Which it didn’t. The Gophers led wire to wire and fended off every mini run the Falcons threw their way. When it ended in a 30-24 Minnesota win, count me as one person who was unsurprised. In fact, it wouldn’t shock me if PJ Fleck’s teams won every ‘meaningless’ bowl game he coaches for the rest of his career.

Fleck’s Minnesota Gophers always care

Why? Because no coach in the country is better than our head coach at rallying their troops toward a goal with questionable significance (like the Quick Lane Bowl). If a Fleck-coached team is playing in a game, whether it’s a college football National Championship or an inter-squad Spring Game, nobody on that field is going to care more than his players.

Coach Fleck talks about why the team is 5-0 in his tenure in bowl games! #Gophers pic.twitter.com/ZyV9ozFJdE

— GopherHole.com (@GopherHole) December 26, 2023

“Our kids, our staff, our administration, everybody takes it really seriously. It’s a gift to play in a bowl game. No matter what, it’s a reward. We have football players on this team. They want to play football games. The more they play, the better they do.”

Related: Bowling Green Coach Mocks Minnesota’s Pass Attack After Gophers Run Over Falcons

And when it comes to college football bowl games in 2023, it’s safe to say that is not the approach every program takes. After missing out on the CFB Playoff field, undefeated Florida State has 23 players skipping the Orange Bowl on Saturday. The Gophers had two that skipped the Quick Lane Bowl. Tyler Nubin and Brevyn Spann-Ford are both preparing for the NFL Draft.

Why did a 5-7 non-eligible bowl team care more about a lowly Quick Lane Bowl in Detroit, Michigan than the Seminoles do a New Years 6 bowl, the likes of which Minnesota hasn’t reached in over 5 decades? Because Florida State’s coach, Mike Norvell put so much importance on a CFP birth that he couldn’t refocus his team and make them care about a lesser bowl.

PJ Fleck has plenty of flaws, but that would never happen with one of his teams. Every game, no matter the circumstances, is its own ‘One-Game Championship Season’, a phrase you can hear PJ say just about anytime a microphone is in his face.

Here's everything #Gophers coach PJ Fleck said after his team's Quick Lane Bowl win over Bowling Green.

"We got put in a bowl game and became 1-0 in a championship season…that's a huge step forward, springboards us into 2024."https://t.co/nXQ0Jk2DFa pic.twitter.com/gNSzKJkSMv

— Ryan Burns (@RyanBurnsMN) December 27, 2023

His message isn’t new to sports or to life. While I was working for a massive world news/media company in the minneapolis suburbs around 2018, we did one of those all-day moral booster seminars where we spent at least 3 hours of it focusing on “being here now”.

PJ Fleck teaches same life lessons, with different approach

Fleck is using the same message, just packaging it into a motivational football tool. Simply put: with all the distractions going on in life today, it’s easy to lose focus on controlling what you can control in the moment, like focus and engagement into the task at hand.

Related: Gophers Football Receiving ‘Substantive NIL Packages’ Recently; Basketball Still Behind

It’s a simple concept but difficult to practice soundly day-to-day, hour-to-hour, even minute-by-minute. Which is why the Minnesota Gophers head football coach takes such an exaggerated approach to tackling one of the most complex and under-the-radar skills of leading a group of over 100 people.

Everyone has individual distractions they are dealing with in their own personal lives. How do you get that many people to, as much as humanly possible, put those distractions aside and focus on a team goal, no matter how insignificant that goal might be to the outside world? By making it a really big deal.

Take his ‘Row The Boat’ mantra, for example. Many people despise it, but he adopted the saying when he and his first wife were grieving the death of their infant son (heart condition) back in 2011. There’s a lot more to it but, essentially, it’s a motivational euphemism meant to help those who buy in deal with life’s roller-coaster ride.

When you row a boat, it’s difficult to see what is ahead of you because your back is turned. That’s a metaphor for life, because we cannot see the future. Much like when you row a boat, all you can see and everything you know is behind you or in the past.

