Introduction to the Decade of 2010-2019: Great Again?

Great Again?: The 2010s

We have already substantially introduced Minnesota sports in the 2010s in our introduction to the 21^st century and the decade of the 2000s. So you already know that Target Field and U.S. Bank Stadium were built, saving Minnesota and the Twin Cities the ignominy of becoming “a cold Omaha.” You already know that the Twins and Vikings have struggled the past ten years (and the Timberwolves the past 30) more than otherwise. You know that college sports in Minnesota, both at the University of Minnesota and at the so-called small colleges, have flourished over the past 20 years, and that high school sports also are flourishing in our midst. Minnesota sports today is bigger and better than ever. That’s what we said. 

So, having already taken a quick look back, let’s look forward. It’s 2020. Where are Minnesota sports headed? Will Minnesota sports be great again in the 2020s? The 2030s?

Back to the Future

Well, anything can happen. But, here are some things that have happened before and that therefore one might reasonably think could happen again.

1. In major league sports, the day will come when Target Center, Target Field and U.S. Bank Stadium become obsolete. In the past, new stadiums have had a shelf life of about 20 to 50 years, and the shelf lives have been getting shorter. On the other hand, the latter two represent relatively extravagant solutions and you might think their shelf life should be a little longer. Still, sometime after, say, 2030 to 2040 or 2050 it is not unlikely that Minnsotans will again face the possibility of becoming “a cold Omaha.” Maybe the Twins, Vikings, Timberwolves and/or Wild will leave, though Minnesotans have always rallied to their teams in a pinch. Still, as Minnesota’s population falls further and further behind growing Sun Belt towns, we may lack the resources to come up with another save. Minnesota’s “big league” status, long-term, cannot truly be guaranteed, at least according to the strictest meaning of the phrase “big league.” Our professional sports institutions are rich and powerful, and they are vastly less loyal to their geographic moorings than their fan base is loyal to them. 

2. College sports are thriving. Ignore those who only care about Gopher football and basketball, which will probably continue to struggle. Minnesota college sports are thriving because Minnesota kids are playing hard and playing well at just about everything except D1 football and D1 basketball. These are sports in which Minnesota kids somehow seem to be lacking, and whatever it is that they lack, they have been lacking it for more than 50 years. It isn’t realistic to think that they will turn around now, though that too is not impossible. But, the good news is that our colleges and universities aren’t going anywhere. They’re not going to be sold to new owners and moved to New Orleans.

3. Don’t underestimate the impact of St. Thomas going D1. St. Thomas was kicked out of the MIAC in 2019, and history will judge that the MIAC did the Tommies a favor. St. Thomas will thrive in D1, and the Twin Cities sports scene will be significantly enriched by having two D1 schools instead of just one. Just imagine St. Thomas playing North Dakota and UMD in WCHA hockey while the Gophers continue to languish playing nobodies like Michigan and Ohio State and Penn State and Wisconsin in the Big 10. Imagine St. Thomas playing basketball in the Big East with Marquette and other Catholic powers. It could happen. How long will it be before St. Thomas beats the Minnesota Gophers at something? Not long.

4. High school sports are another story. In case you haven’t noticed, American society has continued to impoverish our public schools, at least in those areas where impoverishment is not unknown. The MSHSL continues to add sports but it is cutting back on expenses around the margins. Kids and families are paying more and more in participation fees. More and more kids are supplementing their school sports experiences and training by playing club sports in the off-season. 

If the high schools just said, “The hell with it,” and dropped sports from the extra-curriculum, the fact is that clubs could step in and fill the gap in many sports in two heartbeats, if not one. Either way, club sports will continue to chip away at the margins of high school sports. The days of high school/MSHSL monopoly over the administration of youth sports is long past. Any attempt by the MSHSL to take back full control of youth sports, to banish “the invisible hand,” would be met by a full-scale parental revolution. But, it’s not going to happen. God bless the MSHSL for the management of youth sports that it provides. But, that is what MSHSL is: A manager. It is not longer in a position of leadership. “Big time” sports and those who want a piece of it are in the driver’s seat, and it is all that the MSHSL can do to keep the wheels spinning. But, how fast they spin and in what direction is completely out of their hands.

Sports clubs will continue to grow in participants and budgets and visibility, and school sports will narrow a little bit—at least in the public schools. Private schools, meanwhile, seem destined to grow in enrollment and budgets. Within the world of school sports, they will continue to be more successful than they used to be. A backlash is already out there, and a return to separate private school post-season tournaments is not out of the question.

