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University of Minnesota Athletics
Gophers Set to Make First Home Appearance vs. Aggies
9/5/2011 12:00:00 AM | Football
Sept. 5, 2011
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The University of Minnesota Golden Gophers will play their first home game of the 2011 campaign Saturday at TCF Bank Stadium. Minnesota host New Mexico State University in the first-ever meeting between the two schools, with kickoff set for 2:37 p.m. CT
Both teams enter the contest looking for their first victory. The Gophers are coming off a 19-17 loss to nationally-ranked USC last Saturday at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Meanwhile, the Aggies fell 44-24 at home in Las Cruces, N.M. to the Ohio University Bobcats last week.
Minnesota is 1-1 in home openers at TCF Bank Stadium. The Gophers christened their shiny new facility with a 20-13 win over Air Force in 2009, but fell 41-38 to South Dakota in the home opener last season.
BTN will televise the game, with Wayne Larrivee, Brett Basanez and Rebecca Haarlow on the broadcast.
SCOUTING THE AGGIES
New Mexico State opened its 2011 season with a 44-24 loss at the hands of Ohio University Saturday night in Las Cruces, N.M.
The Aggies are coached by DeWayne Walker, who is in his third season as the head coach at New Mexico State. Walker played his collegiate football at Minnesota and was a two-year starter after transferring from Pasadena (Calif.) City College. Walker was the defensive coordinator at UCLA before taking over at New Mexico State.
New Mexico State rushed for just six yards vs. Ohio last week, the second-worst performance of the week (not including Sunday games). However, the Aggies passed for 362 yards, the 10th best total of the weekend. New Mexico State allowed 44 points and 452 yards to Ohio last week. Those numbers ranked 102nd and 90th in the nation among week one totals. Ohio rushed for 245 yards vs. the Aggies, while passing for 211.
THAT'S JUST WAC
Minnesota has only faced off on the gridiron against a Western Athletic Conference team seven times prior to this week's game with New Mexico State. It's been so long since the Gophers have played a WAC opponent, the last one they played isn't even in the WAC anymore. Minnesota's last contest vs. a team from the Western Athletic Conference was in 2003, when the Gophers opened the season with a 49-10 win over Tulsa. The Golden Hurricane are now members of Conference-USA.
KILLER LOYALTY
University of Minnesota head coach Jerry Kill has an unbelievably loyal staff. Of Kill's nine full-time assistants and head strength and conditioning coach, the staff has a total of 94 combined consecutive years of service under him.
There are only six NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision head coaches with more combined consecutive years of service among their assistant coaches.
Perhaps the most impressive statistic when comparing Kill's staff to the five ranked ahead of it is the number of different head coaching positions held by the respective coaches on the list. Kill has made five different head coaching stops -- Saginaw Valley State (Mich.), Emporia (Kan.) State, Southern Illinois, Northern Illinois and Minnesota. Of the other five, two of the head coaches have been at one school for their entire careers. The other three have only made two head coaching stops.
The following is a look at each of Minnesota's assistant coaches and their years of service under Jerry Kill (not including this season): Eric Klein - 17; Tracy Claeys - 16; Rob Reeves - 15; Matt Limegrover - 12; Brian Anderson - 10; Pat Poore - 10; Jay Sawvel - 10; Jeff Phelps - 3; Jim Zebrowski - 1; Bill Miller - 0.
FIRST TIME FOR EVERYTHING
Former Gopher quarterback Adam Weber entered the 2010 season as one of the most experienced quarterbacks in the nation. He ended up his career by starting every game for four years straight and set a Big Ten record for starts and consecutive starts by a QB with 50. In last week's season-opener, two Gophers had firsts under center. Junior signal-caller Marqueis Gray made his first collegiate start as a quarterback, after earning six starts over the previous two seasons at wide receiver. True freshman Max Shortell took his first collegiate snap and played the fourth quarter, when Gray left with cramps.
GT=HIGH PERFORMANCE
In the automotive world, GT stands for grand tourer or gran turismo in Italian. They are high-performance luxury automobiles. On the Gopher defense, GT stands for senior linebacker Gary Tinsley, who plays with a fast motor and often turns in high-performance results. Tinsley led the Minnesota defense with 90 total tackles in 2010, while starting all 12 games. Tinsley was tops among the Gopher linebacking corps at USC last week, turning in seven total tackles, including one tackle-for-loss. He also turned in a team-best two pass break-ups.
NOTHIN' BUT NET
The Univeristy of Minnesota ranked dead last (120th of 120) in net punting in all of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision last season. But the Gophers turned that around in a big way during the first week of 2011. Minnesota's net average of 40.5 yards per punt attempt ranked No. 33 in the nation after the round of games this season.
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