Vikings can win if Harvin is healthy

The good news at Winter Park this week is that Percy Harvin, who has been slowed down because of a serious rib injury, is practicing full-time, and if the best all-around athlete on the Vikings squad is healthy, that greatly increases their chances for a big upset in Green Bay.

The Vikings might have won the first Packers game had Harvin not missed the second half because of his ribs. Instead, Green Bay held on to win 33-27 on Oct. 23 at the Metrodome.

"It gives you a chance to win just about every game that you're in, if you can keep [Harvin] on the field and healthy, which is what we're trying to do each and every week in 2011, as much as we can," Vikings coach Leslie Frazier said.

Harvin can return kicks and play wide receiver and running back. Frazier describes him as a big playmaker who creates tremendous problems for defenses.

"He plays a lot of different positions, and everywhere he goes, the defense has to account for him," Frazier said. "If he's returning kickoffs, it changes how people cover kicks. He's a difference-maker."

But Frazier also said Harvin is susceptible to injuries. "He's not a real big guy, so some of those hits, they effect him," Frazier said.

Harvin's No. 1 role is as a wide receiver, and Frazier described the 2009 first-round pick out of Florida as the best slot receiver in the NFL.

"He is a hard matchup for anybody trying to cover him man-to-man," the Vikings coach said. "We can put him in the backfield and he can still make plays in the backfield. And when you put him in the slot and try to cover him, it's a hard matchup for defensive backs. We're hoping that this bye week got him healthy."

Difference in Carolina Looking back to the Vikings' 24-21 victory at Carolina, Frazier said they held Harvin out in the third quarter because of his ribs, but had they not gotten him back in the game in the fourth quarter, when Harvin had two receptions for 33 yards on the drive for the go-ahead field goal, they wouldn't have won the game.

Frazier praised Harvin's speed, saying he is one of the fastest players in the NFL, if not the fastest. "And he's strong, very strong, it's hard for one guy to tackle him by himself," Frazier said. "He runs over defensive backs, he'll run over linebackers, just a tough, fast, quick football player."

This year, the Vikings have not been able to use Harvin's kick-returning skills as often, in part because of his injuries and in part because the league moved kickoffs up 5 yards to the 35-yard line this year. He has only nine returns for 280 yards -- including a 103-yard touchdown return on the opening kickoff of the season in San Diego.

However, he has had a dramatic increase in runs, whether lined up as a running back or receiver. Through eight games, he already has a career high in carries (20) and rushing yards (185). He is on pace for 62 receptions and 668 yards, but he has yet to record a receiving touchdown this season.

Since Harvin's rookie season he leads the NFL in kickoff returns for touchdowns, with four, and he made the Pro Bowl in 2010 as a kick returner.

U has chance Like last week before the Michigan State football game, the Gophers are a four-touchdown underdog to Wisconsin going into Saturday's game.

But former Gophers coach Glen Mason points out that you can never tell what is going to happen in a game. Last week was a good example: the Gophers stayed close at Michigan State, Iowa upset Michigan, and a 3-5 Northwestern team went into Lincoln and beat No. 10 Nebraska.

So there is always a chance for the Gophers to score a big upset of the Badgers.

"That's what's great about college football, that's why you play the game," Mason said. "We used to go to Penn State, where the experts, including you Sid, gave us no chance. That's why you play the game. That's what's great about it.

"The thing about football, it's the greatest team game that's ever been invented. If you put a bunch of kids together and they play better as a team even though they have inferior talent, and they make less mistakes, they can win.

"It's not like baseball, a seven-game series, you only have to beat them for three hours one time and then you move onto somebody else."

The one reason the Badgers will probably dominate the Gophers is that they might have one of the best quarterbacks in the country in Russell Wilson.

In a recent telephone conversation, Badgers athletic director Barry Alvarez couldn't say enough good things about Wilson, a transfer from North Carolina State.

"Wilson is the guy who makes this team," the former coach said of a quarterback who can scramble as well as he can pass and will be very tough for the Gophers to defend.

Jottings • Kim Royston is the only member of the Gophers who has been on the winning side of the Gophers-Badgers series, and both times were while the safety was at Wisconsin. "At Minnesota, keeping that trophy [Paul Bunyan's Axe] means as much as any other trophy the two schools play for," said Royston, who spent 2006 and '07 in Madison before transferring. ... There are 2,000 tickets available for the Wisconsin game and 5,000 for the Gophers' final home game of the season with Illinois. ... The late Sandy Stephens, a former Gophers All-America, will be honored as a 2011 College Football Hall of Fame inductee at Saturday's game.

• Both Pro Football Weekly and ESPN's John Clayton placed two Vikings on their midseason All-Pro teams, running back Adrian Peterson and defensive end Jared Allen.

• Andy Dunn spent his final week here in the Gophers athletic department as assistant director of event management. He is going to Yale as director of operations in charge of 35 sports.

• Former Gophers forward Phil Kessel continues his hot start this season and still leads the NHL in scoring with 12 goals and 11 assists in 16 games for Toronto. Kessel was named October's player of the month in the NHL, the first Maple Leafs player to be named to that award in 18 years. ... Former Gopher Thomas Vanek is also among NHL leaders in a few categories. The Buffalo forward entered Thursday tied for fourth in scoring with 10 goals and eight assists in 14 games, tied for second in the league with 10 goals and tied for second with three game-winning goals.

• Minnetonka native Jake Gardiner has five assists in 14 games for the Maple Leafs. ... For the New York Rangers, Hastings native Derek Stepan has two goals and seven assists and St. Paul native Ryan McDonagh has three goals and three assists with a plus/minus rating of plus-6. All three played at Wisconsin.

Sid Hartman can be heard weekdays on WCCO AM-830 at 6:40, 7:40 and 8:40 a.m. and on Sundays at 9:30 a.m. • shartman@startribune.com