ALEX KARWOWSKI: How’s it going, everyone? And welcome back to The Gold Standard where we bring you the latest on all things Minnesota sports. I’m Alex Karwowski alongside Champ Howard. And Champ, like, how are you feeling, man? 

CHAMP HOWARD: I’m feeling great. You know, I feel a little bit better than the Gopher soccer team is feeling after this past weekend.

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. What happened? 

HOWARD: Well, after losing to Wisco for the 11th year in a row, they drew with USC, which is good. I mean, a draw is always good. 

KARWOWSKI: Draw’s a draw. It’s not a loss. 

HOWARD: But then they did lose to UCLA. So, they dropped to 45th in the nation, but, you know, it wasn’t much of a fall off because they were at, I think, 40 or 41 before. Played three good teams. After Northwestern, coming up, they got OSU and Penn State, who are both top 15, so. 

KARWOWSKI: Oh, tough. I mean, okay, if of all the losses they could have had. I mean, obviously I don’t want to lose to Wisconsin, border rivals, like you want to win those games. But, didn’t UCLA like, I don’t know, aren’t they like, historically pretty good?

HOWARD: They’re definitely good this year. I mean, they’re 9-2-2, we’re 8-2-2. So, they played a little bit better competition than us. So that’s why they’re ranked so much higher. 

KARWOWSKI: They can probably play a bit longer than the Gophers just because the hot weather there. 

HOWARD: Yeah, I mean even today you could feel it. It was like 60, but Minnesota 60s. 

KARWOWSKI: It was nice. It was nice. Yeah.

HOWARD: I bet it’s still 80, 90 degrees out there. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah, I mean look, the soccer team didn’t beat Wisconsin. But, the volleyball team did. I mean it was kind of a crazy game. I was there with Emmett. I was out taking photographs. It was a gold out, you know, I’m a huge fan of the gold outs. I don’t know about you, but I think I think the gold outs are sick. I mean, it’s just a crazy atmosphere.

But Julia Hanson had the winning kill, and she like pumped her fist in the air and just started crying and it was a great moment for her. They upset Wisconsin because Wisconsin, I believe, was ranked number seven at the time. And then it was a five set match, so you already knew it was going to be like a barn burner. But overall, I think Minnesota really won in just the hitting category. They hit 250 over Wisconsin.

HOWARD: I mean, it’s always nice to beat Wisconsin, no matter what sport it is, but especially in volleyball, I mean, over the past five, six, seven years, especially they’ve been so good.

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. I mean, Wisconsin is just historically is a really solid program. They won the national championship in 2021, I think. And then they didn’t beat them last year and then they beat them once in 2022. 

HOWARD: If there’s any team we’d want to beat, we’d want the Gophers to beat, it’s always Wisconsin. 

KARWOWSKI: Alright, let’s talk about football. 

HOWARD: I love talking about football.

KARWOWSKI: There was a call made on Saturday against Michigan. 

HOWARD: I can’t even like, be too mad about it.

KARWOWSKI: Really? 

HOWARD: Because everyone besides the refs said that it was not enough, so. 

KARWOWSKI: That is, that is very fair. 

HOWARD: So maybe I should be more mad about it because of that. But yeah, if Mike P. says it’s not offsides then. 

KARWOWSKI: I mean, even the Big Ten, like coordinator of officials was like, “Yeah, we messed up. We’re going to change this.” The mistake they’re learning from is from the Minnesota game, which just makes that.

HOWARD: Why do we have to be the game? 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. Why do we have to be that? 

HOWARD: Yeah. That sucks. But I saw something about the Gophers possibly like suing for kind of a replay.

KARWOWSKI: Suing? Ok.

HOWARD: Yeah, I don’t know. I didn’t look too deep into it, but they’re trying to do something to get, maybe the game, that final two minutes replayed somehow. 

KARWOWSKI: I don’t mean when did you see that? Like where did you see that? 

HOWARD: I saw a tweet about I think the night after, I think it was on Sunday. 

KARWOWSKI: Okay, I think that was the, that was them submitting the official to like, “Hey, let’s look at this.” And that’s when the Big Ten official of coordinators was like, “We’re going to change the rules. You guys have to be the guinea pigs though.” 

