TIPSHEET

KNOW THIS

The Gophers can only look back at all their close losses and think that a victory in any one of them, even the one-point home loss to Northwestern, might have saved their NCAA résumé.

WATCH THIS

The Wild begins a week against Eastern teams with a visit to Boston (6:30 p.m., NBCSN). The good news: the Wild is 6-0 all-time in Boston. The bad news: This Boston team is miles into first place in the Atlantic Division.

RANDOM FANDOM

"What is bad about the NIT? New coach, new program, players that haven't been well coached or developed in the past 3 yrs. Why don't we try and get behind a team that could use a little more encouragement and a little less criticism."

— njfan08 on the Gophers at startribune.com.

Weigh in on what you're thinking about to mrand@startribune.com

TWEETED

"Committee does Iowa no favors, putting Iowa in play-in game vs Tenn on day McCaffery's son, Pat, scheduled to have tumor removed."

Fran McCaffery

— Sports anchor Keith Murphy of WHO-TV in Des Moines, referring to Iowa coach Fran McCaffery.

@MurphyKeith