‘You have to earn the right to stay’: P.J. Fleck reflects on Gophers tenure ahead of Rate Bowl matchup with New Mexico

SCOTTSDALE, ARIZ. – P.J. Fleck made his way up the short set of stairs and took his seat on the stage in a ballroom of the JW Marriott Camelback Inn Resort & Spa. Waiting for Fleck on the table was as handful of Sour Patch Kids, a gift from a Rate Bowl executive who remembered the Gophers football coach’s favorite candy.

“Nice,” Fleck said, chuckling at the gesture before he spoke at a news conference on Dec. 24. Fleck and the Gophers take on New Mexico on Dec. 26 at Chase Field in Phoenix. It will be Fleck’s seventh bowl game in his nine years as coach, and all those postseason appearances have been successful. The Gophers are 6-0 in bowls under Fleck and carry an eight-game bowl winning streak into the matchup with the Lobos, the longest active streak in major college football.

“We talk about the bowl game being a celebration of the 2025 season and all the seniors and all they’ve accomplished since they’ve been here,” Fleck said. “… There’s so many guys that we’re celebrating, and then the bowl is a start of the 2026 season."

The 2026 season will be Fleck’s 10th at Minnesota, and there’s no question he has elevated the program. The Gophers’ 11-2 record and No. 10 final ranking in 2019 — the program’s best poll finish in 57 years — prove that. His Minnesota record is 65-44, and his win percentage of .596 is third-best among Gophers coaches with more than 40 games coached, trailing Henry L. Williams (.786, 1900-21) and Bernie Bierman (.716, 1932-41, 1945-50). Fleck’s Big Ten record is 39-40 (.494), the best conference mark among Gophers coaches since Murray Warmath went 65-57-4 from 1954-71.

Consistency, though, can be a dual-edged sword. When a team reaches new heights, its fanbase keeps wanting more. As beautiful as the Valley of the Sun is, the Gophers are in the Phoenix area for a bowl game for the fifth time since 2006.

Since that celebrated 2019 campaign, the Gophers haven’t met the huge ask of another 11-win season. They have two nine-win campaigns and can earn their second eight-win season under Fleck with a win Dec. 26. Aside from a trip to Tampa, Fla., to play Auburn in the Outback Bowl on Jan. 1, 2020, the Gophers have been to two Rate Bowls, two Quick Lane Bowls, one Pinstripe Bowl and one Duke’s Mayo Bowl with Fleck as coach.

Of course, Gophers fans have dreams of the Rose Bowl, which is now part of the College Football Playoff. If not Pasadena, Tampa or Orlando are on fans’ wish lists.

Case in point: 2025. The Gophers enter the Rate Bowl with a 7-5 record, matching the regular-season mark of the 2024 team that won the Duke’s Mayo Bowl. Nine players from last year’s squad made NFL rosters this season, and that left holes that were filled with varying degrees of success. Fleck and his staff nailed the quarterback plan with Drake Lindsey appearing more poised than his redshirt freshman status would suggest. On the flip side, the defense struggled mightily at times, especially in a 38-35 loss to Northwestern on Nov. 22 when it squandered a 15-point second-half lead.

“When you lose nine [players to the NFL], if you’re not one of the top two teams in the country, you have a major dip,” Fleck said.

The new reality of college football with name, image and likeness (NIL) payments, unlimited transfer portal usage and revenue sharing, plus conference expansion, has put a bigger emphasis on money. That’s not necessarily in the Gophers’ favor. NIL collectives guard their financial figures, so an accurate ranking of how much money programs have to work with is a moving target. According to an analysis by 247Sports.com, the Gophers ranked 48th nationally among public schools and 14th in the 18-team Big Ten in NIL potential.

Much of that ranking is due to the fact that the Gophers don’t have a big-name billionaire donor like Nike co-founder Phil Knight is for Oregon, Mark Cuban is for Indiana and oilman Cody Campbell is for Texas Tech. Without such a “white whale,” the Gophers rely on the grassroots efforts of Dinkytown Athletes, their official NIL partner, to broker deals.

Early in the 2023 season, Fleck famously warned, “We’ll be a Triple-A ballclub for somebody else. … So, please contact Dinkytown Athletes." That came after the Gophers lost running back Bucky Irving to Oregon following his freshman season.

“Learning from our past to have a better future,” Fleck said, describing his transfer portal philosophy. “What worked, what didn’t work, what process worked, what type of player worked, what didn’t? How do we have to vet players even more to find the right fit?”

Player retention becomes more important when NIL money is tight. So far, the Gophers have had 13 players declare they will enter the transfer portal when it opens Jan. 2, but most are reserves who saw little playing time. The most prominent to use the portal is running back Fame Ijeboi, the team’s second-leading rusher this year.

“We feel great about the retention and re-signing the majority of our players, especially the majority of our starters, which is really, really critical for the ’26 season,” Fleck said.

Fleck acknowledged negotiations with players can be tricky.

“For the most part, guys are free agents after every single year, and the NFL doesn’t have that type of system, but college football does,” Fleck said. “You know you never want to force your player to sign back or make it just about money. And not one of our guys that we signed back was it only about money, and that’s what makes this the life program that it is.

Player retention, navigating the transfer portal and anticipating the future all are part of a college football coach’s job as 2025 nears a close. Because of the volatile nature of the coaching profession, Fleck didn’t think he would be at Minnesota for 10 years when he took the job. But he and his wife Heather have made the state their home.

“You just take it every day for what it’s worth,” Fleck said. “You live in one-day increments, but your mind’s got to be two to three years ahead. You’re living within that day to make that program better every single day. Win the day, be 1-0. … You have to win to stay. You have to earn the right to stay."

With his seventh bowl game with the Gophers upcoming, Fleck took some time to reflect. He is proud of how the program navigated the aftermath of a sexual assault investigation and boycott fallout from the previous administration. He’s also happy with the Gophers’ consistency, while still trying to improve the results.