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| Tubby Smith, U of M Mens Basketball Coach |
I thought, patient readers, that I would let last weekend go without any Minnesota sports comments, but the opportunities for joy remain few enough that I just can't do so. It all started last Thursday with a bittersweet loss by the Gophers' football team to Texas Tech, 34-31, in the Meineke Car Care Bowl. Bitter, because the Gophers could just as well have won that game but let it get away from them; sweet because they played toe-to-toe with a team widely expected to beat them easily. On Saturday, the Vikings defeated their rival-of-rivals, the Packers in a game that almost no one thought they would win and, thereby, got themselves into the NFL playoffs. In the complicated math of the NFL, the Vikings victory also prevented the Chicago Bears, almost the rival-of-all-rivals, from making it into the playoffs—sweet.
The icing on the cake was the Gophers' mens basketball team. On Sunday and playing at home, the 9th ranked Gophers defeated Michigan State 76-63 in a game that they could just as easily have lost and in year's past would have lost. AP reporter, Jon Krawcynski, in an article entitled, "NO. 9 MINNESOTA TOPS NO. 18 MICHIGAN ST 76-63," concludes, "Maybe this is a different team after all." That is, maybe this Gophers' team will compete at a high level for an entire season and this March find its way deep into the NCAA playoffs. Maybe.
No theology today. Just the warm after glow of a nice New Year's gift from the gods of sports. Happy New Year! Herb
