*This post appeared first at RandBall, your home for keeping everyone happy. *

Game of the week: 7:30 tonight (BTN) #2 Penn State at #15 Gophers volleyball

I’m not sure Gopher volleyball gets the attention it deserves. Most of the Gopher bandwidth in town is taken up with football, men’s basketball, and men’s hockey, and what’s left traditionally is absorbed by the amazing women’s hockey team and the ultra-successful wrestling program. Throw in a few memories of the Lindsay Whalen-Janel McCarville women’s hoops team, and there’s not a lot left for Gopher volleyball.

Allow me to give you a little background; the Gophers haven’t missed the NCAA tournament since 1998, a span in which they’ve made it to the Sweet Sixteen an astonishing ten times and advanced to the Final Four thrice.

The background on Penn State is even more impressive: nine of the last ten Big Ten titles, and four consecutive NCAA titles from 2007-2010. The Nittany Lions are on top of the Big Ten once again this year, with the Gophers in third place, and no doubt Penn State is expected to roll tonight.

I love cheering for an underdog, don’t you?

What else to watch this weekend

2:30 pm today (ABC): #16 Michigan State at Nebraska. Don’t pretend that you haven’t idly checked the Big Ten West (fine, Legends division) standings over the past couple of weeks and thought to yourself, “Huh, I wonder if MSU loses another one and Nebraska loses another one, then the Gophers beat Wisconsin and the Spartans, then… nah.”

1pm Sunday (NBC): United States Grand Prix. Granted, the Formula 1 championship is decided, and the two Red Bull cars were fastest in the practice sessions, so we can probably count on seeing another win out of Sebastien Vettel. Still, the Circuit of the Americas is one of the best tracks in F1, it’s got a fun, goofy hill in Turn 1… and if you watch this, you don’t have to watch either of the awful noon NFL games.

7pm Sunday (FSN): Winnipeg at Wild. I see no reason that these teams shouldn’t don Sioux and Gophers jerseys for this game. It’s geographically sound, and we might as well amp this budding Jets-Wild rivalry up a little bit.

7:30pm Sunday (NBC): Kansas City at Denver. Near as I can tell, these are two of the three good teams in the NFL. Instead of watching the third (Seattle) beat up on the Vikings late on Sunday, save your football watching for this game, and see if the Chiefs can beat the Broncos.

What to read this weekend

There have been a few profiles of Ra’shede Hageman this year, all of them interesting, but I encourage you to check out a very worthy one from SB Nation by John Rosengren.

Now that the 2013 NASL season is over, the offseason can get into full swing – and, for Minnesota United FC, that means it’s time to start making some contract decisions.

Unlike other pro sports leagues, none of the United players have guaranteed multi-year deals. For the vast majority of its players, United holds contract options for 2014 – meaning they can choose whether to bring them back or release them as free agents. For the most part, United signs players to one-year contracts with these team options for a second year, so all but a handful are waiting to find out whether Minnesota will pick up their options.

I talked to team president Nick Rogers to get the contract details for United’s players. Here’s what we know:

Pablo Campos is the only player who is already officially signed for next year. His contract included performance incentives – likely related to goals, though Rogers wouldn’t go into details – and he met those, thus making his option year into a contract year for 2014.

Keeper Mitch Hildebrandt, winger Omar Daley, fullback Kevin Venegas, and center back Connor Tobin are the only players who are completely out of contract and free agents. This is not to say that the team will not bring any of them back, but all four have the ability to negotiate with any team.

It’ll be interesting to see where the team’s free-agent interest lies; Tobin was first choice all year at center back, and developed a good partnership with Aaron Pitchkolan at center back in the second half of the season. Venegas showed flashes after moving from midfield to fullback for the season, and Daley – signed in the summer – finished the year with a hat trick at Tampa Bay. Hildebrandt served as a backup for most of the season, but could well return next season in the same role, especially given his youth (he turned 25 on Tuesday).

Midfielders Calum Mallace and Sinisa Ubiparipovic were on loan from Toronto FC, and thus, have returned to being property of Toronto. Barring a major change in their Toronto status, it’s unlikely that either will be back.

United holds options on the remainder, giving them the ability to pick and choose. They’re virtually certain to bring back a few players, including winger Miguel Ibarra, who will no doubt get another chance to prove that he can be one of NASL’s best on the wing. I would also expect them to bring back Pitchkolan; he was the best Minnesota player this year, and has the versatility to play as a center back or in defensive midfield.

As for the free-agent market, look for Minnesota to be active in trying to find central midfielders, especially central midfielders with the ability to play an attacking role. United is likely to be rumored to sign just about every central midfielder available, so be prepared for a deluge of rumors as the offseason moves along.

*NOTE: This appeared first at SoccerCentric. *

*NOTE: This appeared first at RandBall, your home for utility. *

**Game of the week: Penn State at Minnesota, 11am (BTN). **

Earlier this week, the Star Tribune ran an online poll, asking fans which local sports story interested them the most. The winner, by a landslide, was Gopher football, with 42% of the votes cast; the Wild finished second with 15%.

Part of this is because the Gophers are a good story right now, with three straight wins and Jerry Kill’s status drawing interest. I think it’s also a testament, though, to something else; I think it speaks to Gopher football’s status as the sleeping giant of the local sports scene. The Vikings are far and away the area’s favorite team, but I think Gopher football might be the natural #2.

The poll is evidence, but just going to a Gopher game is evidence enough. I make jokes about the typically-geriatric Gopher football fan, and there are certainly plenty of old-timers who can remember the pre-1965 glory days – but there are plenty of people in the under-40 crowd as well. We under-40s have no memories of the Gophers ever being good, but we show up anyway, and I think that’s a sign.

