Midweek Review: Minnesota 14-26 Illinois

1. Minnesota's chances for a special season are practically dead.

That's it, then.

The Gophers still can win the Big Ten West, but the two teams who now sit as the favorites are the two who hold tiebreakers over them. It will likely require a perfect back half of the season, and a lot of luck, for them to make it to Indianapolis. And if they somehow make it that far, they will face long odds to beat Ohio State or Michigan.

Might a 10-3 Minnesota, having miraculously won the West, with just one noteworthy win (Penn State), receive a Rose Bowl bid? Or, failing that, an invitation to the Cotton or Orange Bowl? Theoretically, sure. But I wouldn't count on it. And from here, it borders on inconceivable that such a scenario can come to be in the first place. With the problems they've shown, the hole the Gophers have created for themselves is too great to overcome.

This is a good team. Being merely good is an acceptable station for Minnesota in the aggregate, and we should never forget that. It remains frustrating that when there was so much potential for 2022 to be a dream, that dream has been all but extinguished at just the halfway mark. This team didn't have to be more than just good to achieve those goals. Now, their sights must be lower. A respectable final record, and wins over their rivals in November, are the only realistic goals left for which to play.

2. Minnesota couldn't get Illinois off the field.

For the most part, the Gophers defended pretty well on early downs. The Illini's average 2nd down distance was 7.7 yards, and their average 3rd down distance was 6.4 yards.

Yet the Illini punted or kicked just seven times all game. The reason: Minnesota kept allowing untimely chunk plays. The Illini's passing downs success rate, per collegefootballdata.com, was 42.9 percent, significantly higher than their season-long mark (35.0 percent) and nearly twice that allowed by the Gophers this year (21.5 percent). That fact undersells the problem, though, as even when the Illini couldn't convert on 3rd down, they kept the ball moving by converting on four 4th downs.

The Gophers undid their good work on early downs by giving up too much space against the run...

...by not turning pressures into sacks (or even hits)...

...and thanks to lapses or gaps in coverage.

The latter issue was a problem all day for the Gophers. The Illini were passably efficient throwing the ball before Saturday, but this was the best they've looked all season. Tommy DeVito completed 25 of 32 attempts for 252 yards. The Gophers only broke up one pass, intercepted none, and recorded zero sacks.

Justin Walley had the toughest day. By Pro Football Focus' tracking, Walley allowed catches on five of the six times he was targeted, conceding 74 yards. He also committed pass interference while tracking Pat Bryant on a fade in the fourth quarter.

Illinois' success converting on 3rd and 4th down allowed them to control the game. Their slow pace limited the Gophers to just nine non-kneeldown possessions — three before halftime. This made every offensive failure that much more costly. Illinois again put Minnesota into a negative game state, something the Gophers have repeatedly had difficulty digging out of under P.J. Fleck. If the defense didn't let the Illini off the hook so frequently, this game could have gone differently.

3. The Illini could have run the ball more effectively than they did, but they did enough.

The story was not just what happened on late downs and passing downs, though. Illinois still ran for over 200 yards, and it wasn't just volume. Chase Brown played like one of the best running backs in the country, using his patience and balance to find open space. Seven of Brown's carries gained at least 8 yards. The Gophers' defensive ends didn't always set a wide enough edge, but a lot of the time, Brown just found a way into the second level, whether via a cutback lane or by making one defender miss and accelerating past one or two others.

Additionally, Illinois handily won short-yardage situations. They converted all five of their carries on 3rd- or 4th-and-2 or shorter.

You can find explanations for each stat here.
Line yards and success rate are via
collegefootballdata.com.

Even so, it could have been worse. Minnesota stuffed nine of Illinois' 53 rushing attempts, a fairly average proportion but not the easiest accomplishment. And the work of Tyler Nubin and Jordan Howden in particular prevented Brown from turning any big gains into giant ones. A less adept safety pairing would have let Brown blow past them repeatedly, the way Reggie Corbin did in these teams' 2018 meeting. Instead, the Gophers kept Brown from creating many truly explosive plays. They didn't exactly defend the run well, but it was enough of a not-bad performance to keep the game within reach into the fourth quarter.

