Not long ago, SKOR North put out a list of the top
unexpected seasons in Minnesota sports history (or at least since when Judd
Zulgad started watching sports). I thought that was an interesting list, so I
decided to make a list of my own, involving my favorite teams (Wisconsin
football, Wisconsin men’s basketball, Packers, Twins, Timberwolves and Wild)
since I was born in June of 1989. It was brutal to get this down to 10. There
were a number of honorable mentions that deserved to be on the list, but I
couldn’t find a spot for them. Ordering them was brutal too. So here we go:
Honorable Mentions:
Wisconsin men’s basketball 1993-94
Wisconsin men’s basketball 2007-08
Wisconsin men’s basketball 2013-14
Wisconsin football 2009
Wisconsin football 2016
Wisconsin football 2019
Green Bay Packers 1989
Green Bay Packers 2007
Minnesota Twins 2015
Top 10
10. Green Bay Packers 2019
Green Bay was coming off a 6-9-1 season, one in which Mike
McCarthy was fired after an embarrassing loss at home against the lowly Arizona
Cardinals. Aaron Rodgers’ play had declined the previous few years. He was
still good, but not Superman like he had been. The Packers responded by
drafting Rashan Gary and Darnell Savage in the first round and Elgton Jenkins
in round two. Add that to the free agent signings of Adrian Amos, Za’Darius
Smith, Preston Smith and Billy Turner.
Even with the signings, there weren’t high expectations for
Green Bay in 2019. However, fans were excited after the week one win at
defending NFC North champion Chicago 10-3. They backed that up with another
victory over an NFC North contender, Minnesota, staving off a Vikings comeback.
The Packers began the season 3-0 and finished with a totally unexpected 13 wins
and a No. 2 seed in the playoffs, earning a bye.
Green Bay’s biggest win came in Minneapolis to win the
division 23-10 in week 16 and the team won nine games by one scorer, including
a 28-23 win over Seattle. Aaron Rodgers did not play great this season, but he
was solid and led the Packers to a berth in the NFC Championship game. I don’t
think any Packers fan saw this coming. We were hopeful that the team could make
the playoffs again, but I don’t think anyone saw a 13-3 season.
9. Wisconsin men’s basketball 2019-20
Wisconsin had more stuff it had to deal with than any team
should. It started on Memorial Day weekend when assistant coach Howard Moore
was in a car accident that claimed the life of his wife and daughter. Transfer
Micah Potter also had to sit out the first semester of the season after the
NCAA kept rejected his and Wisconsin’s appeals to let him play before later
December. The strength coach Erik Helland resigned due to him using the n-word
when telling a story from his days with the Chicago Bulls. Finally, Kobe King,
a talented young guard, left the program shortly before a trip to Iowa City in
January. That doesn’t even cover the fact that the Badgers had to replace
all-world forward Ethan Happ.
The season didn’t start promising, starting out 5-5 and had
to fight to beat Milwaukee in Potter’s first game, but were able to defeat
three ranked teams in the start of January, including two on the road. But
still, the Badgers found themselves at 12-9 and 5-5 in Big Ten play after
Wisconsin blew a lead in Iowa City. Their next game was against No. 14 Michigan
State without King, who had transferred, and no Brad Davison, who was suspended
for the contest.
After a loss at Minnesota, Wisconsin won its final eight
games of the season, including the finale at Indiana with a Big Ten title on
the line. Trailing by seven in the second half, Brad Davison and Micah Potter
came up huge to pull off a comeback win. Davison’s two free throws cemented the
championship in a 60-56 win. Unfortunately, COVID cancelled the NCAA Tournament
because it would have been fun to see how this team would have done in March.
With all that went on, it is amazing the team won it all. People were calling
Greg Gard to be fired, but he galvanized the team and led them on a roll. Wisconsin
wore “4 More” patches throughout the season due to the four members of the
Moore family involved in the car crash. The Badgers won the championship clinching
game at Indiana by four. Four Moore.
8. Minnesota Twins 2001
The Minnesota Twins entered the 2001 season with a young
roster that most expected to be a few years away from truly making a run at the
division. Not only that, but they were looked at as a contraction candidate
along with the Montreal Expos. But the Twins busted out of the gate to a 14-3
start and were 55-32 at the All-Star break. They also drafted the future face
of the franchise in Joe Mauer, having the top pick in the draft.
While Minnesota faltered in the second half, going just
30-45 to finish 85-77, it signaled big things ahead. It was first winning
season since 1992 and would start a string of nine seasons out of the next 10 finishing
above .500. The very next season, the Twins, made up of largely the same
players, reached the American League Championship series. In the next decade,
Minnesota reached the playoffs six times and lost in game 163 (which should
have been in Minneapolis) another season.
And most importantly, the unexpected success of the 2001
Minnesota Twins stayed just that……the MINNESOTA Twins.
