. It happened against the best defenses he has faced all year.

Great to see that Buck Nut guy on television again, that guy just doesn't get enough exposure.

That's because they are running "The Mike Leach System With 5 Star Athletes" as the announcers reminded us over and over again.

USC has just been hot and cold all year, like they will play great for one half then get blow out in the second half. After their quarterback was injured, there was just no life in the entire team when they had been playing well up to that point.

I think he would have tweeted that during Lamar Jackson's total video game campaign during his Heisman winning Sophomore season at Louisville and not several years later when he might be NFL MVP.

His recruiting classes at Iowa would dip into the Texas High School talent pool.

At one point in retirement he was living in a Las Vegas neighborhood with some other old coaches like Bum Phillips in nearby houses.

Man, if this guy can get fired then its like almost anyone can get fired.

PJ Fleck likes traditions, and he might just get introduced to a little tradition known as the overmatched B1G team against an SEC team in a bowl game in Florida. Their opponent could be on about the scale of Florida or Auburn depending on how the selections shake out.

Corso head gear moment for Fleck and the Gophers

Gameday intro from Minnesota, to get to the National Championship game in the Superdome in New Orleans they have to row their boats a thousand miles to New Orleans This is their defensive leader getting the team hyped before the Northwestern game, if these guys can slow down the Badgers today then they have a chance

I only watched parts of the game in between doing other things but Buffalo just looked like they were enjoying themselves and playing as a team and doing all the little things. It wasn't just the quarterback but the defense and the linemen and the special teams. Their coach, I don't follow the NFL so I don't know his name, has just put it together as far as playing as a team goes. I don't think they win the division anytime soon, but they could win one playoff game this year.

Okay, now I remember them going total power-O for the second half last year to protect their lead. They make more adjustments on offense than the other teams in the division do, and I can see some wrinkles or maybe even a trick play in store for this game.

I see a small opening for the Gophers because their passing game is in sync and their receivers are better than anything that the B1G West has seen since the divisions were set up in the B1G. I can also see them slowing down the Badger running back if they throw everything at stopping the run. Wisconsin has just been bigger and stronger than the rest of the division, their offensive line especially, for the past ten years.

Okay, Tanner Morgan was clearly at full speed and the Gopers started the game by taking a 21 point lead. It wouldn't surprise me if they were keeping some offensive wrinkles for next week. Northwestern has just been awful this season. The wide receivers have been the stars for the team as the season has gone on, and the B1G West just doesn't get these kinds of playmakers at that position. They get open in any part of the field and use their bodies to create just a little space and Morgan has been dropping the ball into them. Its on to Wisconsin on Saturday afternoon at TCF Bank Stadium, tv is 2:30 central time on ABC and it looks like the Badgers are slight favorites on the road. The Badgers seem like they hit their peak performance against Michigan early in the season. Purdue stuck around with them for the first half this week. They just don't seem to be getting better as the season goes on. The Gophers looked awful in close early season wins but have been looking better as the season goes on.

Okay, the Northwestern line is only 13 because Tanner Morgan might be injured with a concussion but they can beat him with any backup because the Wildcats are just that awful this year.

Okay, next up is the Northwestern Wildcats, at Ryan Field in Evanston Illinois. The Gophers are favored by 13.5, and I think they can name the score against the Cats. Teams often play extra mean in the week after their first loss of the season. The Northwestern team just doesn't have the rhythm on offense that they need to get their version of the spread to work. If you want to see a bunch of short guys running around and endless incomplete passes, this is your kind of team. At least for this year. Anyway, the secondary ticket market has seats for about $6.00 and its just outside Chicago.

Kind of odd reason to start a thread about the draft after one guy gets injured. When a whole lot of other guys will get injured between now and the draft.

I was watching the press conference where Fleck explains why he runs onto the field after a late hit, the hit was like a long five seconds after a play. He says he was on the staff at Rutgers when Eric Legrand was paralyzed on the field. I went and checked the Rutgers media guide and found the Fleck bio page just for fun

The Iowa offense broke a bunch of their tendencies in their first possessions. Things like going shotgun on short yardage or a toss play that they hadn't run all season. The Gopher defense looked confused early, and missed tons of tackles they didn't seem to do last week. The Hawkeyes hadn't scored an opening drive touchdown against a decent opponent in a long time, but they had three touchdown drives to start the game. 20 of their 23 points came on those first three possessions. The announcers noted that they were anticipating the secondary for Minnesota to be aggressive, and some double-moves hit for large gains. The Iowa offensive line had their best game of the season, Stanley was able to get into a rhythm he hadn't been in all season. This is an offense that looked dead against every other B1G opponent and then they just march down the field to start this game. The Gopher's play action and RPO game started slow, the running plays just weren't gaining many yards and the passes were getting tipped at the line by linemen who were staying back to sniff out the run. The Gopher wideouts dropped a few passes early. Iowa was able to keep two safeties deep and have linebackers dropping into coverage zones most of the night. Morgan had a couple passes nearly picked but dropped. The Iowa secondary had a couple really athletically limited guys out there, but they had four guys in a zone looking at the football and didn't give up any big plays. Minnesota was stalled in the red zone without getting a touchdown a few times. The radio announcers were blown away by the Gopher wide receivers, they are just better than what you see in the B1G west. They can get to multiple levels and stretch out the defense. The special teams battle was lost by Minnesota missing a field goal early, and an extra point late in the game. The final sequence with the missed PAT, the onside kick, then having to pass to score a touchdown was a bad spot to be in. Assuming they beat Northwestern next week, it will come down to the last game at home against Wisconsin to decide the B1G West.

Okay, the game at Iowa is on FOX at 3:00 and Minnesota is the 3 point dog on the road, the point total is 44.5 which is way on the low side for college football. Iowa has upset some top ten opponents in similar situations in the past few years. The Iowa offense is struggling to score points in any conference game or against any competition. If Minnesota gets 25 points they almost definitely win. Iowa's secondary is a weak spot this season, and a real playmaking wide receiver can do something to the. Minnesota's quarterback played the near perfect game last week, and he probably won't match that performance two weeks in a row, but he probably won't have to. Can the Gopher's maintain the emotional high they had last week? They can basically clinch a tie for the B1G West this weekend.

I remember about five years ago, one of the local college teams fired its head coach who was doing just okay but the team was kind of stuck in a rut of mediocrity. They didn't have any tradition of success or name brand and just an average size fanbase and no real recruiting footprint or advantage there. The local columnists made several suggestions, but several indicated that you need a gimmick to kind of break our of a cycle. They were talking about something like installing the option offense, or redesigning the uniforms over and over again. People think of gimmicks like in a pejorative sense. But in a system like college football where so many guys are competing for recruits attention it can be useful to get you in the door with some guys. It gets people's attention. Anyway, Fleck has some videos where he even talks about himself as a guy that other people call a gimmick coach.