For The Record

As some of you might now, Tom at Gopher Nation has been diligent this season in keeping track of all the football picks made by members of the Big Ten bloggers group. I bring this up not because I'm winning this esteemed contest. I'm not. I rode the Tim Brewster bandwagon to far too many losses earlier in the season.

Still mathematically alive in the contest, I made the following selections this week. Here's the email I sent to the group.

Ohio State over Michigan
PSU over MSU
Indiana over Purdue
Minnesota over Wisconsin (Timmy Brewster gets his first conference win!!!)
Illinois over NW
Iowa over WMich

Whew.

PJS

I bring this to your attention because the Gophers are one half away from pulling the upset against Wisconsin and, I imagine some of you who insist I'm too hard on Tim Brewster would have never believed I made this call.

I will say I was impressed with this: Mike Dunbar came out in the first quarter, already down 3-0, and decided to run the football. The Gophers marched down the field--keeping our inept defense on the sidelines--and tied the score. I hope to see more as the second half goes on, and maybe, just maybe, Brewster will have the Gophers crawling back into the locker room with an axe on their backs!

** 4th Quarter/Harold Howell Update: The Gophers offense did the job it had to do, marching down the field. Ernie Wheelright came out of his shell. Adam Weber was throwing with confidence. Then, the defense came up with three stops. The Gophers were going to be in a position to drive the field for a game-tying store with the axe on the line. But it wasn't to be. Harold Howell, who has made me cringe all season, looked like an 8th grader on an attempted punt return, muffed the catch, and gave the Badgers the ball in the redzone with about 5 minutes left. The Badgers, of course, quickly converted for 7.

Brewster had paid a big price this season as he's played kids like Weber, Howell and basically an entire secondary filled with underclassmen. In this instance, it would have been wise for Brewster to put a veteran out on the field for that punt return like Eric Decker. This has been an entertaining game. And I'm sorry to see the Badgers take control late after a boneheaded play by Brewster's prize recruit Harold Howell.