7. Wisconsin men’s basketball 2001-02
On many other people’s list, this may be even higher.
Wisconsin was coming off a solid season in which it was the No. 6 seed in the
tournament, but was bounced by upstart Georgia State 50-49 when Mark Vershaw
missed two free throws in the closing seconds. Early in the season, the veteran-laden
team led by Vershaw and Mike Kelley lost its coach to retirement. Much like Bo
Ryan during the 2015-16 season, head coach Dick Bennett retired abruptly during
non-conference play. Brad Soderberg took over for the remainder of the season.
I still always wonder if they had beaten Georgia State and had upset Maryland,
does Soderberg get the full-time gig?
Soderberg obviously did not get the full-time job. That went
to a coach who was turning around UW-Milwaukee and had had enormous success at
UW-Platteville by the name of Bo Ryan. Bo had his work cut out for him. Not
only was Wisconsin losing a ton of seniors, but he only had eight scholarship
players. The team had a lot of talent, led by junior Kirk Penney and freshmen
Devin Harris and Mike Wilkinson. The team limped to a 3-6 start, including
losses to Hawaii and Weber State. But the team won its final six games to
finish 18-11 in the regular season and 11-5 in the Big Ten, finishing in a tie
for first place in the Big Ten (with Illinois, Indiana and Michigan State), the
first regular season championship for the Badgers since 1947 (!!!!). Wisconsin
knocked off St. John’s in the first round of the tournament 80-70 as a No. 8
seed and only trailed top-seeded and eventual national champion Maryland 38-30
at halftime before running out of gas in an 87-57 defeat.
But Bo Ryan was here to stay. He never finished lower than
fourth in the Big Ten and earned two Final Four trips in his final two full seasons.
In his second season at the helm, the Badgers won the Big Ten again, this time it
was outright, defeating Illinois in a thriller in Madison in the regular season
finale. Ryan led the team to four conference titles in all.
6. Wisconsin men’s basketball 2021-22
The Badgers were losing a terrific senior class that led
them to the Big Ten title in 2020. They retained Brad Davison and received a
transfer big man Chris Vogt from Cincinnati. However, they were picked
preseason to finish 10th in the Big Ten. As Matt Lepay put it so
beautifully after the victory at home against Purdue, “And then they played the
games.”
Many people thought sophomore Johnny Davis would become a
force for the Badgers. Even the biggest Badger homers didn’t think he’d become
Big Ten Player of the Year and First Team All-American, but that is just what
he did. Johnny showed up in the biggest games. The country was first put on notice
when they played a very good Houston team in the Maui Invitational. Davis
poured in 30 points on 18 shots in a 65-63 upset of the No. 12 Cougars. In
early January, Davis dropped in a career-high 37 points in a monster 74-69 win at
Mackey Arena, which has been a house of horrors for Wisconsin, against No. 3
Purdue. With a chance of at least a share of the Big Ten on the line, Bucky met
those same Boilermakers in the second to last game of the regular season. It
wasn’t Davis, but a freshman Chucky Hepburn who nailed the biggest shot of the
season, a triple from the left wing to knock off No. 8 Purdue and clinch a
share of the Big Ten.
Not bad for a team picked to finish 10th in the
conference preseason.
5. Twins 2017
The Minnesota Twins entered the 2017 season with no
expectations. Following a surprising 2015 campaign, the 2016 season was
abysmal. They went 59-103, good for the worst record in Major League Baseball.
Minnesota won its first four games of the season, signaling it was a different
team. The Twins became the first team in MLB history to reach the playoffs the year
following a 100-loss season.
Minnesota had to hold off the Los Angeles Angels for the
final wild card spot, helped by back-to-back games with a walk-off home run in
the month of August. Eddie Rosario crushed a two-run bomb down the right field
line to beat San Diego and Byron Buxton followed with one to left-center to
defeat Toronto. A late five-game winning streak helped put away the Angels.
Unfortunately, Minnesota lost to New York (because of course) in the wild card
game, squandering a 3-0 lead, but this turnaround season was one of the more
surprising seasons in recent memory.
4. Wisconsin men’s basketball 1999-2000
This team is surprising because of the incredible run it
had. This team’s run made fall in love with Bucky basketball. Wisconsin was
coming off a season in which it scored just 32 points in an embarrassing 43-32
loss in the 1999 NCAA Tournament to Southwest Missouri State. The regular
season was ho hum, but finished in spectacular fashion as the Badgers upset No.
14 Indiana 56-53. The Badgers finished the season at 16-12 and reached the
semifinals of the conference tournament.
The 18-13 Badgers made the NCAA Tournament as a No. 8 seed
where they took on NCAA’s leading scorer and future NBA draft pick Courtney
Alexander and Fresno State, coached by the legendary Jerry Tarkanian. The
Bulldogs led midway through the second half before Jon Bryant took over with
four triples from the same spot to put the Badgers in front for good.