HOWARD: Yeah, that sucks. Yeah, it really sucks. 

KARWOWSKI: I mean, it’s kind of like the basketball team last year where they don’t play two complete halves. Saw that in Iowa. You saw it against Michigan. Hopefully you don’t see it against USC.

HOWARD: USC lost the same to Michigan.

KARWOWSKI: I did see that. 

HOWARD: So it should be a great game. They lost 24-27 also. 

KARWOWSKI: And that’s going to be like the Gophers kind of last grab at a chance at a bowl game. Because, you know, after that, you just play Rutgers, Illinois, you play Wisconsin, Penn State. It doesn’t get any easier after USC. 

HOWARD: What is the best case scenario for the Gophers season this year? What do you think at least? 

KARWOWSKI: Like record? 

HOWARD: Record, bowl game, I mean is there any chance we do anything in the Big Ten? 

KARWOWSKI: I hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think the Gophers are going to make a bowl game.

HOWARD: That’s P.J. Fleck’s favorite thing to do. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah, but I mean, they don’t they didn’t make it last year, technically. They got to go to the Quick Lane Bowl, now the Detroit Bowl, because of their academic standing. I just don’t see him repeating. 

HOWARD: I don’t either especially, you have to play USC alongside the Michigan’s, Ohio State’s, Iowa’s. 

KARWOWSKI: Right. 

HOWARD: You have to play all these teams are just so much better than we already played in the past year. 

KARWOWSKI: It’s just kind of a weird year in the Big Ten with Michigan being not as dominant as it was. This expanded conference just kind of shakes things up. You could be number 10 in the conference and you could be pretty darn good. 

HOWARD: Exactly, exactly. You can be almost undefeated and be 10th in the conference.

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. 

HOWARD: It’s crazy. But I mean, Minnesota Gopher football is bad, but the Vikings are doing great. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. Yeah. The Vikings, like crazy.

HOWARD: Great to see. I never would have thought Sam Darnold would be the guy. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. It seems like the world was ending for every single Viking fan when J. J. McCarthy was like out for the season. But, maybe there’s a silver lining. 

HOWARD: Yeah. Maybe it’s even better than having J. J., Sam Darnold, he’s jumped around so much that it’s like, you finally give him a good receiver and look what happens. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. But do you think J. J. McCarthy, cause I think the original plan was to kind of work him in, in the latter half of the season. If Sam Darnold started as he is, do you think they would have worked in J. J. McCarthy given Sam Darnold’s kind of success?

HOWARD: If he wasn’t healthy? Oh, if he was healthy, I think there’s no way he would have seen the field this year. Which I would have been fine with, because, I mean, rookie quarterbacks usually suck anyway. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah, stay with the guy that’s hot. 

HOWARD: Exactly, I mean, C. J. Stroud and Jayden Daniels, they’re not every single rookie quarterback. So, and I think J. J. is a guy who’s not quite NFL ready physically yet, but mentally he might be there.

KARWOWSKI: Right. 

HOWARD: And that’s something that comes along in year two or year three. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. In year two, it’s going to be like a red shirt freshman. But he’ll probably learn something from just being on the sidelines and being in that atmosphere. 

HOWARD: Yeah. And Sam Darnold is also a vet now, too. I think he was a 2017 or 2018 class. So, I mean, that’s six years of playing NFL quarterback, whether it’s bad places or not.

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. He knows the field. 

HOWARD: And Brian Flores and the defense have just been absolutely amazing. One of the best defense in the NFL, but do you think that they’re contenders or do you think they’re pretenders? 

KARWOWSKI: The Vikings? Oh, I definitely think they’re contenders. 

HOWARD: Me too, I don’t know if they’re going to win a ring or not but. 

KARWOWSKI: I don’t want to, I don’t want to jinx it, but I think they can definitely like do something.

HOWARD: Especially with the way the NFC East has been, or NFC North has been going this year. It seems like the Bears still just aren’t quite there yet. And maybe Caleb just needs one more year with a little more chemistry. The second half of the year, they could be better. But, I don’t know, the Packers have been weird, their only two wins are with Malik Willis. Doesn’t look like he’ll be coming back any time soon. 