4. Minnesota at least did a good job in the red zone.

Because they didn't generate a ton of big plays, Illinois had to work for their points at the goal line. Here, the Minnesota defense compensated somewhat for its shortcomings. The Gophers created no turnover opportunities and rarely kept the Illini from driving, but they at least kept the score from getting out of hand with some red zone successes. Field goals are failures, after all, and Illinois kicked four of them.

The Minnesota defense got these stops by playing like the Minnesota defense normally plays. Against the pass, the Gophers took advantage of the reduced space near the goal line and played effective zone defense.

Against the run, the Gophers swarmed to the ball. When Illinois playcaller Barry Lunney Jr. tried to throw them off with misdirection, they stayed disciplined and kept the play from going anywhere.

When needed, Minnesota can play a bend-don't-break game on defense. Outside of garbage time this season, per collegefootballdata.com, the Gophers have allowed just 2.7 points per scoring opportunity faced. Just 10 teams (including the top-ranked Illini) have done better. The Gophers ranked squarely in the middle of FBS in this regard a year ago, but it's been one of their strengths so far. Continuing to clamp down in the red zone will keep the team in games. Assuming the defense gets some help, that is.

5. Minnesota's passing attack couldn't get going at all.

Tanner Morgan just didn't have a chance. His receivers rarely generated separation and couldn't hold onto the ball when hit, and the Illini defense overwhelmed his offensive line. According to PFF, Illinois blitzed Morgan on 12 of his 17 dropbacks.

With nowhere to go with the ball, he had to scramble or try passes he was unlikely to complete. His one interception on the day would have probably been a touchdown to Michael Brown-Stephens with a clean pocket. Instead, two closing rushers forced Morgan to throw off his back foot and float the ball, giving safety Kendall Smith — covering a long distance — time to make the play.

The downfield passing game was nonexistent, and the short game wasn't effective either. Illinois sat on Minnesota's slants, breaking up a couple in man-to-man coverage and batting one down at the line. Offensive coordinator Kirk Ciarrocca didn't have an answer to Ryan Walters' defense. Morgan, while not good enough on his own, was left out to dry.

He finished with the second-fewest completions and yards of any game in his career — only behind his 1-for-1, 7-yard garbage time debut in 2018.

Two weeks ago, I noted that Illinois' pass defense hadn't faced a serious test before playing Minnesota. If Saturday counts as that serious test, then the Illini deserve high marks. They live by man-to-man coverage, an aggressive rush, and single-high looks, and it proved far too much for the Gophers to handle.

6. Athan Kaliakmanis' first meaningful college appearance was not a success.

For those interested, the play that resulted in Morgan's injury should have been under the purview of Rule 9, Section 1, Article 2.a of the NCAA rule book:

No person subject to the rules shall strike an opponent with the knee; strike an opponent’s helmet (including the face mask), neck, face or any other part of the body with an extended forearm, elbow, locked , palm, fist, or the heel, back or side of the open hand; or gouge an opponent.

While scrambling toward the line to gain, Morgan received a strike to the head and left the game. Where the punch landed was purely accidental, the kind of blow that is always a risk when coaches emphasize punching out the ball. It was an attempt at a football play that went wrong, and Morgan and the Gophers suffered for it. While it should have drawn a flag when it happened, the officials missed it, and there is nothing to be done about it.

Morgan's replacement was Kaliakmanis, a redshirt freshman who in mop-up appearances has been more impressive than the more experienced Cole Kramer. There's never an ideal circumstance for the young backup to come in, but this was an especially difficult spot: down two possessions in the fourth quarter against one of the Big Ten's best defenses. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Kaliakmanis struggled.

Kaliakmanis' stat line — 2-for-6, 17 yards, two interceptions, and one sack — sums it up aptly. He had trouble dealing with pressure and couldn't even start to click with his receivers. He wasn't ready. Maybe neither he nor Kramer was ever going to be ready in these circumstances; it's hard to come off the bench straight into a game. The Gophers will hope that if Morgan cannot play at Penn State, whoever fills in for him will benefit from a few days of reps with the first team.

7. Mohamed Ibrahim continues to show his importance.

There were a lot of problems with the Minnesota running game against Purdue, and only one of them was Ibrahim's absence. But having him in the backfield sure gives a boost.