Wisconsin followed that up by upsetting top-seeded Arizona
with Gilbert Arenas and Richard Jefferson and Stromile Swift’s LSU Tigers. Wisconsin
reached the Final Four for the first time since 1941 with a win over Purdue, which
it defeated in the Big Ten Tournament just a few weeks before. The run to the
Final Four re-energized the program and helped set up a great run of success
under Bo Ryan.
3. Minnesota Wild 2002-03
Okay, no one in their right mind had Minnesota doing much in
this year, just its third season of existence. The Wild were coming off a
season in which they finished 12th in the Western Conference. Not
only did they reach the playoffs, but made two huge upsets to reach the Western
Conference finals for the first (and to this point, only) time.
Led by youngster Marian Gaborik, Minnesota went 42–29–10–1
in the regular season and was the No. 6 seed in the playoffs. In the first
round, it was seemingly a David vs. Goliath matchup against the star-studded Colorado
Avalanche, led by Adam Foote, Peter Forsberg, Milan Hejduk and Patrick Roy. Since
the start of February, Colorado was 22-5-2-3, so Minnesota had a tall task to
put it lightly. Minnesota won game one, but lost the next three to the heavy
favorites. Following a game five win, the Wild came back home and Richard Park gave
Minnesota an overtime victory. The Wild followed that up with a remarkable game
seven victory in overtime with an incredible winner by Andrew Brunette.
Minnesota followed that up with another series against
Vancouver in which it came back from a 3-1 deficit to win. In the deciding game
seven, the Wild came back from a 2-0 hole to score four unanswered and win 4-2.
In both series, the Wild won three games on the road. Minnesota still has not
made it back to the conference finals. This unlikely run there needs to be
ranked high.
2. Green Bay Packers 1992
The Packers hadn’t made the playoffs since the strike-shortened
year of 1982 and had only five winning seasons since the Vince Lombardi years
and made the playoffs just the once. Green Bay was coming off a 4-12 season. The
Packers brought in the hottest coach on the market in Mike Holmgren to run the
show and new general manager Ron Wolf traded a first round pick for a backup
quarterback named Brett Favre. To make matters worse, the Packers started out
the 1992 season with an 0-2 record and coming off a 31-3 drubbing in Tampa.
Enter the week three game at Lambeau Field against
Cincinnati. Green Bay entered the fourth quarter trailing 17-3 and the team
lost its starting quarterback Don Majkowski to a serious injury. Enter Brett
Favre. The team had cut the deficit to 23-17 and had to start inside its own
10-yard line after a poor decision by Robert Brooks on the kickoff. That is
when the legend of the gunslinger who wears No. 4 began. Favre led his team
down the field, throwing a 35-yard touchdown pass down the right sideline to
Kitrick Taylor with 13 seconds left to earn the 24-23 win over Cincinnati.
The team ended up going 9-7, missing the playoffs, but it
set the stage for future success. It was the last time Green Bay did not make
the playoffs until 1999. It signaled the Packers had found their quarterback in
the form of a second-year man out of Southern Miss. In the run of playoff
berths, they would win at least one playoff game every year from 1993-97. The
one time they didn’t, let’s be honest, Jerry Rice fumbled and the Packers
should have won that one following the 1998 season.
1. Wisconsin football 1993
Throughout the late 1980s, the Wisconsin Badgers football
program was a disaster. Following the unfortunate passing of head coach Dave
McClain prior to the 1986 season, the Badgers under Jim Hilles and Don Morton
went a combined 9-36, including an embarrassing 5-27 record in Big Ten play.
In 1988, the University of Wisconsin hired Donna Shalala as
chancellor, who hired Pat Richter as athletics director a year later. A year
after that, the two hired Barry Alvarez as the new head football coach. Alvarez
was thrust into a position that hadn’t seen the school reach the Rose Bowl in
nearly 30 years. In his first three years, the Badgers won 11 games and 10 in
the previous two games. The program was ready for a big jump in year four under
Alvarez.
The Badgers were primed for the breakout season behind the
great running back core of Terrell Fletcher and the Big Ten player of the year,
the late, great, Brent Moss. The Badgers only hiccup was a loss at lowly Minnesota,
but Wisconsin knocked off Michigan State in Tokyo to earn the Rose Bowl spot
after Michigan beat Ohio State in the regular season finale.
Wisconsin went out a won the Rose Bowl against UCLA in its
home stadium. Darrell Bevell’s 21-yard touchdown run was the difference as
Bucky won 21-16. People thought about the Wisconsin football program
differently that day. After hardly ever going to bowls, the Badgers go there on
a regular basis. Starting with that win, Wisconsin has been to six Rose Bowls,
winning three of them. With that, it has started the Badgers being a big time
program for the past 30 seasons.