KARWOWSKI: I will say, I think four wins is a little early to make kind of a definitive like, “Oh, they’re looking pretty good.” Cause like, it’s so incredibly early in the season. Because the same narrative is happening over at Rutgers with Athan Kaliakmanis. 

HOWARD: Yeah. 

KARWOWSKI: Like it’s, I don’t know. I don’t want to get too excited, but I also like, want to get excited. 

HOWARD: Yeah, it’s nice to see Athan too, 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. 

HOWARD: Playing well, sadly on a different team. Got Gopher swim coming back, too, pretty soon. Vivi Del Angel will be returning after winning a National Diving Championship last year. And then, yeah, I’m going to be spending some time talking to her and Coach Kramer tomorrow. So, be on the lookout for a story coming this Sunday or this Monday about Gopher swim.

KARWOWSKI: What do you plan to ask about? 

HOWARD: I’m going to talk about what the expectations are for this year. I mean, you win a national championship as a junior. When do you come back? What’s more to do, you know? 

KARWOWSKI: Bar Soloveychik after going to the Olympics.

HOWARD: Yeah. Hopefully I get a chance to talk to him, too. Cause there’s just so much potential for that team. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. That seems like a pretty loaded team. 

HOWARD: Yeah. It should be a great year for most Gopher sports honestly. 

KARWOWSKI: Let’s talk about men’s basketball. 

HOWARD: We need to talk about Timberwolves basketball, too. I just think that there’s a good group of guys coming in this year. There’s a lot of vets. I think three underclassmen, four underclassmen maybe. So, that was really Ben Johnson’s goal though, is he thinks that instead of getting guys that he needs to teach to play basketball, get guys that already know how to play basketball and just need to learn the Gopher way. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. 

HOWARD: And I think Dawson and Parker coming back is really going to add to the ability to teach the Gopher style of basketball. 

KARWOWSKI: Do you think they can be contenders in the Big Ten?

HOWARD: Again, Oregon, UCLA and USC coming over makes everything so much harder. But, I do think that that, if we don’t have the same problem as last year, if we can put two halves together, I feel like this team can beat anyone, almost anyone, I mean.

KARWOWSKI: I mean, yeah, play two halves, like they can do something. 

HOWARD: Dawson Garcia was named to the all preseason Big Ten list. 

KARWOWSKI: I did see that, that was cool. Wasn’t he named last year though, too? 

HOWARD: I think he was, but I know he was named to the second team after the season. But, returning Big Ten highest scorer. So, we have what could be the Big Ten Player of the Year on our team. 

KARWOWSKI: Right. Yeah. Looking forward to the season. I mean, fingers crossed, they looked a lot better. Like from my sophomore year to last year. So it was the 2021-22 season was my sophomore year. That was a train wreck to cover. Like it was not fun. It was kind of the same story every time. 

But then last year, you know, they finally started to win games and it looked like they were kind of a promising team, still areas of development. Like you said, the two complete halves. But I think hopefully now with Ben Johnson, having time to get a footing in the program and kind of establish himself as a head coach, I think, I think hopefully they can do something.

HOWARD: Yeah. And this is, will be one of the first times he had, you know, six guys come back. Three starters coming back or two starters coming back and a sixth man coming back. So it’s going to be really nice to see what Ben can do while also having his best player for now three years.

KARWOWSKI: Yeah, that’s gonna be the longest. I mean last year was the longest Dawson Garcia has been under the same head coach. So having that third year, I think will definitely help as well. 

HOWARD: Yeah, it’s gonna mesh even better.

KARWOWSKI: Let’s talk about the women’s team. Mara Braun, Amaya Battle, Mallory Heyer, Niamya Holloway, the four core, the core of the four, core four. They seem to want to be an NCAA tournament team. And it looked like they were going to be that way before Mara Braun got injured. And then the season kind of went down the drain. But, I mean, I think there was, there was a lot of promise in the WNIT. Would you agree? 

HOWARD: Oh yeah, they played great. I mean, they made it to what, the third round? 

KARWOWSKI: No, they were in the championship game. 

HOWARD: They were? 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. 

