Saturday was a great day to be a Gopher football fan as Big Ten rivals stumble
The Minnesota Golden Gophers improved to 2-0 with a win over Western Illinois on Saturday but little did they know that wasn't going to be the best part of their day. After the Gophers hammered the Leathernecks 62-10, they went home and watched their Big Ten rivals stumble.
It started in Madison where the Wisconsin Badgers were hosting Washington State. The Cougars had to walk into a hostile environment at Camp Randall but things didn't go to script for the Badgers.
Former Wisconsin running back Nakia Watson scored a pair of touchdowns and the Badgers committed 106 yards in penalties. A pair of missed field goals from Vito Calvaruso and a fumble by Clay Cundiff inside the red zone with just over five minutes to go doomed the Badgers and helped the Cougars come away with the upset 17-14 win.
Meanwhile, the Iowa Hawkeyes had their hands full while battling the Iowa State Cyclones.
One week after scoring three points offensively against the South Dakota State Jackrabbits, the Hawkeyes offered up a rotten encore with 150 total yards against the Cyclones. Amazingly, the Iowa defense maintained a 7-3 lead until Iowa State engineered a 99-yard drive in the fourth quarter that ended with a Hunter Dekkers touchdown pass to Xavier Hutchinson.
Iowa made a last-ditch effort, driving into field goal range in the final seconds of regulation, but a game-tying field attempt from Aaron Blom went wide left and the Hawkeyes dropped their first game of the season.
Just when it couldn't get any better, the Nebraska Cornhuskers raised the stakes. Hosting Georgia Southern, the Huskers went down to the wire, taking a 42-38 lead on a Casey Thompson touchdown run with 3:05 to play.
On a day where Marshall beat Notre Dame and Appalachian State beat Texas A&M, Georgia became the third Sun Belt school to score a major upset using Kyle Vantrease's eight-yard touchdown run with 36 seconds to go to earn a 45-42 victory.
Although Purdue and Illinois scored convincing victories, it proved to be a great day for the Gophers. With the offense throwing the clock back to 2019 and a dominating defense, Minnesota will at least be in the conversation to win the Big Ten West play like they did in Week 2.
