Weather, or not

To recap: In a span of less than three decades, the once-mighty Gophers program (those younger than 50 might not know this, but the Gophers have won six national titles, the latest in 1960) has based its hope for a turnaround on two new stadiums -- the first indoors, the second outdoors. That certainly has the appearance of contradictory logic, but at least one prominent former Gopher who admits he was sold by Holtz on the merits of playing indoors believes the climate -- literally -- favors the program's return to the great outdoors.

"I think the timing is right [to go back outdoors]," said Rickey Foggie, a Gophers quarterback from 1984-87, who once said he never would have made a visit to Minnesota had it not been for the Metrodome. "Back in the early-to-mid '70s, Minnesota winters were a lot more harsh than these days. I think the severe winters have been reduced."

Gophers coaches might indeed need to invoke global warming as a recruiting tool. This much is certain: Minnesota's brisk weather is going to be used by rival coaches during recruiting battles, more so now that the program has returned outdoors.

Fact is, former coach Glen Mason said it was difficult to battle the weather in recruiting even when his team was playing in the Dome. That's because from December through February, it's relatively easy for rival coaches to paint Minnesota as a frozen tundra.

"Absolutely," Mason said. "We were fighting it anyway [even in the Dome]. The typical deal would be another coach calling a kid and telling him to get out USA Today and look at the back page of the front section [the weather map], and asking the kid: 'Did you see Minnesota's in the blue? Did you see how cold it is there today?' Or coaches would just send the weather map to kids and circle Minnesota."

Mason admits it was an advantage to be able to tell recruits that the weather in the Dome always was perfect. Now, that advantage is gone.

It is back to the future for the Gophers, or pre-1982, when the team played outdoors at Memorial Stadium. Former coach Joe Salem said one of the biggest blows to his recruiting efforts came when Sears used International Falls, Minn., as the locale for its DieHard battery TV commercials in the late 1970s.

"That was terrible," Salem said, able now to laugh at the memory. "You look at that ad, and it might have been taken on Lake Superior. There was nothing around but snow. It was a bad image for us. I'm sure opposing coaches carried a copy of that in their briefcase when they recruiting against us. But I guess it probably sold a lot of batteries."

When it comes to outdoor football, the perception of Minnesota's weather is cause for concern. Even if the reality of autumn days in Minnesota is pleasant conditions, the perception outside the state is usually different.

"I came from Ohio, and the stereotype was that it was a lot colder here," said Bryan Cupito, who quarterbacked the Gophers in the Dome from 2003 to '06. "I came here in 2002 [on a recruiting trip], and I thought it was going to be a nightmare. But I now think that perception is mostly a myth."

But that perception is certain to grow the first time major newspapers carry a photo of the Gophers playing a home game in a snowstorm. Some former Gophers players and coaches believe returning to the outdoors could, in the long run, make it tougher to recruit in warm-weather states.

Bruce Vandersall, a Gophers assistant from 1973 through 1982, said he was able to recruit largely in the Upper Midwest, getting athletes who wanted to play in the elements.

"But the game has changed," he said. "Now it's all about multiple-skilled athletes and throwing the ball more. My guess is some players will definitely be impacted in their decision because of what they will be hearing from other schools that will be recruiting them. ... I think Texas, Florida, wherever in the south that they may have been OK coming to the Dome, you might be in a situation where they have a second thought [about coming here] because it's going to be drilled into his brain by opposition teams recruiting against you that potentially you're going to be playing in snow or bad weather."

Current Gophers coach Tim Brewster is confident he can overcome whatever fears young players from warmer climates might have.

"You know, it's interesting, a lot of kids in the South have never seen snow, they've never touched snow, and they're intrigued by snow," Brewster said. "We talk to those kids about kind of stepping out of the box and embracing and experiencing something different. A snowball fight, being outside, sledding in the snow. ... We don't try to shy away from the fact it does snow in Minnesota."

And although Minnesota has compiled numbers to show that most of the weather is decent in the fall, there have been plenty of exceptions. The Gophers at Memorial Stadium played in September snow/sleet storms, freezing October days and November blizzards. The Gophers had home games last season on Nov. 8 and Nov. 22, when the temperatures at kickoff were 34 and 31 degrees, respectively.

"They'll get used to the cold, the sleet, the rain, the frozen feet, the frozen hands," said former Gophers running back Garry White (1977 to '80), a Texan, while laughing. "But I enjoyed it. It was something new coming from the South. It was pretty rough my freshman year, but after that I adjusted."

The recruiting tradeoff to the weather is that Brewster has a new stadium with superb facilities to sell to prospective Gophers. And almost everyone agrees that should be a net plus even when factoring in the weather in the recruiting wars.

But if history has taught us anything, it is that a program's success -- in recruiting or on the playing field -- is not linked to a stadium. Remember, skilled athletes were supposed to flock to the Dome. But in 27 seasons at the Dome, the Gophers had more last-place Big Ten finishes (nine) than first division (five). They never finished higher than third, and never played in a New Year's Day bowl.

"To be honest, I think the stadium gets blown way out of proportion in how it's going to change the world," Cupito said. "It's not. It's going to come down to winning games, to coaching and the style of play. I'm definitely excited about the new stadium. But keeping people excited is going to come down to winning and losing."

Just like it always has, be it at Memorial Stadium, the Metrodome or someplace brand new.