WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — What a difference a fortnight can make.

Coming off a rivalry game victory over Iowa, the Gophers had beat Michigan State on Oct. 28 and went into Halloween parties feeling good, sitting in first place in the Big Ten West Division.

Two weeks later, Minnesota has lost two straight and will struggle to reach bowl eligibility, needing a a sixth win through Thanksgiving weekend.

The Gophers got blown out 49-30 by Purdue at Ross-Ade Stadium on Saturday — an almost never-ending series of defensive calamities and capitulations.

Minnesota (5-5, 3-4 Big Ten) plays at No. 1 Ohio State next week and will host rival Wisconsin on Nov. 25.

Snapping a four-game losing streak, Purdue (3-7, 2-5) put up season highs for total yards (604), rushing yards (353) and points.

The breakdowns were foreshadowed at the end of the 27-26 loss to Illinois last week. It was also reminiscent of another Illinois game in 2018, when the Illini destroyed Minnesota so completely that defensive coordinator Robb Smith was fired the next day.

On Saturday Boilermakers quarterback Hudson Card was made to look like Drew Brees or even Aidan O’Connell. Card threw for three touchdowns and 251 yards.

Running backs Devin Mocokbee and Tyrone Tracy each went over 100 yards rushing and a touchdown apiece. Card added 44 on the ground and another score.

The Gophers cut the Purdue lead to 28-20, but the offense went missing in action in the second half for a third straight week.

The Gophers allowed 28 first-half points — the most since Michigan scored 35 in the 2020 season opener.

The Gophers defense could do nothing to stop Purdue’s offense on its opening four drives. The Boilermakers produced four touchdown drives spanning at least 75 yards apiece.

It was the first time Purdue (3-7, 2-5) scored four touchdowns to start a game since 2004 against Ball State.

After Devin Mockobee’s 65-yard run late in the second quarter — the longest rush allowed by the U this season — the Boilermakers were averaging an unbelievable 25.5 yards per play.

Minnesota’s defense missed injured starting linebackers Cody Lindenberg and Maverick Baranowski, but breakdowns came along the defense line and secondary as well.

It was Minnesota’s offense that set the frantic pace on its opening drive, but they couldn’t keep up.

The Gophers marched down the field, scoring easily after only four plays and two minutes into the game. Tight end Brevyn Spann-Ford was left wide open, and Kaliakmanis found him for a 20-yard score to make it 7-0.

After being held scoreless on opening drives through the first eight games, Minnesota produced touchdowns against Illinois and Purdue.

Then the Gophers offense had two drives stall inside the 30-yard line, and they settled for two shorter field goals from Dragan Kesich.

On the next drive, Chris Autman-Bell dropped a touchdown in the end zone on third down and Kesich missed 39-yard field.

But after forcing Purdue to punt for the first time on its fifth drive,  Kaliakmanis found Chris Autman-Bell for a 27-yard touchdown to cut the Boilermakers’ lead to 28-20 with 16 seconds left in the half.

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Chanhassen has been widely considered the cream of the crop in Class 5A football this season.

But Mahtomedi put a sizable scare into the Storm’s quest for a championship.

Charlie Brandt ran for two scores and threw for another, but the Zephyrs came up 80 seconds short of an upset in Saturday’s state quarterfinal.

Defensive lineman Dominic Castagnetto capped a 12-play, 76-yard, nearly five-minute drive with a 2-yard run out of the power package with 1:20 left as the Storm rallied for a 28-22 win.

It’s the second straight week Castagnetto scored late to let Chanhassen advance. His short run with 34 seconds left gave the Storm a 37-36 win over perennial-power Mankato West last week.

“Two in a row is nice, but it’s better that we won,” he said.

Mahtomedi, which got a 25-yard field goal by Charlie Thein for a 22-20 lead with 7:14 to play, got the ball on its own 38 after Castagnetto’s score, but a sack and three incompletions allowed Chanhassen to celebrate.

Finishing 4-4 in the regular season, including losses in its final two contests, Mahtomedi (6-5) had seemingly found its stride in the postseason with a 33-point win over Tartan and a 19-7 win over Cretin-Derham Hall to set up a date with the Storm.

“I told our kids I love their fight,” said Mahtomedi coach Dave Muetzel. “They didn’t listen to anybody, and they came in here and fought the whole game.”

“It’s about improving each week,” he continued. “We got a few guys back as well from being injured, but the kids kept battling and kept working. It’s a competitive group, and it showed out here today.”

Maxwell Woods ran for 102 yards and a touchdown, caught a score and took a kick to the end zone for Chanhassen (11-0), a first-time tournament participant that will face Andover in a Nov. 18 semifinal. That game is at 7 p.m. inside U.S. Bank Stadium. The 10-1 Huskies beat Armstrong 37-20 Saturday.

“That’s awesome; we get to play football inside,” coach Cullen Nelson said as the wind picked up postgame at chilly Apple Valley High School.

Down by 14-13, Mahtomedi took advantage of Max Strecker’s recovery of a fumbled punt return midway through the third quarter with arguably its best drive of the day.

Twice the Zephyrs converted on fourth down — both on Brandt keepers — before the senior quarterback lofted a perfectly placed 18-yard pass into the hands of Will Newman for a 19-14 lead after the two-point try failed.

“Just a gritty football team,” Castagnetto said of the Zephyrs. “They’re not the biggest guys I’ve ever faced against, but they played very hard, very fast.”

Woods, a North Dakota State commit who had a rushing score late in the first half, had a 13-yard catch early in the fourth quarter for a 20-19 Storm lead.

Brandt snuck in from the 1 for a quick 7-0 Mahtomedi advantage, but Woods took the ensuing kickoff 85 yards to tie the game.

A quartet of Chanhassen miscues — fumble on the 5, short punt and two defensive penalties in the red zone — resulted in Mahtomedi going up 13-7 midway through the second quarter on another Brandt sneak. He gained 12 yards on a fourth-and-8 earlier in the drive.

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Winning the Class 5A state championship this season will likely entail stopping — or at least slowing down — St. Thomas Academy star senior running back Savion Hart and the Cadets’ potent rushing attack. Owatonna couldn’t do it Saturday in Woodbury.

Hart ran for five scores — pushing his total for the year to 34 — as the Cadets downed the Huskies 46-28 in a Class 5A quarterfinal bout.

St. Thomas Academy wide receiver Luke Dobbs (11) catches a pass over Owatonna defensive back Owen Beyer in the second half of a Class 5A quarterfinal game in the State Football Tournament at Woodbury High School in Woodbury on Saturday, Nov. 11, 2023. St. Thomas Academy won 46-28. (Craig Lassig / Special to the Pioneer Press)

Cadets coach Travis Walch believes slowing his team’s running game will be a tall task for any opponents generally unfamiliar with the Cadets’ offense.

“I think when you ask a lot of coaches, ‘Why is it tough to defend STA?’ They’ll say, ‘My gosh, they’ve run 22 formations this year,’ ” Walch said in a phone intervew. “I’m so proud of our coaching staff when you talk about the offensive side. When it comes down to it, we don’t do a lot scheme-wise, but we do a lot with formations and motions. And if you’re not lined up in the right gap because it’s a formation you’ve never seen, that’s all we need to give Savion that crease on top of a really good o-line and some tight ends. It just makes it really, really tough.”

“I’ve been on the defensive side of the ball, I would love to see a team that only runs four formations. But you just don’t know what we’re going to come out in each week, and I think that’s the real challenge.”

Owatonna certainly didn’t have any answers Saturday, as Hart ran for two touchdowns in the game’s first seven minutes to stake St. Thomas Academy to a 15-0 advantage. Owatonna was never dead, as the Huskies (8-3) moved the ball offensively. Jacob Ginskey threw three touchdown passes, including two to Nolan Ginskey.

But St. Thomas Academy’s defense made enough plays to constantly keep Owatonna at an arm’s length. The Cadets forced at least four turnovers, while committing none. That’s the thought for St. Thomas Academy’s defense this season: Find a way. While the offense returned nearly everyone from last season, the defense essentially started from scratch, from personnel to scheme.

“It’s apples and oranges when it comes to why is our offense where it’s at and why is our defense where it’s at,” said Walch, who’s in his first season at the helm. “And don’t get me wrong, we work every week to get finer and better at all the little things.”

But, given the offense’s potency, an opportunistic defense is still a very complimentary unit.

St. Thomas Academy players celebrate with their fans after defeating Owatonna 46-28 in a Class 5A quarterfinal game in the State Football Tournament at Woodbury High School in Woodbury on Saturday, Nov. 11, 2023. (Craig Lassig / Special to the Pioneer Press)

“If we can do that, we can beat anyone. We don’t care who it is,” Walch said. “I’m sure Owatonna is sick right now knowing, ‘Minus, turnovers, we’ve got a shot.’ But it’s part of the game. And we take great pride and we spend a lot of time on tackle turnover throughout the week.”

St. Thomas Academy (9-2) will meet Alexandria (11-0) in the state semifinals at 2 p.m. Friday at U.S. Bank Stadium. Alexandria beat Rogers 38-14 in its quarterfinal Saturday.

Next week will mark the Cadets’ first trip to downtown Minneapolis since 2019. St. Thomas Academy fell in the state quarters each of the past two seasons, and there was no 2020 state tournament because of COVID-19. So next week will mark the first appearance for these Cadets on the state’s grandest stage.

“When you come to St. Thomas Academy in ninth grade, and you choose to come here, the thought is you’re going to end up at the Bank. And not only because of COVID, but also because of not being able to win the last two years, yeah, we had kids on the sideline crying,” Walch said. “I think about all the people that don’t get this, yeah, they’re big-time excited, and they need to be. Because this is why they choose St. Thomas Academy. … This is the mission of the school. We want to be great academically. We’re going to prep you for college. But, make no mistake about it, we want to win championships.”

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In June, Wes Spearman appeared before a St. Paul deputy legislative hearing officer to plead his case for a liquor license. The longstanding Grand Avenue restaurant and bar he operates, Billy’s on Grand, has been serving alcohol through a license officially still held by the previous business owner, which is problematic for two reasons.

First, the city’s Department of Safety and Inspections has sought to revoke the establishment’s existing license following gunshots in and outside the bar, among other documented incidents triggering escalating fines and municipal penalties. And second, the corporate entity that holds Billy’s on Grand’s existing liquor and business licenses may soon no longer exist.

“I recently had some contact from the current owner, the RJMP Group I purchased the business from two and a half years ago,” said Spearman, in a recent phone interview. “He stated he’s dissolving the company. I don’t know what that will do to our business. There has to be some corporation (acting as license holder).”

Since his June hearing, which drew public testimony from about a dozen residents for and against his proposal, Spearman said he’s heard radio silence. The city has yet to inform him what the hearing officer’s recommendation to the city council will be, or when the city council will consider his license application.

“It’s been frustrating at best,” said Spearman, late last month. “To say we’re heading into the month of November, and to not have a response to our request is unacceptable. It’s been very discriminatory to my business.”

A rough debut

Billy’s on Grand’s current licenses were issued around June 2020 to the RJMP Group, which is owned by Randall Johnson and Matthew Prendergast. RJMP, in turn, entered into a management agreement around April 2021 with Spearman’s outfit, the DWD Group, which took over operation of Billy’s on May 28, 2021.

The debut was far from smooth. Residents and city officials became alarmed after 132 documented police calls for service over the course of a year.

Last December, an administrative law judge supportive of the city’s proposed fines said that while not all the police calls could be attributed definitively to the restaurant and bar, averages of one police call every three days were too compelling to ignore. Billy’s was fined $500 by the city in February 2022 and $1,000 in February of this year.

As a legal appeal hearing before the judge was being scheduled last year, St. Paul police investigated a call for disorderly conduct shortly before 1 a.m. on May 21, 2022, but reported being barred from entering the establishment. Based on that incident and the restaurant’s previous history, the city Department of Safety and Inspections later recommended full revocation of Billy’s liquor, patio and entertainment licenses.

The city council has yet to vote on that recommendation. On April 5, the city council voted 6-0 to allow the DWD Group’s application for a new liquor license to move forward before DSI, even as revocation of the existing license hovered as a possibility overhead.

On Oct. 23, a DSI spokesperson said the matter was still before the city’s legislative hearing office, which had yet to complete its report.

A rebrand to the Gather Eatery and Bar?

Acknowledging “hiccups” since his group reopened the bar and restaurant in 2021, Spearman approached community groups such as the Summit Hill Association last May and presented a plan to partially remodel and then rebrand Billy’s as the Gather Eatery and Bar.

The concept called for “elevated” bar food, creative cocktails, small bites, live music and theme nights such as Karaoke, Latin and country, and ultimately a reservation-only “speakeasy”-style side room and family gathering space.

In an effort to diminish its reputation for hosting an afterhours club-like atmosphere, the bar currently closes at midnight on weekdays and 1 a.m. on weekends, rather than the 2 a.m. closing time allowed by its licenses.

“Disappointed doesn’t even begin to describe how I feel about the way I have been treated during this process,” said Spearman, in an email Tuesday. “I have done everything in my power to work with the city and residents to make sure I’m being a good neighbor. I’ve proposed a re-brand for my business so that it is more in line with what the neighborhood wants, I close earlier than what I have to in order to appease those who live in the area. I qualified for a grant to help me with the re-brand and I’m not able to obtain it to begin work because I have no license.”

Waiting for a decision

Some neighbors were instantly skeptical of the Gather Eatery proposal, given the history of gun violence in the area. Spearman said he would put $225,000 toward the rebrand, a figure that struck neighboring residents as too low for a top-to-bottom concept change and partial remodel.

Spearman said that given the hold-up with the city in determining if he qualifies for a liquor license, even that sum has been out of reach.

“Without a license, my bank is not willing to take a chance on a business that we don’t know will have a liquor license moving forward,” he said.

“I was in heavy contact with DSI at the time prior to making this proposal,” he continued. “We had told our customer base that we were closing (for the remodel). We had tagged our tables. And then all of a sudden (the deputy legislative hearing officer) was saying, ‘We don’t know how long this decision is going to take.’ We were thinking 30 days. We’re well outside of 90 days.”

On Oct. 23, a legislative aide to St. Paul City Council member Rebecca Noecker confirmed in an email that the matter still rested with the legislative hearing officer, who had yet to complete her report to the city council.

“Her recommendations are forthcoming and will be heard by council when they’re complete,” she wrote.

Monica Haas, executive director of the Summit Hill Association, in an email that the delay in a decision “negatively impacts our community for neighbors, the property owners, the business itself and the city of St. Paul.”

“It’s unprecedented that any business in St. Paul has had to wait so long for a decision, and we hope that no other business owners will have to go through this inefficient process,” she said.

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