Stanzel’s Sports Takeout — BREAKING NEWS: 10.13.25

Oct 13

Vikings get back to work to face the Eagles on Sunday at home. All indications are J.J. McCarthy returns against a ticked off Philly defense.

Wild Back Down to Earth in 7-4 Home Opening Loss to CBJ

The Wild has some holes to fill early this season. Following that 5-0 whitewashing of St. Louis on Thursday, Columbus had a relatively easy time beating Minnesota 7-4 in a Wild home opener that had to have made Jacques Lemaire’s head spin. Lemaire and the original Wild coaching staff, plus Doug Risebrough, were guests as the team began its 25th season.

The Wild brought in Nico Sturm to win faceoffs, and he got hurt the first day of camp and is going to be out two months. It’s already an issue (Columbus won 62 percent of Saturday’s draws), and Joel Eriksson-Ek can’t be pleased centering a second line with Marcus Foligno and Vladimir Tarasenko. Seems a lot of you believed in the Tarasenko resurgence, but nothing he’s shown us in two games makes you think he’s even a shell of his former self.

The Wild outshot the Blue Jackets 52-32 but still lost 7-4. On the bright side, Jonas Brodin only missed the first game and is back.

Kevin Fiala’s Kings come to town tonight for a rare Monday evening hockey game.

Perich INT Keys Gophers’ Comeback Win Against Purdue

Koi Perich had an unbelievable freshman campaign, but had drawn some criticism from the always encouraging P.J. Fleck early this season. But the Gophers’ defensive back came up big Saturday, with an interception return for a go-ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter in a 27-20 homecoming win over Purdue.

Minnesota trailed by 10 in the first half, and was down seven when Drake Lindsey hit Jameson Geers for a game-tying TD midway through the fourth quarter. On the next play from scrimmage, Perich picked off Ryan Browne and ran in it 27 yards for the game-winning score.

The Gophers allowed 253 yards and, despite getting injured Darius Taylor back, ran for just 30 themselves. Minnesota was outgained by almost 200 yards overall, but still pulled out the victory.

It’s a Friday night home game this week against Nebraska on Fox national. Both teams are 2-1 in the Big 10; the Gophers are 4-2 overall and the Cornhuskers are 5-1. It’ll be a good test for the home team.

Gopher Hockey Update

The Gopher men failed to win a game in a weekend series just three times last season - twice against Michigan State and once against Michigan. It’s already happened once this season, as the Gophers netted a 2-2 tie with No. 10 B.C. on Friday at Mariucci to drop to 1-2-1 on the young season. The much-anticipated series at The Ralph is this weekend against a 2-0-0 North Dakota team. Good luck getting tickets if you haven’t already.

The third-ranked Gopher women swept No. 10 St. Cloud State, setting up an epic showdown at Ridder this weekend against No. 2 Ohio State. The Gopher/Badger rivalry is obviously great, but I love it when the Badgers and Buckeyes throw it down in women’s hockey. The Gophers won just one of the four regular-season matchups in 2024-25, but they did beat Ohio State in the WCHA Final Faceoff.

Loons Enter Season’s Final Week Fourth in West

The Loons are guaranteed to host a best-of-three, first-round playoff series, but they’re going to need some help to avoid nemesis Seattle in that series.

Minnesota does play the last-place Galaxy, but they can only move up to third or second if either or both of FC San Diego and LAFC lose. If all those teams win (or all have the same result), it’ll be the Loons hosting the Sounders in round one. Minnesota is two points behind both FC San Diego andd LAFC.

The Loons have won just five of 25 all-time matches against Seattle. Minnesota’s first-round series won’t start before Oct. 24.

I love that the MLS plays every Eastern Conference game at one time and every Western Conerence game at another time on the season’s final day. No waiting around to see how other’s do, just scoreboard watching during the game.

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