The Gophers passed their first test of the young season last week, holding off the visiting Utah Utes and showing, at the very least, they can can solidly beat a middle-of-the-road Pac-12 team. That’s not nothing.
Things get a little more interesting this week, as they head out west to the Vancouver Showcase to take on Texas A&M, Santa Clara and Washington in a round-robin event. For those keeping track, the Showcase was originally supposed to be a bracketed tournament, so the Gophers are actually sort of benefitting by getting a guaranteed game against Washington now that it’s a different format.