(The Minnesota Star Tribune)
Gophers' struggles will be another test of Lindsay Whalen's resilience
It's easy to forget now, but in Whalen's first year as a Gophers player, Minnesota went 8-20 overall, including 1-15 in the Big Ten. Her first season with the Lynx wasn't a success either.
January 15, 2019 at 6:42PM
Welcome to the Tuesday edition of The Cooler, where even legends struggle sometimes. Let's get to it:
*The prevailing wisdom in Minnesota is that everything Lindsay Whalen touches turns to gold, and there is ample evidence to support this notion.
She carried the Gophers to the Final Four as a player in her senior year, then had pro success in Connecticut before ultimately helping the Lynx to four WNBA titles. She retired a few months ago and seamlessly transitioned into full-time coaching with a 12-0 start as the head coach of her alma mater.
But maybe we should add one word to the equation: everything Whalen touches eventually turns to gold.
It's easy to forget now, but in Whalen's first year as a Gophers player, Minnesota went 8-20 overall, including 1-15 in the Big Ten. Three straight NCAA tournament appearances, culminating in that Final Four, followed.
In her first season after being traded to the Lynx in 2010, Minnesota went 13-21 and missed the playoffs. The Lynx won an NBA title the next season, their first of four, and never missed the playoffs in Whalen's eight seasons here.
She's in a different role and a different situation as a head coach, but the larger point remains: These things can take time, and if given just a little bit of that — and some more help around her — things tend to work out in grand fashion.
Unfortunately, the Gophers' 12-0 start this season probably masked that point and the team's deficiencies.
Minnesota's nonconference schedule was squishy soft outside of a very good win over Syracuse (No. 4 in the RPI, per RealTime RPI) and a good win at Boston College (No. 80). The rest of their nine nonconference wins came over teams with an RPI of 165 or lower — part of the reason Minnesota itself is No. 97 in the RPI with a strength of schedule of 165 at the moment, neither of which will help at all when NCAA bids are handed out.
More than just hurting the Gophers' tournament resume, though, that nonconference slate left Minnesota unprepared for a step up in competition in Big Ten play. The exposure has come in the form of four consecutive losses since that start.
Whalen has seemingly been outcoached at times, with the Gophers coughing up halftime leads in a bad home loss to Illinois and another home loss to a very good Iowa squad on Monday. The Hawkeyes had success with a zone defense, and Minnesota had few answers for how to counter.
Then again, one of the best ways to beat a zone is with three-point shooting. The Gophers made 297 three-pointers last season on the way to an NCAA tourney berth under departed coach Marlene Stollings. Carlie Wagner and Gadiva Hubbard combined for 170 of those makes; Wagner graduated and Hubbard hasn't played yet this year while recovering from foot surgery.
In their four consecutive losses, the Gophers have shot a combined 11 for 55 (20 percent) from three-point range, while opponents have shot a combined 25 for 62 (40.3 percent).
Until that improves, the Gophers and Whalen can expect to see more teams daring them to shoot. Whalen can show her coaching mettle by finding creative ways to counter those defenses, but she can't make the ball go through the hoop by herself anymore. That might be the biggest challenge of all.
That said, it might seem strange to see Whalen struggle. But it's happened before. With the benefit of time, though, things usually pan out in a big way.
*Bears coach Matt Nagy is not happy that kicker Cody Parkey — whose 43-yard field goal attempt was slightly tipped before hitting the upright and crossbar in Chicago's 16-15 playoff loss to the Eagles — went on The Today Show to talk about it. "I didn't necessarily think that that was too much of a 'we' thing," Nagy said.
If all of Parkey's missed kicks didn't seal his fate in Chicago, that appearance might have.
*There is "winning the press conference," and then there is whatever Adam Gase did while being introduced as the new Jets head coach on Monday.
*Just for fun, here's Len Dawson in Super Bowl I smoking a cigarette and drinking a Fresca during halftime.
*Former Apple Valley star Tre Jones, brother of Tyus and freshman star at Duke, suffered an AC joint separation in Duke's loss to Syracuse on Monday and will be out indefinitely.
Sanni Ahola made 38 saves as the Huskies earned a split of the home-and-home series by winning in St. Cloud.