HOWARD: Yeah, they played great. You gotta take a step forward after that. Like the next step is the post, the real postseason. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah. I mean, you’re playing in the WNIT tournament game. They didn’t win, unfortunately, but I don’t know. I think Mara Braun getting healthy again, the same four people playing under the same program for three years now, like, I think they can be a NCAA tournament team. And I have full faith, and I’m really confident in saying that, which is a good thing, I guess. 

HOWARD: Yeah, life should also be a little easier with Caitlin Clark not in the conference anymore. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah, but they still, Nebraska still have got Alexis Markowski, and all those other players that are, Jaz Shelley, like, it’s, but then the Gophers also have, um.

HOWARD: They got Mara, man. Honestly, Mara is probably one of the best players in the Big Ten.

KARWOWSKI: Sophie Hart. That’s who they have. Yeah. They still have Sophie Hart. But yes, Mara Braun, I think, is arguably, maybe, probably one of the better players in the Big Ten. I think she could make a run for Big Ten Player of the Year. 

HOWARD: I mean, there’s gotta be like an expectation. She averaged, what, 17 last year?

KARWOWSKI: Yeah, something like that. 

HOWARD: Yeah, we might. She needs to take that next step to that 20 to get over the 20 points per game. And that’s when you become like a real superstar in college basketball. 

KARWOWSKI: For sure. Alright. Timberwolves. 

HOWARD: Timberwolves basketball. I was not expecting to see Karl Anthony Towns traded.

KARWOWSKI: Yeah, that was a crazy trade. 

HOWARD: Yeah. I got to miss Adrian Wojnarowski because the first non Woja bomb of the summer happened. What do you think of the new roster with Julius Randle and Donte DiVincenzo? 

KARWOWSKI: Honestly, I don’t know much about those guys. My roommate was watching highlight reels of them to fuel his confidence. But this is probably a hot take. I have never been a fan of K.A.T.’s game. I just think he gets too emotional when it’s not really necessary. And I, I don’t know, I just don’t really agree with that. That being said, he’s a great player. 

I’m not from Minnesota, just a little disclaimer, but I know he’s meant a lot for Minnesota Timberwolves fans, just being with the team for so long. And going through all that struggle and getting so close this year. We can probably like sniff it, like I don’t know, like that’s got to be gut wrenching.

HOWARD: But I agree with you 100%. 

KARWOWSKI: Yeah.

HOWARD: I mean Karl Towns, he’s meant so much to the city. He’s one of the longest tenured players in the NBA with the final team. But he’s always fouling out, committing bad turnovers or like you said, he’s just complaining to the refs. For things like a third quarter foul. What are we complaining about?

KARWOWSKI: I don’t know. It’s bad. 

HOWARD: He let his emotions, like you said, get in the way of him so much that it was like that 60 point game he had, he could had 80, but he was just taking bad shots and they lost to the Hornets when he had 60 points. 

KARWOWSKI: Right. Yeah, no, it was but I trust Tim Connelly. I think he’s a smart guy. I think a lot of people are calling his decision into question, but I think, I don’t think he would have made this trade if he didn’t know what he was doing. 

HOWARD: Yeah, not only do they save $60 million after Randall’s contract is up. But remember what happened with the Rudy Gobert trade? Do you remember how hated Tim Connelly was and everyone said this is the worst trade in history? Granted, they didn’t win a ring and they still don’t have very many picks, but, they just went to the Western Conference finals. 

KARWOWSKI: I think this is probably one of the best Timberwolves seasons. 

HOWARD: Since 2004. I don’t know. We’ll see if the Karl Towns will continue the streak of Timberwolves bigs that get traded and go win championships starting with Kevin Garnett and Kevin Love. So we’ll see if you can do the same thing in New York.

KARWOWSKI: Well, there’s a lot of Gopher sports happening. It’s a lot happening this week, a lot happening next week, and a lot happening for the rest of the year. So, I mean, this is not the last podcast we’ll ever do. We’ll be back, again. 

This episode of the Gold Standard was brought to you by Alex Karwowski and Champ Howard, and produced by Ceci Heinen. 

Thanks again for giving us a listen. And as always, if you liked what we said, if you disagree with us, if you want to send us a nasty email, you can email me, at [email protected] with any questions, comments, concerns, or hot takes or disagreements. I welcome that, too. Once again, I’m Alex Karwowski and this is Champ Howard. And this has been The Gold Standard.