Thursday, October 18, 2007

To play, or not to play NDSU, that is the question

Early in his time as Gopher's head coach, Brewster made a comment about how the U should not be playing teams like NDSU. Saying that it doesn't help recruiting, and therefore, it wasn't worth putting them on the non-conference schedule.

Again yesterday, in the Pioneer Press, Brewster was quoted as saying "Is North Dakota an area we identify as a place where we're going to go and spend a great deal of time recruiting? I don't think so."

While I agree with Coach Brewster that he's probably not going to spend a lot of time recruiting in North Dakota, I still do not agree with his assessment that the Gophers should not play NDSU.

This has the chance to become a great rivalry for the Gophers, and while recruiting North Dakota may not be a priority for Coach Brewster, and rightfully so, he has said numerous times that recruiting ALL of Minnesota's high school players is. I'm not quite sure that Coach Brewster understands how much NDSU/UND are a part of the culture in northwestern Minnesota. Playing NDSU gives further exposure to the Golden Gophers to the players in northern Minnesota. In addition it gives the folks in northern Minnesota an additional reason to travel to the Twin Cities for a Gopher game.

I agree with Joel Maturi: "I agree with coach Brewster in that we want to upgrade our schedule and also schedule such that it will help recruiting. If we continue to play FCS teams, we will do so regionally. It makes economic sense for them and for us."

Playing NDSU every other year at least makes good sense for the Gopher football program.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I agree. These days, collegiate athletics is a business just like everything else. And playing NDSU makes cents. These games are guaranteed sell-outs (a rare thing these days at the Metrodome) and provides for increased regional exposure for both programs. As a lifetime gopher fan and NDSU alum, I want to see both programs prosper, and this arrangement is good for both teams. It's just too bad that the Fargodome does not hold more fans. With a sellout crowd around 20000, MN will not be visiting Fargo anytime soon.

Anonymous said...

This LOSS buy the gophers will be their best attended game until they play NDSU again. Brewster's goal of not winning 6 games is coming true. Way to set you sights high and aim for the stars. Please keep this fool in Minnesota where he belongs.

Anonymous said...

I think the gophers should play the bison because the bison are a good team no matter what team they face and plus they get almost all of they're recruits from the state so why cant we just recruit some players there i mean look what it did for the bison, and another thing to add, the gophers ought to be a decent team next year with that dominating recruiting class coming in