Today, the Gophers go for a fourth consecutive Big Ten win. The last such streak was 40 years ago, in the same year that was the last time the Gophers won six conference games, the minimum bar for being a decent team. Let the sleeping giant awake, I say. This town has waited a long time.

What else to watch this weekend

Saturday, 6pm: Hockey Night in Everywhere. The NHL Network shows Hockey Night in Canada on Saturday nights, a great development that’s tempered by the fact that HNiC long ago became Maple Leafs Night in Canada. Fear not, hockey fans: you have choices! The Wild and Carolina are at 6pm on FSN, to go along with Toronto and Boston on NHL Network; if neither tickles your fancy, at 7:00, you can watch Chicago play Dallas (and root for the arena to collapse.) Or, you can watch…

Saturday, 7pm (CBS): #13 LSU at #1 Alabama. Oregon’s out of the title picture, at least for the moment – and wouldn’t it be just like Les Miles, the King of Chaos, to throw a wrench into the SEC picture by taking LSU into Tuscaloosa and beating Alabama? (Well, I hope so. I couldn’t be more sick of stupid Alabama.)

Sunday, 10am (NBC Sports): Arsenal at Manchester United. Formerly, this was the only rivalry in the Premier League that mattered. Now, it’s a matchup of first-place Arsenal trying to prove they belong, vs. eighth-place Manchester United trying to reverse a season that has so far been a disappointment. Also, if you watch this you won’t have to watch any of the awful NFL pregame shows.

Sunday, 8:30pm (FSN): Wolves at Los Angeles Lakers. Minnesota’s lost 22 straight to the Lakers. They haven’t beaten LA since 2007; they haven’t won in Los Angeles since 2005. But this year, the Wolves are good and the Lakers aren’t, and maybe, just maybe, we can see the Wolves walk off the floor in LA with a win.

Michael Rand appeared on the podcast yet again; we always like when he stops by. We talked Wolves, Wild, Gopher hoops, football, and hockey, and also watched some of the Country Music Awards together.

Who wouldn’t want to listen to that?

Today at Twinkie Town, I posted Volume 9 of the Scenes From An Offseason.

It’s also my last regular column for Twinkie Town. After nearly seven years writing for the site, I feel like I’m out of jokes to make; it’s time to focus on other things. I can’t thank my buddy Jesse Lund enough for sticking with me through a thousand goofy columns, and for always being first in line to leave a supportive comment.

Because he is nice, Jesse put together a retrospective of many of the things I’ve written, a lot of which I’ve forgotten about. I’m ashamed to tell you how many times I laughed at myself today.

Anyway, so ends the time of Jon at Twinkie Town. Thanks for reading. It’s been great.

*NOTE: This appeared at SoccerCentric. *

First of all, if you haven’t opened your print editions of the paper – you do get the print edition, right? – you missed out on a couple of United pieces in Sports. David La Vaque wrote a long recap of the disappointments of 2013 for Minnesota, while I looked forward to 2014 and at what United needs to do in the offseason.

Standings update

All four NASL games tonight are happening at the same time – 6:30pm Central time. It was a conscious choice by the schedule-makers, designed such that no team could get an advantage by playing later than another team and thus knowing what result they might need to get on the final day.

Of course, in the event, it doesn’t matter at all; New York will play Atlanta in the Soccer Bowl next week, even if both teams lose 11-0 tonight. And so today has a very last-day-of-school feeling in the league; nothing anyone does really matters, and most people are just trying to enjoy it and get to the end of the day, before a long break.

United currently sits fourth in the standings, but could finish anywhere from second to seventh, depending on today’s results – though they would have to win by three goals (and see Carolina lose by a couple) to climb all the way up to second.

However, if Minnesota loses, and Atlanta or Edmonton wins, then guess what – it’s back to sixth place for United, which finished sixth in 2011, 2012, and in the spring of this year.

Tonight’s squad

Three players will be missing from tonight’s squad that United fans have grown used to seeing. Midfielder Calum Mallace was back in Montreal this week as the Impact prepared for their playoff game in Houston (which the Dynamo won 3-0). Connor Tobin, who aggravated his knee injury early in the first half last week, will also miss out on the season’s final game, and Brian Kallman did not travel to Tampa, as he’s in Minnesota attending to a personal matter.

The squad for tonight’s game: Van Oekel, Hildebrandt; Davis, Dias, Pitchkolan, Friedland, Venegas, Brent Kallman; Bracalello, Takada, Daley, Ibarra, Rodriguez; Campos, Ambersley, Wall, Polak.

It will be interesting to see if any of the potential pieces for United’s future – like Brent Kallman, or Travis Wall – make a start toinght.

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!

Minnesota does an excellent job of video production, but it’s worth remembering that not all of the NASL’s teams have that same skill set.  Witness the below video, produced by the Atlanta Silverbacks to promote next week’s Soccer Bowl:

I have several thoughts.

1. It’s just good to hear that the monster truck announcer is still finding work.
2. It’s nice that they put that spinning soccer ball on the commercial, just in case you were confused about whether this was a soccer game or a lacrosse game they were promoting.
3. I also like that at some point, whoever put this ad together apparently thought, “You know, I like that spinning soccer ball, but I’m not sure people will get it. What if I put another spinning soccer ball in the background, but larger, and spinning a different direction?”
4. Speaking of which: no soccer ball has been produced that looks like that since about 1985, yet somehow it’s the graphic of choice for any and all soccer video production. I can’t quite understand it.

Game details

It’s at 6:30 tonight, and you can watch on NASL.com/live, as per usual.

A note: thanks to everyone who read the United coverage this year. It’ll still keep going in the offseason, but no doubt it will slow down; thanks for reading all year.