Ten Fourteen Eighteen B1G Things
- Iowa at night is probably not the best way to get your first start.
- I guess 10-2 is out of the question now, huh?
- Or maybe he’s tanking to avoid having to go to the playoff while taking the Penn State job.
- Teams traveling multiple timezones remain terrible.
- With the exception of that green team over there.
The Rundown
He done did it again: Minnesota 24, Nebraska 6
P.J. Fleck seems to know a thing or two about beating Nebraska. Or seven.
BigRed_Twice: Nebraska is simply not that good. They aren’t bad, really, but they definitely aren’t good. Raiola makes moments of
magic, but there are enough other major liabilities (hello O-line) that this team is vulnerable against any team with a pulse.
At least we can stop seeing the graphic about what happens in Rhule’s third year, yes?
WhiteSpeedReceiver: Last week was an abysmal showing that ended with Minnesota squeaking out a win but looking rather pathetic. This week was a whole new team. Both lines showed up and whipped the shit out of Nebraska up front yet again to the tune of almost 200 yards rushing and 9 sacks (and seemingly non-stop) pressure. Drake Lindsey did his job nearly perfectly, and the receivers were just fine. Both OC Greg Harbaugh and DC Danny Collins had outstanding evenings, and the halftime adjustments were flawless. 0 points allowed and a 98 yard drive to start the 2nd half really can’t be beat.
Nebraska players and fans did nothing but talk before the game. Raiola taunted the Minnesota students, and Emmitt Johnson wanting to be a Gophers growing up gave the media fodder about how it was going to be a bad day to be a Gopher. Johnson got to 100 yards of total offense, and Raiola provided a pair of highlight reel plays…and nothing else. Once again they’re all cattle no hat. Or whatever the corn version of that is. “All silk no kernel” feels right.
PJ Fleck hates Nebraska, and we all really appreciate it. 7-1 against them with 6 in a row is elite.
BigRed_Twice: The Talk: “Being born and raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota, it’s going to be extremely fun to have a lot of family come watch, who don’t usually get the chance to come out here,” Johnson told reporters Tuesday in Lincoln, Neb. “It’s going to be really exciting.” and “I wanted to go to Minnesota out of high school. But I didn’t get an offer from them. So that is more motivation for me.”
I’m sorry, the only way this is construed as “smack talk” is if you are 12. A guy who grew up in Minnesota saying it will be fun to play at home, that he wanted to play there, and he hopes to have a good performance given that situation is… like, a normal thing to say?
If PJ really did use that as the big motivation, I guess good on him. He’s got a future in mega churching or certain strains of politics if he gets tired of football, because that’s first class “manipulating your audience into believing they’re victims.” A skill, I guess.
Minnesota won this game because Nebraska’s O-line is terri-bad. Good for them. Sometimes, it’s just not that deep.
MinnesotaWildcat: Oh my god, Gopher football as megachurch makes total sense now.
BigRed_Twice: Right? As soon as I typed it, I was like “Oh yeah, he WOULD be an amazing Osteen-type!” He probably would need hair plugs to really sell people on a prosperity gospel message though. And he would probably need to become a substantially worse person than he is.
Narrator: Rolling on the floor laughing reaction from HoustonBoiler
WhiteSpeedReceiver:
HoustonBoiler: Here’s a thought for a mailbag – which B1G head coach would be most likely or best suited to lead a megachurch?
Michigan 24, Washington 7.
Good news for Michigan is they have five wins already. Bad news is they only have two home games left.
Brian Gillis: After a rough trip to Los Angeles, Michigan bounced back and held a good Washington offense (and a great quarterback) to seven points.
On to Michigan State.
RockyMtnblue: Well this was a pleasant surprise. A few things happened here, including Washington not really having two TEs they fully trust. When teams line up in 12 personnel Wink almost always responds by going to a 5-2, and dropping one of the ends in coverage. This is by far Michigan’s least effective defensive formation so teams should be pushing it all day (as USC did). But today the defense was in a 4-3 nearly the entire game and the result was 7 points and 3 turnovers for Washington. More surprisingly Demond Williams and Jonah Coleman combined for only 31 rushing yards.
The offense played maybe its best game of the year despite losing starting LT Evan Link in the first half (for the year if I had to guess). With his loss, and with RB Haynes out, freshmen now outnumber non-freshmen on offense. Still Michigan outgained UDub 417-249, getting 23 first downs to Washington’s 14, and winning the turnover battle 3-0.