5. Girls and women’s sports will continue to grow at all levels. If you take a sneak peak down below, you’ll see that Minnesota’s top five athletes of the 2010s, and five of our top six teams, and three of our top seven coaches are all women. Why is that? Well, Minnesota has committed—at every level—to the spirt of Title IX. The opportunities for girls and women’s sports will continue to be supported in Minnesota. And, while boys and men’s sports are supported everywhere, that is not quite true of the girls. So, Minnesota girls will continue to do well relative to their national cohort.

#8 Dynasty

#7 Season

Minnesota Gopher Women’s Hockey Wins 62 Straight Games and a Fifth (of Seven) NCAA Title(s)

The Minnesota Gopher women’s hockey team was formed in 1998. They beat Augsburg 8-0 in the first intercollegiate game ever played in the state, and finished the year 18-3-3 under coach Laura Halldorson. In their second year, they were 32-6-1 and won the AWCHA national title, which administered the first national tournament before the NCAA took over the following year. They finished second to UMD in the WCHA, both in the regular season and in the playoffs, then beat the Bulldogs 3-2 in the national semis. They beat Brown 4-2 in the final. 

Since then, they’ve become one Minnesota most successful sports team with 650 wins, 139 losses and 54 ties (.803), along with Augsburg wrestling and Concordia (St. Paul) volleyball. They've played in ten national championship games in 21 seasons, winning seven. They still play in the WCHA to the relief of Gopher hockey fans who were disappointed when the Gopher men abandoned arch-rivals North Dakota and UMD to play Big 10 hockey.

Like the men, their success owes much to the success of Minnesota high school hockey. They’ve had 22 all-Americans and two Patty Kazmaier award winners. One, Krissy Wendell, grew up in Brooklyn Center. She played for Brooklyn Center in the Little League World Series in 1994 at the age of 12; she was just the fifth girl ever to start in the LLWS. Later, she led Park Center to a state championship. The Gophers other Kazmaier award winner, Amanda Kessel, was from Madison, WI. Along with Wendell and Kessell, the Gophers top career scorers include Natalie Darwitz for Eagan, Hannah Brandt from Hill-Murray, Gigi Marvin from Warroad, Ronda Curtin from Roseville and Laura Slominski from Burnsville. Wendell, Curtin and Slominski all won the Ms. Hockey Minnesota award, along with future Gophers Renee Curtin, Roseville, and Dani Cameranesi, Blake.

It all came to a head in 2013 as the Gophers won the NCAA title with a perfect 41-0 record. They beat North Dakota 2-0 in the WCHA final and then 3-2 in three overtimes in the NCAAs. They needed overtime to beat Boston College, too, also 3-2, in the semis, then beat Boston U. 6-3 in the finals. The following year they extended their winning streak to 62 games before losing. The 2013 Patty Kazmaier finalists were all Gophers—Megan Bozek, Kessel and goalie Noora Raty. 

The Gophers have had just two women’s hockey coaches. Laura Halldorson, a Wayzata grad who played college hockey with Patty Kazmaier at Princeton, coached the Gophers through their first ten years, winning 278 games (.787) and the first three national titles. Brad Frost took over in 2007 and in 13 seasons has won 372 games (.815) and four national championships in five years from 2011 to 2016. The 2014 team lost just one game, that to Clarkson 5-4 in the NCAA final. Otherwise, the Gophers would have won five straight national titles. They got to the national final again in 2019, losing to Wisconsin 2-0.

The Gophers have seven national titles, UMD and Wisconsin five each. Only Clarkson, with three, also has won an NCAA title.

One of these days, there will be eye-popping changes to Minnesota’s sporting landscape. Maybe football will disappear from the high schools. Maybe Minnesota will emerge as an international soccer power. Maybe St. Thomas will become a national power analogous to Notre Dame. Maybe we will become “a cold Omaha.” One of these days, there will be eye-popping, jaw-dropping changes to Minnesota’s sporting landscape. But, having looked ahead, we again look back at the decade of the 2010s and acknowledge that, for the most part, we puttered along much as we always have—our professional sports teams faltering, especially in anything resembling a big game. Gopher football and basketball mostly struggled, though it’s true that the gridders finished the decade with their best season in somewhere between 60 and 115 years, your choice. We made a little bit of a splash internationally—“we” meaning Lindsay Vonn and Jessie Diggins, not too terribly unlike the Evelyn Halls and Amy Petersons and Greg LeMonds of past generations. 

One of these days, there will be eye-popping, jaw-dropping changes to Minnesota’s sporting landscape. Change is brewing. But, right now, it remains a generation away. You and I will not live to see it. Our children’s children will be the ones to know when it happens.