For all his skills, Ibrahim's vision is perhaps his greatest. He knows exactly where to find a crease and how to get through it. Even if he's never had breakaway speed, his intelligence as a runner buys him yardage at least as often as his power does.

If it had been supplemented with just a mediocre passing day, Ibrahim's performance might have been enough to win. Minnesota has had better days on the ground, but against a team that regularly swallows opposing running backs whole, this counts as a much-needed rebound from the disappointment two weeks ago.

8. For the second straight game, the Gophers have not widely distributed the ball.

There are some mitigating circumstances and things to grant, obviously. As stated, the receivers haven't been at their best. Against Purdue, the Gophers didn't have Ibrahim, and against Illinois, they didn't have Trey Potts. They only ran 41 plays on Saturday.

At the same time, one of the most impressive aspects of Minnesota's win over Michigan State was how many skill players were involved. Ten different players made a catch in that game, and three running backs received carries. No specific player was the focal point of the offense.

That has not been true at all in the two games since. Daniel Jackson, Brown-Stephens, and Brevyn Spann-Ford were easily Morgan's favorite three targets among his main pass-catchers against Purdue. Ibrahim was the only running back to carry the ball against Illinois, even with Bryce Williams and Zach Evans healthy. Clay Geary and Le'Meke Brockington haven't recorded one target between them since facing the Spartans. Minnesota's offense just isn't using all of its pieces like it looked like it might after Chris Autman-Bell's injury.

While the Gophers have other issues to sort out, how little they've involved their secondary options is one of them. If the top players are the only ones getting the ball, the opposing team will have a better idea of how to defend. If Jackson, Brown-Stephens, and Dylan Wright never leave the field, or if Ibrahim gets every carry, they will tire. If Williams is only on the field to pass block, that's a clear tell. Rotation is important, and so is actually using the players that rotate into games.

9. Fleck's decision to force a first-quarter field goal into the wind was not smart.

Illinois' normal kicker, Caleb Griffin, has been injured, which means Fabrizio Pinton has handled that role since the Iowa game. In his latest act of bizarre timeout management, Fleck tried to take advantage of Pinton's presence early on Saturday.

The Gophers had forced the Illini into a 3rd-and-8 at the end of the first quarter. With 25 seconds left, Fleck took his first timeout. After a short run by Brown made it 4th-and-6, Fleck used another timeout with 20 seconds left in the quarter.

Moving to the other side of the field would have given Pinton a more favorable wind. Fleck's timeouts meant that Bret Bielema had to either trust his redshirt freshman kicker to make a 41-yard field goal or go for it on 4th down. Bielema chose the latter option, and Illinois converted. The drive ended in a field goal anyway.

The outcome suggests that this was a bad move on Fleck's part. But if you try and divorce yourself from hindsight and look at the process... well, it was still a bad move. As I've previously stated in this space, Fleck seriously undervalues first half timeouts. With a full complement of timeouts near the end of a half, Fleck can buy his team a better chance of scoring than they would have with one or zero timeouts — if not creating an entirely new chance.

He instead throws away those timeouts easily, and for such tiny potential gains. Yes, this game figured to be close and low-scoring, which theoretically increases the impact of either team gaining 3 points. But field goals are still not that impactful, especially with 45 minutes left to play. Yes, Pinton was not the regular kicker, and you want to find edges anywhere you can. But how much less likely was a backup kicker to make a kick at the windier end of the stadium? Probably not so much that it was worth a major tactical action. And yes, Fleck should have expected to get a stop if Bielema did indeed go for it on 4th down. But Fleck shouldn't give opposing coaches chances to extend drives, increasing the likelihood that his team gives up a touchdown instead of a field goal.

This incident represents a novel way of mismanaging a game, but it fits comfortably next to the others in Fleck's tenure. He hasn't learned anything about the value of a timeout. It looks like he never will.

10. It was an okay day on special teams, but with one spark.

Mark Crawford, who over the last two games has punted three times as often (nine attempts) as he did in the Gophers' first four games (three), was fine. His 12 punts on the season have been returned just twice, and his first touchback came on Saturday. Minnesota got more out of him last year, but Crawford has done well enough. There are plenty of games left for him to impress.