Michigan looks like two radically different teams home and away. Unfortunately next week is MSU away.
Northwestern 19, Purdue 0.
Ok so looks like Purdue is done looking competent for the season.
BoilerUp89: full disclosure, I turned the game off with 13 minutes remaining. that was an embarrassing effort and performance by Purdue.
LincolnParkWildcat: That was fun! On the 30th anniversary of the 1995 team that shocked college football and won its first outright Big Ten title in a very long time, Northwestern shut out the Purdue Boilermakers. I’m very happy today as I’m drinking Halloween beer and grilling surf and turf.
HoustonBoiler: I didn’t watch the first three quarters due to mulching duty and subsequently learned that I was much better off spreading mulch. The Purdue team that showed up in Minneapolis a week ago was energized and ready to play though they made plenty of mistakes that cost them that game. The Purdue team that showed up in Evanston didn’t seem that interested in playing and it showed. Northwestern dominated the game so a tip of the hat to the Cats. I’m very disappointed in the Purdue today.
MinnesotaWildcat: Yes, the celebration of the 1995 Rose Bowl team–complete with smiling, crowd-feted Pat Fitzgerald–featured an homage from the 2025 Wildcat defense, which came out with its piss hot and tortured poor Ryan Browne, who fittingly (somehow) lost both the final game at Ryan Field and the final game at Martin Stadium. The ‘Cats forced fumbles, picked off Browne’s replacement once, and generally came out and did what, well, we loved about those Mike Hankwitz (or maybe Ron Vanderlinden?) defenses–including assuaging my fears that Malachi Singleton would have room to run. Purdue isn’t great, but a shutout is a shutout is a shutout.
On offense, the homage continued. Northwestern ran the goddamn ball (for the most part), racking up 232 yards on 50 carries. Thank god, because Preston Stone looked little better than (with all due respect) present-day Steve Schnur, a comment which is only meant to evoke the fact that Schnur is now 51 or so. But a completion rate under 50% ain’t gonna do much against better teams, and that’s who’s on the schedule from here on out.
Before the season, 5-7 (3-6) was on the vaguely optimistic/realistic side. Northwestern is now 5-2 (3-1) and the task gets tougher, with roadies at Nebraska and USC, the search for a first win at hostile Wrigley against Michigan and Minnesota, and a likely Thanksgiving loss at a hungry Illinois club. Five on the slide would suck and yet feels realistic. BUT! That’s why they roll em out and don’t sim to finish. And it’s just nice to have a Northwestern season where I don’t want that to happen, especially when that looked likely a couple weeks in.
Finally, RIP to the Bunny Hutch. You’ll live on in some form, thank goodness, as a palace for the ever-deserving Northwestern women’s lacrosse team and also the Chicago Red Stars, but we’ll always have these two delightfully frustrating and confusing years of lakeside football Ludovico’d into our collective memory.
Indiana 38, Michigan State 13.
So Indiana’s copying UCLA now too?
thumpasaurus: Teams from Indiana have saved their best performances for the Illini. This strategy backfired for Purdue but hasn’t bitten Indiana……….yet
Thus far my best aged prediction is Wisconsin as turbo ass
BuffKomodo: Indiana wins the Spittoon in back to back years for the first time since the 1960’s. Are you having fun yet???
HoustonBoiler: Ummm … I think you mean Spittoon in this instance even though I expect Indiana to win/retain the Bucket on November 28.
BuffKomodo: Whoops.
Good catch.
Ohio State 34, Wisconsin 0.
MaximumSam: The Buckeyes played. As is custom we were searching for meaning by the middle of the third quarter.
Narrator: That about sums it up.
Oregon 56, Rutgers 10.
If a duck mauls a knight but no one is around to see it, I don’t know where I’m going with this. What I do know is Rutgers allowed a near-record number of yards to Oregon, coming just shy of what they gave up against Ohio State in 2016.
Iowa 25, Penn State 24.
Penn State led 21-10, then Iowa remembered they could just run the quarterback and there isn’t a damn thing Penn State could do about it.
UCLA 20, Maryland 17.
It’s OK Terps, the October misery is almost over.
Larry31: Wow. I’m glad I didn’t watch. I knew I’d be much more pissed and frustrated than I already am had I watched. For the third week in a row, Maryland played well enough to win but, didn’t. Stupid penalties and never having a .500 record in conference play will be Locks’ Terps legacy.
Notre Dame 34, USC 24.
You had one job!
