The pain was profound in the the Gophers men’s basketball team’s loss to Iowa on Sunday.

Come Thursday, similar ingredients went into Minnesota’s 84-76 loss to No. 2 Purdue at Mackey Arena in West Lafayette, Ind.

The Gophers’ hot 3-point shooting helped them stake a 43-35 halftime lead, but foul trouble added up and the U couldn’t keep up in the second half. That was familiar to the Hawkeyes game.

The Gophers (15-9, 6-7 Big Ten) were 16.5-point underdog, but pushed the Big Ten leaders in Purdue (23-2, 12-2). The Hawkeyes game will keep stinging because they are not at the Boilermakers level.

Purdue went on a 15-1 run midway through second half and didn’t let it go to improve to 12-0 at home this season.

The Boilermakers live at free throw line this season and doubled up Minnesota at the stripe (32 to 16 attempts). They made seven more.

Zach Edey, the reigning Naismith Player of the Year, finished with 24 points and 15 rebounds.

Gophers center Pharrel Payne battled foul trouble from the first minute of the game and fouled out with one minute left. He made the 7-foot-4 Edey work for his offensive outfit

Dawson Garcia led Minnesota with 24 points. Garcia missed the end of the Iowa loss with a lower-body injury, but returned Thursday. He exited with his fifth foul with 28 seconds left.

The Gophers trailed 7-0 and 16-5 within the first five minutes of the game, but finished the half on a 21-5 run to take a lead at the half.

Edey picked up his second foul and went to the bench with a 16-10 lead and 13 minutes left in the half. That six-point lead remained, 25-19, when Edey returned five minutes of game time expired. Minnesota got back into the game primarily with him on the floor.

Minnesota shot 67% from 3-point range (9 of 16), with Mike Mitchell making four treys and Cam Christie hit three.

The U committed only one turnover in the first half, while they forced Purdue into seven turnovers and scored 12 points off the giveaways.

The primary concern for the U in the first half was foul trouble: Garcia had three, while Parker Fox and Pharrel Payne each had two.

Minnesota was in a similarly strong position Sunday at Iowa, but let a 20-point second-half lead slip away in a 90-85 road loss.

MOBILE, Ala. — In the last 25 years, the Chicago Bears have drafted two edge rushers who went on to have a double-digit-sack season for the team.

Mark Anderson, a fifth-round pick in 2006, had a career-high 12 during his rookie season. Rosevelt Colvin, a fourth-round pick in 1999, had 10 1/2 sacks in 2001 and 2002 before departing leaving as a free agent.

The only other edge rusher to reach at least 10 sacks in a season did it elsewhere — Leonard Floyd, selected ninth in 2016, had 10 1/2 sacks this season for the Buffalo Bills and the same number in 2020 for the Los Angeles Rams.

The Bears have fueled their pass rush largely with free agents or trade acquisitions, and general manager Ryan Poles filled a gaping need midseason when he traded for Montez Sweat and then secured the defensive end with a four-year, $98 million extension.

For coach Matt Eberflus’ defense to reach another level — and that’s the goal — the Bears need a pass-rushing threat opposite Sweat. A handful of veterans will be worth consideration in free agency, including Danielle Hunter of the Minnesota Vikings, but in a perfect world the team would be able to pair a rookie with Sweat, who will turn 28 in September.

It’s way too early to project how things will shake out, but if the Bears draft a quarterback with the No. 1 pick in the draft, they could consider a wide receiver, offensive tackle or edge rusher at No. 9. If Poles trades down at No. 9, he still could fish in the same waters for those positions.

UCLA’s Laiatu Latu is the most accomplished pure edge rusher in the draft and projects as a first-round pick after totaling 23 1/2 sacks over the last two seasons. The Pac-12 defensive player of the year also won the Lombardi Award as the best defensive lineman in the nation, and he has looked the part this week at Senior Bowl practices with some silky smooth spin moves on the edge and high-level hand usage.

Latu measured 6-foot-5, 261 pounds, so he has good size, but his arms probably aren’t an ideal length at 32 1/2 inches. For comparison, Sweat was 6-6, 260 at the combine in 2019, and his arms measured 35 3/4 inches. Eberflus puts a big emphasis on length when he’s scouting defensive players.

But the production is there, and the biggest question for Latu beginning next month at the scouting combine will surround medical reports. Latu briefly retired from football after suffering a neck injury at the beginning his college career at Washington. Latu suffered a stinger in practice as the Huskies prepared for the 2020 season.

“Just took a weird hit and got a stinger going down my body that lasted 20 seconds, like a lot of other people feel,” he said.

Latu didn’t feel right afterward, and following an MRI, Washington doctors decided he would need to sit out the season. He eventually required surgery for a slipped disk in March 2021. The Huskies medical team essentially decided it wasn’t safe for him to continue playing and basically medically retired him.

Rehab was supposed to be a grueling nine-month process. But 2 1/2 months removed from surgery, Latu felt no complications. He was still at Washington and had retained his scholarship but wasn’t allowed to play football.

“You can call me stubborn, but I went into playing men’s rugby and really just testing my body, tackling grown men and stuff like that,” he said. “I earned a contract from the Seattle Seawolves to go and play with them for an extended part of time. They’d pay me and give me housing, stuff like that, turned that down. I wanted to chase my passion for football.”

Latu sought another opinion on his neck injury and met with Dr. Robert Watkins in Southern California. Latu was cleared to play football, entered the transfer portal and turned into a heck of a find for the Bruins.

Every team here has asked him about his journey and the medical process, and he can point out he had no injury issues the last two years at UCLA.

“Head, neck and heart, those are the three issues that get really tricky for the medical teams,” a high-ranking personnel man said after practice Tuesday at South Alabama’s Whitney Hancock Stadium. “It could be a deal where half the teams pass him and half fail him.”

Sweat had a heart issue when he came out of Mississippi State. He was reported to be diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, which results in thickening of the heart walls. Some later said that diagnosis was incorrect, but the official I spoke to said his team removed Sweat from its draft board. Sweat is a clear example of a player with a medical-related issue who can go on to have a productive and durable career despite the questions of highly trained doctors.

On the field, Latu isn’t great defending the run and has had a few instances in practices in which he has struggled to set the edge.

“He’s not overly strong,” a college scouting director said. “He’s willing and it’s not a lack of effort in the run game. You might want him to add some weight if he’s a three-down player. But there’s so many sub packages, if you’re just drafting him to hunt the quarterback, you’re fine.”

In a draft class that isn’t stocked with elite edge rushers, Latu could have skipped the Senior Bowl and kept his focus strictly on preparing for on-field testing at the combine in Indianapolis.

“I was told I could never play football again,” Latu said. “To me, I can’t get enough of it, especially learning from the best of the best while being out here. Really just gaining knowledge and growing.”

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Members of St. Paul’s teachers’ union cast ballots Thursday to decide whether they’ll walk off the job if they can’t reach a new contract agreement with the school district.

If they approve a strike, it could happen as soon as early March.

Months of negotiations between the St. Paul Federation of Educators and St. Paul Public Schools have failed to result in a new contract. Teachers and non-licensed staff are asking for pay raises and more help with health insurance payments, but the district says it can’t budge with a looming budget deficit of more than $100 million.

If the union approves a strike, it would be the fourth consecutive two-year bargaining cycle in a row where that’s happened. The union went on strike for four days in 2020 and almost went on strike in 2018 and 2022.

“I’m frustrated that we’re here again,” SPFE president Leah VanDassor told reporters outside a union hall as members voted Thursday afternoon. “We’ve been doing strike votes since 2018, we have to bargain every two years and we shouldn’t get to this point.”

10-day countdown if strike approved

Word on the strike vote could come as soon as late Thursday night, VanDassor said.

If membership approves the strike, leadership can then announce their intent to follow through, which VanDassor said could come as early as next week.

Members of the St. Paul Federation of Educators wave during a vote on whether to authorize a strike against the St. Paul Public Schools at the Carpenters Local Union 322 hall in St. Paul on Thursday, Feb. 15, 2024. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)

Once the union files to strike, there’s a 10-day countdown for final negotiations between the union and the district before the strike can begin.

VanDassor said her union feels the school district is “dragging its feet” as other districts in the metro and state, such as the Anoka-Hennepin school district, have reached deals.

There are still two more closed-door mediation sessions scheduled — one on Feb. 23 and one on March 1. In a letter to district staff, SPPS human resources chief Pat Pratt Cook said recent discussions between the district and union had been productive.

“While the SPPS bargaining team does not believe (the) strike vote is necessary to move negotiations along, we acknowledge and respect SPFE’s right to take this collective action,” she wrote. “Regardless of the outcome of the vote, we will continue to negotiate in good faith in an effort to reach a fair and financially sound agreement.”

VanDassor said there has been progress in mediation but there are still issues with wages and benefits.

Thousands cast votes

It was a busy scene Thursday afternoon outside the Carpenters Local Union 322 Hall in St. Paul as thousands of members of the St. Paul Federation of Educators showed up to cast their ballots. Members with signs and clad in red caps streamed by the hundreds in and out of the union hall to cast their ballots and others in vests directed traffic in the busy parking lot.

Among the union members who voted in favor of the strike was Michael Houston, a Harding High School math teacher who has been with the district for 20 years and was Minnesota’s teacher of the year in 2023.

Houston said he backs the strike because he wants to support fellow educators.

“I feel like the district doesn’t really value our voices as educators,” he said. “We’re the ones in the classrooms, were the ones on the front lines.”

State funding, projected budget deficit

Despite the state Legislature increasing funding for education last year, many districts still face shortfalls as federal pandemic aid expires. St. Paul Public Schools faces a $107.7 million deficit in the coming year, according to a February budget projection.

St. Paul Public Schools officials estimate requests from the SPFE could top $112 million, and the district said it was willing to allocate only $12.4 million in additional funding.

Early union proposals included a $7,500 pay bump for all teachers and community service personnel in the district, as well as a 7.5% raise in the second year. They’re also asking for a $5.43-an-hour raise for educational assistants followed by a 7.5% raise in the second year.

St. Paul Federation of Educators president Leah VanDassor talks about the union’s strike authorization vote at the Carpenters Local Union 322 hall in St. Paul on Thursday, Feb. 15, 2024. Members of the union voted Thursday on whether to authorize a strike against the St. Paul Public Schools. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)

Besides wage increases and insurance policy changes, teachers want more funding for student mental health support services and more support for restorative practices — a shift away from traditional discipline like suspensions and moving toward an emphasis on community building.

Union leaders say the district should be able to accommodate their demands as it received an ongoing $56 million increase in state funding tied to inflation.

St. Paul teachers are among the highest-paid in the state of Minnesota. In the 2022-2023 school year, the average teacher salary was $87,250, according to data from the Minnesota Professional Educator and Licensing Standards Board, placing the district in the top 10 statewide.

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