Gophers top Syracuse for 6th straight bowl victory
Although the biggest storyline from the Pinstripe Bowl was the injury to quarterback Athan Kaliakmanis, the Minnesota Gophers defeated Syracuse 28-20 for the sixth straight bowl victory.
- 2022: Minnesota 28, Syracuse 20 –Pinstripe Bowl
- 2021: Minnesota 18, West Virginia 6 – Guaranteed Rate Bowl
- 2020: Minnesota 31, Auburn 24 – Outback Bowl
- 2019: Minnesota 34, Georgia Tech 10 – Quick Lane Bowl
- 2018: Minnesota 17, Washington State 12 – Holiday Bowl
- 2017: Minnesota 21, Central Michigan 14 – Quick Lane Bowl
It's the fourth straight bowl win under head coach P.J. Fleck. The previous two were under head coach Tracy Claeys. Before that, Minnesota had dropped seven straight bowl games under Glen Mason, Tim Brewster and Jerry Kill.
In the Pinstripe Bowl, redshirt freshman Athan Kaliakmanis left the game in the second quarter with an apparent leg injury. He was replaced by sixth-year senior Tanner Morgan, who threw the ball just seven times. Two of them went for touchdowns to Daniel Jackson.
Sixth-year senior running back Mo Ibrahim had 71 yards on 16 carries, one of them for his 20th touchdown of the season. His 20 touchdowns are a single-season Gophers record and he passed David Cobb for the most rush yards in a season (1,665) and Darrell Thompson for the most rush yards in Gophers history (4,668).
History for Mohamed Ibrahim!
— ESPN College Football (@ESPNCFB) December 29, 2022
His 20th rushing TD sets a single-season record for @GopherFootball 👏 pic.twitter.com/KI9UUSvLWI
The biggest play of the day belonged to Minnesota's defense as freshman cornerback Coleman Bryson picked off Garrett Shrader and returned it 70 yards for a touchdown to put the Gophers up 21-10 in the third quarter.
Coleman Bryson read this play perfectly for a pick-six‼️ @GopherFootball pic.twitter.com/pOBPtCeBqf
— ESPN College Football (@ESPNCFB) December 29, 2022
The Gophers end the 2022 season with a record of 9-4. They went 9-4 in 2021, 3-4 in the Covid-shortened 2020 season, 11-2 in 2019, 7-6 in 2018 and 5-7 in 2017, which was Fleck's first year at Minnesota.
Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen. His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011. Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play. Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers. Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.