For all the PJ Fleck haters, how many of you know the real story behind row the boat? pic.twitter.com/xcOHQuSOrd

— Ky (@kyleighfaye) November 9, 2019

So, as PJ Fleck often says. All you can do is put your oar back in the water, focus on where you are now, what you can control and see in the moment. Do not let your past or what you’ve seen cripple what you’re trying to accomplish. Instead, use it to be better in the moment and learn from past mistakes.

Again, anyone who has gotten good advice from a coach, teacher, parent or other mentor has heard some version of life advice much like this. ‘You can only control what you can control’ or ‘you can’t fix the past, you can only learn from it’, etc.

But as I mentioned earlier, it’s Fleck’s commitment and over emphasis of these well-founded life lessons that make his approach different than other coaches. It doesn’t always work, because some people find his exaggerated approach too much to handle.

PJ knows and accepts that. What he also knows is sports are founded in motivational life lessons and, more often than not, his style works. And for those who do buy-in, it seems to install a sense of pride, loyalty and confidence that other coaching approaches do not always produce.

Which brings us back full-circle to Fleck’s success in bowl games. In a day and age when many schools and coaches are getting caught up in the weakening status of these end of season exhibition games, winners often boil down to which team cares more.

And no team will ever care more, no matter the prize, than Fleck’s.

But in the end, PJ Fleck remained undefeated in bowl games, as Gophers head coach (5-0), and Minnesota extended their bowl winning streak to SEVEN games, the longest in college football.

Longest active bowl winning streak in the nation 💪 https://t.co/MYCxmnyvB4

— Big Ten Conference (@bigten) December 26, 2023

Darius Taylor returns to dominance in Quick Lane Bowl victory

Fresh off of a new contract with Minnesota’s official NIL collective Dinkytown Athletes, phenom freshman running back Darius Taylor made his triumphant return to the football field, after spending about half of the regular season nursing undisclosed injuries.

Related: Phenom Freshman Darius Taylor Announces He’s Staying in Minnesota

Just like when he won three-straight Big Ten Freshman of the week awards a couple months ago, Taylor was playing on another level compared to everyone else, running up, down and all around the Bowling Green defense.

When the dust settled and the scoreboard showed a Minnesota 30-24 victory, Darius had racked up 208 yards and a touchdown, on 35 carries, as PJ Fleck showed off his most prized weapon for the 2024 season.

🗣️ Nobody can stop Darius Taylor‼️

Here are some of the highlights from the Minnesota freshman RB's career-high 208-yard day on the ground. ⤵️@Dariustay1or x @GopherFootball pic.twitter.com/FdWlQsuSRj

— Big Ten Football (@B1Gfootball) December 26, 2023

Minnesota Gophers underwhelming through the air

With Taylor running at full speed, Fleck realized very quickly that the Falcons defense was not going to be able to slow him down. And when PJ knows that you can’t stop his running game, he’s going to run and run and run and run and run and run and run.

So to nobody’s surprise, that’s what happened. Minnesota ran the ball 44 times, between Taylor, Jordan Nubin and QB Cole Kramer. On the contrary, aforementioned super senior quarterback — who pushed off some wedding planning to make his first career college start — only threw 16 times, completing half of them for a total of 26 yards and one early game touchdown strike to Elijah Spencer.

Related: Gophers Football Receiving ‘Substantive NIL Packages’ Recently; Basketball Still Behind

Bowling Green coach Scot Loeffler mocks Gophers pass attack

After the game, Bowling Green head coach Scot Loeffler appeared frustrated with losing to a Gophers team that couldn’t even muster 30 yards through the air, telling a local reporter at the postgame podium that Minnesota “couldn’t throw it from me to you”.

Loeffler didn’t seem concerned with the many other reporters within earshot, who do not cover the Falcons, including Pioneer Press beat reporter for Gophers sports, Andy Greder.

Quote: Bowling Green coach Scot Loeffler at postgame podium to a reporter sitting roughly 10 feet away about the #Gophers’ passing attack in Quick Lane Bowl:

“They couldn’t throw it from me to you.”

— Andy Greder (@andygreder) December 26, 2023

The funny part about the opposing head coach’s comments is that they aren’t wrong. There’s a reason why Cole Kramer was a career backup at the University of Minnesota, a school that has not been known for its passing prowess for at least two decades.

