SID's JOTTINGS

• Gophers football coach Jerry Kill reports that highly recruited Minneapolis Washburn running back Jeff Jones is in school and eligible for spring practice next season. Jones, who was the top-ranked player in the state by Rivals.com for the Class of 2014 and the seventh-ranked running back in the nation, rushed for 1,525 yards and 34 touchdowns last year for Washburn.

• Eight years ago, the University of Minnesota started the Gopher Graduation Program in which the school offers a chance for athletes who leave school to play pro sports or for other reasons to return and earn a degree. A total of 34 athletes have come back to school to get their degrees, and one of the latest is 74-year-old former All-America football player Bobby Bell, who even got an A-plus in one of the courses he took. Among others who have taken advantage of the program are basketball players Willie Burton, Trent Tucker, Sam Jacobson and Randy Carter and hockey player Ben Clymer.

• Gophers fans might outnumber Missouri fans at the Citrus Bowl in Orlando, with a chance of more than 10,000 Gophers supporters attending, thanks to a big Florida delegation from Naples and Fort Myers, where a great number of Minnesota natives spend the winter. … Byron Helgeson, a member of the Florida Citrus Sports group that runs the Citrus Bowl and pushed for the Gophers to be invited, graduated from Gustavus Adolphus. … The Gophers are expected to take 103 players to the game.

• Indications are that former Twins manager Ron Gardenhire will accept the paycheck he has coming for this year, not work for the Twins in another position and wait to see if a managing job opens during the season that he certainly is qualified for. Gardenhire is now residing in Fort Myers, Fla.