As the calendar flips to January, the non-conference slate is in the books, and the Minnesota Gophers are staring down the grind of Big Ten play. At 8-5, Minnesota has shown flashes of promise, but they’re likely two steps behind where they needed to be to seriously enter the NCAA Tournament bubble conversation.
The preseason roadmap was pretty clear: go 6-2 in November, follow it up with a 4-1 December, and you’ve got a shot. The Gophers hit that December mark, but the November stumble-specifically a 1-3 stretch against San Francisco, Stanford, Santa Clara, and Indiana-has them playing catch-up.
Now, we can’t ignore the context. Injuries to Chansey Willis Jr., Robert Vaihola, and BJ Omot have loomed large.
That trio missing time gutted Minnesota’s depth, forcing head coach Ben Johnson to roll with a seven-man rotation, including two freshmen off the bench and very little size to work with. Combine that with a cold shooting stretch in November, and it’s not hard to see how a few games slipped away.
But here’s the thing: even with all that, the Gophers are playing some solid basketball right now. They’re competing, defending their home floor (a perfect 8-0 at Williams Arena), and showing signs of cohesion. If the injury bug starts to ease up and they can manage foul trouble and fatigue, there’s still a path-albeit a narrow one-to bubble relevance.
Let’s break it down.
According to KenPom’s rankings-one of the more respected analytics tools in college hoops-Minnesota currently sits at No. 101.
That’s not bubble territory. In fact, there are 47 teams ranked ahead of the Gophers that aren’t projected to make the tournament field based on current automatic bids.
That includes teams like San Francisco, Stanford, Santa Clara, and Missouri-four squads that have already beaten Minnesota. And just like the Gophers, those teams have a steep hill to climb.
San Francisco and Stanford, for example, each have to leap over 40 teams to get into the mix. Missouri and Santa Clara are a little closer, but still have work to do.
So where does that leave Minnesota?
Right now, they’re ranked 69th out of 79 teams in what we’ll call the “high-major” pool-a group that includes the power conferences plus programs like Gonzaga and Memphis. Within the Big Ten, the Gophers are 16th out of 18, ahead of only Rutgers and Penn State. Maryland sits one spot ahead.
If Minnesota wants to make a run, they’ll have to climb over a handful of conference peers: Maryland, Wisconsin, Washington, Northwestern, and Oregon. The good news?
They’ll get a crack at all of them. In fact, those five teams, along with Rutgers and Penn State, make up nine of Minnesota’s remaining games.
Add in matchups against Iowa, USC, Nebraska, Michigan State, and UCLA-plus a return trip to Indiana, who the Gophers already beat-and you’re looking at 15 games that are, on paper, winnable.
The toughest road tests? At Illinois, at Ohio State, and at Michigan. Those are likely the biggest hurdles standing between Minnesota and a late-season surge.
So what’s the magic number? To really get back into the bubble conversation, Minnesota probably needs to go 11-7 or 12-6 the rest of the way.
That’s a tall order, especially for a team that’s had to patch together rotations and survive on grit. But it’s not out of the question.
The Gophers have already proven they can protect home court, highlighted by a win over Indiana-a team sitting 29th in KenPom.
It’s a long road, but the journey starts this weekend with a trip to Northwestern. If Minnesota can steal one on the road and keep building momentum, maybe-just maybe-there’s a late-season run in the cards.
For now, the Gophers are still in the fight. And in a Big Ten that’s as unpredictable as ever, that’s not a bad place to be.