PJ Fleck will PJ Fleck no matter who is making jokes

But as has often been the case under PJ Fleck, that didn’t matter on Tuesday night because Loeffler’s Falcons couldn’t stop Darius Taylor, just like defenses struggled to stop Mo Ibrahim before him. I expect the Gophers passing attack to improve by leaps and bounds next season, under transfer QB Max Brosmer.

Related: 4 Minnesota Gophers Defensive Coordinator Candidates to Replace Joe Rossi

But as long as Darius Taylor is healthy or Minnesota has a dominant feature back to feed, opponents are going to have to prove they can stop the ground game before Fleck worries about throwing the ball against them. And I can promise Scot Loeffler’s comments aren’t going to change his ways. In fact, they’ll make PJ him smile from ear to ear.

New Gophers defensive coordinator will be a great leader, likely from the outside

Fleck wants someone who can lead the defense. Not just the players on that side of the ball, but the coaches too. PJ made it clear in his National Signing Day press conference this week that he likes the foundation of his defense and the new defensive coordinator isn’t going to come in and make wholesale changes.

Related: Minnesota Gophers National Signing Day Signees – 2024

An incredible leader, great presence, really intelligent. And a great connector of people, because that’s the thing. I’ve got three staff members in there. They’re all good. They’re all signed for the following year. So this isn’t like bringing in an entire staff and starting over. We’ve got incredible recruiters and incredible coaches, but you’re looking for that presence in front of the room. That leader in front of the room that’s going to be able to add to what we do.

PJ Fleck on what he’s looking for in the Gophers next DC

While the head coach may not want a completely new identity on defense, he appears determined to hire someone from the outside. Fleck used language like ‘add to what we do‘ and talked about how the new coordinator “won’t be bringing in an entire staff and starting over”.

Minnesota Gophers defensive coaches show talent, lack experience

PJ talked about the three coaches already on defense that he likes, but he must not like them enough to consider promotions to defensive coordinator. Now, part of PJ’s hesitation to promote from within has to do with the age of his assistant coaches on that side of the football.

Their safeties coach, 31-year-old Danny Collins, is expected to call the defense at the Quick Lane Bowl. The defensive line coach, Winston DeLattiboudere, has played more college football in the last three years than he has coached.

Related: Minnesota Gophers Football Transfer Portal Tracker 2023-24

The only defensive coach over the age of 32 is cornerbacks coach and co-defensive coordinator, Nick Monroe, who graduated from my alma mater — the prestigious St. Cloud State University — in 2001 has only been on Minnesota’s staff for one season… and it was the worst defensive season in the last five years.

Does that mean Monroe would be a bad hire? No, but it’s just another reason why an outside hire makes more sense than keeping in in-house. So… who are some rumored candidates? The job has been unfilled for weeks now. Well, there aren’t any real hot rumors out there, mostly because they haven’t started the search yet.

Too much going on to focus on coaching search

Why? Because there’s too much going on right now for him to commit the requisite attention needed to operate a proper assistant coaching search. His focus will shift to hiring a new DC, after the bowl game is over.

“I want to be able to give 100% of my attention, like I just did [for recruiting leading up to National Signing Day]. That was 100% of my attention. My mind was nowhere else. For me to be able to put 100% of my attention right now into the hire, I’d be shortchanging our team, our staff, our players and the state of Minnesota.

I have an obligation to make sure that I do my due diligence, and not spottingly. There’s a lot going on right now. We have bowl prep, we got the transfer portal, we got NIL fundraising and we’ve got obviously Signing Day. We got all these things going on. And oh yeah, by the way, you gotta go make an important, really, really massive hire.”

PJ Fleck on when to expect a new DC

As mentioned briefly, earlier in this blog, the Minnesota Gophers bowl game is on December 26 (Quick Lane Bowl) vs the Bowling Green Falcons. Fleck wants to move swiftly once he does shift focus to hiring a new defensive coordinator.

Related: Top In-State 2024 Recruit Koi Perich Officially Signs with Gophers

Expect hire to happen by first week of January

The Gophers would prefer to have a DC in place for January and February recruiting, both in the transfer portal and at the high school level, not to mention eventual preparation for the Spring Game. So, while Fleck is asking for patience, he himself expects a hire to be made in the first week of January.

