Gophers Suffer First Home Loss
January 17, 2008

In December, the Indiana Hoosiers defeated Tubby Smith’s old team. On January 17, Indiana defeated his new team.

The University of Minnesota Golden Gopher basketball team lost to Kelvin Sampson’s Hoosiers, 65-60, last night. On December 8, the Men of Sampson were victorious over Tubby’s former employer, the University of Kentucky. The score in that game was Indiana 70, Kentucky 51, and the Hoosier players enjoyed their time throughout, something that could not be said about their meeting with the Gophers.

Minnesota led, 56-52, with four minutes left in the contest when reserve Jordan Crawford scored to cut the Indiana deficit to two points. With 3:15 left, Minnesota’s Al Nolen fouled the Hoosiers’ sensational freshman, Eric Gordon, who canned both free throws to tie the game at 56. With one minute and 49 seconds left and the score tied at 58, Minnesota’s Spencer Tollackson scored the Gophers final points on a reverse layup for a two-point lead. The backbreaker for the Gophers came when Indiana’s Lance Stemler, left alone, scored on a three-point attempt. Minnesota never led after that. “We didn’t defend well on that three-point play,” Smith acknowledged after the game.

This was a game of stark contrasts. Minnesota forced Indiana into 26 turnovers, but Indiana sank 12 of 14 free throws. Minnesota, on the other hand, made only 11 of 21 free throws but scored 16 points off Hoosier turnovers. Indiana shot 56 percent from the field and Minnesota only 38 percent. The Hoosiers out-rebounded the Gophers 42 to 26.

“Twenty-six turnovers,” Sampson marveled after the game, “and we win on the road. I’ve never been a part of anything like this. You take away our turnovers and we were good. I kept reminding our players during timeouts that we’re wearing red tonight.”

Tollackson gave Minnesota its first second-half lead at 53-52 with 7:36 remaining. Senior forward Dan Coleman followed with a three-point play pushing the Gophers to a four-point advantage, 56-52. Minnesota’s 9-3 spurt in the first two minutes of the half had narrowed the Hoosier lead to 43-41. Indiana held a 52-47 lead with 12:01 remaining but did not score again until almost eight minutes later. During that span, the Gophers turned a five-point deficit into a four-point lead.

Despite pressuring the Hoosiers into 13 turnovers in the opening period and limiting Gordon to just five first half points, Indiana held an eight-point advantage, 40-32, at halftime.

In the end, it was poor free throw shooting that did in the Gophers. Shooting under 50 percent in key games such as this one will doom even the best of teams. Just last week at State College, Pa., Minnesota was aided in their victory by the inability of Penn State to capitalize at the free throw line. Last night, the shoe was on the other foot. Tollackson was the chief culprit, going 0-for-7 from the line.

Amazingly, Gopher officials selected the distraught Tollackson as one of two players to meet with the media under the hot lights of the press room (Lawrence McKenzie was the other). This was unfair to Tollackson, a fine young man clearly in the midst of a deep depression. “I couldn’t buy a free throw,” he said. I go 5-for-5 [from the foul line] against Penn State, and we end up winning the game. I go 0-for-7 here and we end up losing the game by five points. Obviously, it’s not acceptable. Bottom line, it’s disgraceful. I’m crushed and heartbroken.” NBA players are expected to meet with the media regardless of their game failures. But this is not the NBA. This is Big 10 intercollegiate basketball. Tollackson should have been spared the embarrassment of the media appearance.

For his part, McKenzie refused to blame Tollackson: “We did some good things in creating 26 turnovers. We capitalized on some of them but didn’t make the most of them.”

Sampson refused to single out individual Gopher failures. “Outside of Xavier, Minnesota is as good as any team we’ve played.” (Xavier waxed Indiana, 80-65, on November 24, in the finals of the Chicago Invitational Challenge Tournament.)