Kickoff specialist Dragan Kesich's touchback rate has increased from to 64 percent in 2021 to 87 percent in 2022. The coverage team has only faced five returns and done a decent job in that small sample. Illinois' only return on Saturday reached the 23-yard line, which is short of counting as statistically "successful." (A successful return, as defined by Bill Connelly, reaches at least the 25-yard-line. Put another way, it sets up an offense better than a touchback would.)

The Minnesota return game, meanwhile, struggled in the first half. Quentin Redding's first three kick returns couldn't get past the 20-yard line. Illinois kept him in check. Until after halftime, that is.

Redding's 92-yard return (buffeted another 4 yards by a horsecollar tackle) set up an immediate Gophers touchdown, giving them a quick, if narrow lead, and putting pressure on Illinois to score.

Of course, Illinois scored a touchdown on their next drive, kicked a couple of field goals after that, and kept Minnesota from scoring again. But Redding still gave his team a desperately needed boost. The proof of concept he showed in the Purdue game looks a lot more legitimate. Though we need to see a more efficient return game than appeared in Champaign, we now know it can be explosive. That's at least one positive to take away from a deflating loss.

Next Game

Minnesota's next opponent is another team facing harsh realities after a Week 7 letdown, James Franklin's Penn State. While the Nittany Lions hung with Michigan for a while thanks to a wonky first half, eventually the Wolverines pulled away and showed just how far behind the elite of college football their guests remain. Those kinds of existential worries — "we can't make the Playoff but are still one of the marquee programs in the sport and still win a lot" — don't deserve much sympathy from the middle class, and the Nittany Lions are probably still better than the Gophers overall. But it's true that Saturday exposed just how serious this team's issues are.

For one, the offensive line still isn't fixed. Tackle Olumuyiwa Fashanu has proven himself vital in his redshirt sophomore season, but he has not rescued a unit that's hamstrung this program for several years. Sean Clifford, flawed as he is, does not nearly often enough have time to operate. Penn State's explosive running backs, led by true freshman Nicholas Singleton, do not see enough holes to consistently show their brilliance. The line is still broken.

Clifford remains himself, in ways good and bad. His play-to-play accuracy and decision-making range from excellent to ghastly. He can make incredible throws while getting hammered by a defensive lineman, and he can run well enough, but sometimes he breaks from the pocket too early. He averages out to solid for this level, but fully capable of delivering a clunker and just as incapable of overcoming his lack of help.

If Clifford received better protection, there may be fewer calls for true freshman Drew Allar to replace him. Allar, for his part, can look just as good as his 5-star pedigree suggests, but his performance at the Big House was not inspiring.

Slot receiver Parker Washington has somehow not scored a touchdown in 2022. It's not for lack of trying — he's second on the team in catches — nor of ability — he's 6th in the conference in average yards after catch, per PFF. Washington still is one of the best, shiftiest receivers in the Big Ten. The Gophers have to limit the damage he inflicts.

The most jarring aspect of the Michigan game was how Penn State's defense totally shattered. Blake Corum ran for 166 yards and was actually Michigan's second-leading rusher, as Donovan Edwards had 173 rushing yards. The Nittany Lions couldn't stop the run at all, which even Wolverine homers didn't expect leading up to the game.

After getting so thoroughly toasted, and facing a Gophers team that may lean even more heavily into the run than normal, defensive coordinator Manny Diaz will likely prioritize slowing down Ibrahim. That route wold put more pressure on PSU's pass defense, but that's the area where the Nittany Lions have been best. They rank 4th in FBS in completion rate allowed. Joey Porter Jr. and Kalen King make one of the Big Ten's best cornerback pairings, and Diaz has a few capable pass rushers to deploy. Chop Robinson, Adisa Isaac, and Dani Dennis-Sutton would each lead the Gophers in pressures, as recorded by PFF. Even if those three haven't finished many plays (they've combined for 5.0 sacks), they will cause problems for Minnesota's passing game.

For the first time this season, the Gophers face the challenge of a difficult road environment. For potentially the only time this season, they face a major talent deficit. And for the first time since 2018, their starting quarterback may be someone other than Tanner Morgan. Though the Nittany Lions have problems of their own, they remain a tough opponent. If the Gophers start slow, it's not hard to imagine this one spiraling.