“I’ve told our team, be patient. It’s going to be a little while. I’d like to be able to have that done in the first week of January, because this is about getting to see people face to face. Again, I owe it to our team to do the due diligence necessary to find them the best leader of the defense, and our staff has been incredibly supportive of that.

PJ Fleck on when to expect a new DC

Here is the entire PJ Fleck presser. He talks about the defensive coordinator hire at the 43-minute mark.

The $30K figure that was floated has never been and probably will never be verified, but Gopher football insider for 247Sports.com, Ryan Burns, confirmed that Kramer did accept some sort of NIL package in order to stay.

That brings us to Monday, when Kramer took to a podium at the Gophers practice facilities to meet with media and discuss their upcoming bowl game matchup vs the Bowling Green Falcons.

Related: Get to Know Cole Kramer, Minnesota’s Quick Lane Bowl QB1

Cole Kramer denies accepting NIL payment to stay for bowl game

Toward the end of his Cole’s presser, Andy Greder (Pioneer Press) asked him if he had anything in response to rumors floating around that he received ‘substantial NIL money for this opportunity’. Kramer’s response: Deny, deny, deny…

Cole Kramer denies receiving 'substantial NIL money' to stay with #Gophers through bowl game. pic.twitter.com/pA0k0sH2Tq

— Minnesota Sports Fan (@realmnsportsfan) December 19, 2023

Greder: “There’s a rumor going around that you received some pretty substantial NIL money for this opportunity, what do you have to say about that?

Kramer: Yeah, you know, I saw that. I saw the post and the articles and, you know, that’s not true. It’s not accurate information. As much as I would love it to be true, it’s not. Just getting the chance to play, especially this last time and to start. You know, that’s what means a lot to me and that’s what makes it really special.”

Plausible denial by the Minnesota Gophers Quick Lane QB

Look, I wouldn’t expect Cole Kramer to use the podium as a confessional and tell us all about how he was offered and came to accept whatever NIL offer he did, in order to stick around and quarterback the Gophers through the upcoming bowl game, but that was highly unlikely to happen today.

Related: Did Drake Just Curse the Minnesota Gophers?

As could have been predicted, Kramer denied receiving any such NIL payment, meaning the random poster from GopherIllustrated.com, along with Ryan Burns’ sources, are both lying, which I doubt to be true.

It’s quite possible the $30,000 is an exaggerated figure, but I’d be shocked if he’s not getting something worthwhile out of Minnesota’s NIL fund. Then again, we’ll never really know so his truth is as good as anyone else’s.

5th year senior Cole Kramer — who according to PJ Fleck is supposed to be living in Arizona right now, planning his wedding and getting on with his after-football life — will make his first career start as a college quarterback.

Related: PJ Fleck, Gophers Have Turned in Multiple Rival Schools for Tampering

Kramer has seen very little action this season. He has more rushing yards (3) and attempts (2) than he does passes (1) or passing yards (0). His only recorded throw of the season… was an interception.

INTERCEPTION TAR HEELS 🔥

🎥 @UNCFootball | ESPN

pic.twitter.com/vrpUdBS772

— ACC Football (@ACCFootball) September 16, 2023

Why is Cole Kramer starting for the Minnesota Gophers?

Until just a couple of weeks ago, the Gophers starting quarterback was redshirt sophomore Athan Kaliakmanis, who entered the transfer portal following Minnesota’s season finale loss vs Wisconsin.

According to reports, Athan started to sour on PJ Fleck’s program after the head coach chewed him out in front of “others” at Purdue. Weeks later, when the coaching staff wouldn’t promise Kaliakmanis bowl game QB1, he hopped in the portal.

Minnesota has already found their QB for 2024 and they have a young stud prospect committed for the future. But on December 26, the Gophers will trust in Cole Kramer, who’s stuck with his hometown program for a half decade, even as other 3-star quarterbacks were climbed ahead of him on the depth chart.

