Minnesota Football: Wednesday Nugz and Pregame Content

Football is only a day away. Tomorrow night, the Golden Gophers will finally face an actual opponent in an actual game to hopefully kick off the most successful season in the recent history of Minnesota football. GET HYPE, HOMERSOTA!

The Oregon State game begins at 8 PM CDT tomorrow, and there’s plenty of content from the Star Tribune to help you kill time until then:

• Chip Scoggins reminds us that Mike Sherels embodies all that is good about college football. He’s still recovering from an undisclosed medical condition requiring multiple surgeries, and recovery is expected to be slow. But Coach Sherels has never backed down from a challenge, and nobody will be surprised if he returns to the sidelines sooner than expected.
• It’s getting kind of crowded on Leidner Island (which is now an actual place, at least on Twitter). Michael Rand and Joe Christensen try to gauge Minnesota’s chances while giving Mitch props for playing through injury. But they also wonder if he can handle the pressure of carrying the team.
• Injury report: KiAnte Hardin will be back for the Oregon State game, Claeys confirmed during the weekly Big Ten teleconference. Brandon Lingen and Eric Carter are still being evaluated, however.
• Is Claeys on the hot seat? That’s an open question, and AD Mark Coyle may have stoked the fire just a bit with this quote: “We want to win. I’m a very competitive person.”

The view from Oregon State’s sideline looks a bit different. The Beavers were 2-10 last year under first-year head coach Gary Andersen, and expectations for the season are not unreasonably high.

• Andersen’s last coaching stop was at Wisconsin. What does that mean? Well, he’s somewhat familiar with Minnesota, and terrible axe puns abound (Danny Moran, The Oregonian).
• Darell Garretson, a transfer from Utah State, will be the starter at quarterback for Oregon State. The Beavers had a number of players rotate through the position last season, so just having a full-time starter will be an improvement. In 2014, playing in five games in place of the injured Chuckie Keeton, Garretson threw for 1,140 yards and eight touchdowns.
• Pacific #HOTTAKES: On the one hand, Minnesota lost some offensive weapons and Oregon State now has depth and experience from junior college players as well as quarterback Darell Garretson. On the other hand, Oregon State has been kind of awful at football lately.

Finally, this moment of hump day Zen: