Big Ten is off to strong FB recruiting start

The Big Ten is off to a strong start in football recruiting. The 11 teams in the conference have combined to get 83 verbal commitments to date. This ties them with the Big 12, which also has 83 verbals, but has one extra team. The ACC has 53 commitments, the Big East has 45 and the Pac 10 has 40 verbals.

Unfortunately, for the Gophers, the rest of the conference is off to a fairly big head start. Penn State leads not only the Big Ten, but all college football with 16 verbals. This is a remarkable number, since the signing day does not start until February 4^th and teams are only allowed to sign 25 players.

Perennial powers Ohio State and Michigan have 11 and 10 verbals, respectively. Michigan State has received nine commitments, Illinois has eight and Purdue has seven verbals. Indiana and Iowa have six commitments each. Wisconsin has received five verbal commitments.

Minnesota and Northwestern have received just two commitments. The Gophers got verbals from 6-8, 320 pound Lydon Murtha from Hutchinson (MN) High and 6-2 John Carlson of Minnetonka (MN) Hopkins.

GOPHER SWIMMERS SHINE IN SUMMER NATIONALS

Gopher swimmer Mike Brown finished second in the 200-meter breaststroke at the 2003 ConocoPhillips Summer National Championships in College Park, Md. Brown finished with a time of 2:13.50, good enough for the Olympic trial cut of 2:19.99. He will also compete in the 100 breaststroke on Friday.

Brown, a freshman this past year, finished third in the 200 breaststroke in the 2003 NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships, earning first-team All-America honors. He gained second-team All-Big Ten honors in the 200 breaststroke as he helped lead the Gophers to a second-place finish at the Big Ten Championships. Brown was a bronze medal at the Commonwealth Games and broke the Canadian record in the 200 breaststroke, while in high school.

Gopher swimmer Adam Mitchell finished 39th in the 200-meter backstroke. Minnesota women's swimmer Keri Hehn finished ninth in the 200 breaststroke.

GOPHER VOLLEYBALL TEAM SETS MEDIA DAY

The Minnesota volleyball team will have its media day on Monday Aug. 25 at 2:45 p.m. Minnesota will start the season later that  week when it plays in the Hawaiian Airlines Classic in Honolulu, Hawai’i on Aug. 29-31.

Minnesota will start its fall practice schedule on Friday, Aug. 8. Head Coach Mike Hebert is currently coaching the U.S. National Team at the Pan-American Games and will not be available to be interviewed until Monday, Aug. 18. There will also be an intersquad scrimmage on Friday, Aug. 22 at 3 p.m.

The Golden Gophers return nine letterwinners and five starters from last year’s team, which won the first Big Ten title in school history and advanced to the “Sweet Sixteen” for the third time in four seasons. Minnesota landed the fourth-ranked recruiting class in the nation according to prepvolleyball.com.