Cole Kramer at Eden Prairie High School

Kramer Enrolled at the University of Minnesota in January 2019, after completing his senior year at Eden Prairie High School early. Earlier that fall, Kramer threw for 1,700 yards and 14 touchdowns, earning 2018 Star Tribune All-Metro Second Team and KARE 11 All-Metro team honors.

It was great to catch up with Eden Prairie and future #Gophers QB Cole Kramer (2019 Class) and head coach Mike Grant. This is year No. 40 coaching for Mike. We'll have more on the first official day of Minnesota high school football practice on @KSTP at 6:50 and 10:20. pic.twitter.com/3wADB1onfW

— Darren Wolfson (@DWolfsonKSTP) August 13, 2018

Related: Minnesota Gophers Football Transfer Portal Tracker 2023

After leading Eden Prairie to a Minnesota class 6A state championship as a junior the year before, Kramer and the Eagles fell one win short of a repeat in 2018, losing to Lakeville North in the state title game.

In his high school career at Eden Prairie, Kramer started three years, where he totaled around 4,000 yards, 50 touchdowns and an unknown number of interceptions. For whatever reason, Kramer’s 2018 stats are a bit elusive to find.

We know he went his entire sophomore and junior seasons without throwing an INT. But that streak quickly ended when he threw his first career high school pick in week one of his senior season vs Eastview.

Kramer turns into a Wildcat Gopher

Coming out of high school, Kramer was a three-star recruit and the no. 27 ranked 2019 dual-threat quarterback by 247Sports composite. He ranked as the No. 3 2019 football recruit in Minnesota, according to Rivals and ESPN.

As a Gopher, Kramer has mostly been limited to Wildcat QB duties, a position that got him on the field for 8 games in 2021 (63 snaps), 8 games in 2022 (39 snaps) and just 2 games (6 snaps) in 2023. His most memorable pass came in 2021 @ Iowa when the perfect Wildcat play call happened at the perfect time (4th and 2).

Big Man Ko Kieft rumbling stumbling bumbling for a touchdown. What a play pic.twitter.com/v3bEugmQaS

— Big Cat (@BarstoolBigCat) November 13, 2021

I’d expect a very heavy Darius Taylor + Cole Kramer read option offense later this month vs Bowling Green. It’s the offense he operated in high school and, as a Wildcat QB, an extremely run-heavy play-call sheet with mostly read-option and play-action passing plays available.

Can Kramer help and lead the Gophers to a 7th straight bowl win and help PJ Fleck stay undefeated in Gopher bowl games? We’ll soon find out…

Read all of our Gopher football blogs

But on Sunday, we found out what bowl they will play in and who their opponent will be. First, the College Football Playoff Committee named (1) Michigan, (2) Washington, (3) Texas and (4) Alabama as the four playoff teams, leaving an undefeated Florida State team out of the running for NCAA National Champion.

Related: How Much NIL Can Gophers Pay vs What Transfer QBs Actually Cost?

Quick Lane Bowl: Minnesota Gophers vs Bowling Green Falcons

The Match Up is set!

2023 Quick Lane Bowl@BG_Football vs @GopherFootball
📅December 26, 2023
🕙2:00 P.M. EST
📍Detroit, MI pic.twitter.com/IFIK6dR3Wc

— Quick Lane Bowl (@quicklanebowl) December 3, 2023

Throughout the rest of the day, the entire slate of bowl matchups has been revealed. And just moments ago, we finally found out where and who the 5-7 Golden Gophers will play. Detroit, MI – Quick Lane Bowl vs (7-5) Bowling Green.

PJ Fleck is undefeated in bowl games (4-0), as Minnesota Gophers head coach and he’s 5-2 overall as a college football head coach (1-2 at Western Michigan).

• 2018 (7-6): Quick Lane Bowl vs Georgia Tech | (W) 34-10
• 2019 (11-2): Outback Bowl vs Auburn Tigers | (W) 31-24
• 2021 (9-4): Guaranteed Rate Bowl vs West Virginia | (W) 18-6
• 2022 (9-4): Pinstripe Bowl vs Syracuse | (W) 28-20
• 2023 (5-7): Quick Lane Bowl vs Bowling Green