If the Gophers are ‘really good,’ it’s time to show it

There’s a certain audacity to declaring that you have “a really good football team,” as Gophers coach PJ Fleck did shortly after a 39-point loss.

But if we take him at his word and buy into the non-false idea that Ohio State is just a different class of program than Minnesota (and maybe the rest of the Big Ten…and maybe the rest of college football), we can see Fleck’s statement for what it is.

OK, you’re not going to compete with the Buckeyes. At least not this season and not most of the time.

But if the Gophers (3-2, 1-1 Big Ten) are a very good football team, they must show it in the victory column starting Saturday night against Purdue (2-3, 0-2).

Three of the next four games will be at home, including the homecoming game against the Boilermakers in which Minnesota is favored by more than a touchdown.

A really good team would win at least three of the next four: at home against Purdue, at home against Nebraska, at Iowa, at home against Michigan State.

Excluding a road trip to powerhouse Oregon, six of the Gophers’ final seven games are against teams in the Gophers’ weight class, as Star Tribune writer Randy Johnson described the matchups on Wednesday’s Daily Delivery podcast. Both after the Oregon game: at Northwestern and at home against Wisconsin.