Grace Grocholski had 18 points and 11 rebounds, and Mara Braun added 16 points and four steals as Minnesota rolled past Drake, 68-43, Sunday afternoon at the Knapp Center in Des Moines.

Finau Tonga scored 12 points off of the bench for Minnesota, which improved to 9-3 and won its third straight nonconference game since a heartbreaking, double-overtime loss to No. 7 Maryland in their Big Ten opener on Dec. 10.

Maggie Taylor led Drake (2-9, 1-0 Missouri Valley) with nine points as the Bulldogs shot only 29 percent from the field and turned the ball over 21 times, leading to 24 Gophers points.

Drake took an early 15-11 lead before the Gophers ended the first quarter with a 13-4 run. A 12-0 run early in the second quarter gave Minnesota a 36-19 lead, and the Bulldogs never got within single digits again.

The Gophers started the fourth quarter with a 12-0 run that put the game away. Brylee Glenn’s layup put Minnesota up 65-36 with 7:12 remaining.

The Gophers are off until Dec. 29, when they travel to Indiana to resume Big Ten play. Tipoff is set for 5 p.m. CST.

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J.J. McCarthy and Caleb Williams were selected nine picks apart at the top of the 2024 NFL draft class, and nearly two years later one wonders what might have happened for McCarthy had he not missed what has officially become his rookie season.

With a year of NFL football under his belt, Williams, the No. 1 overall pick, is a burgeoning star leading the Bears to heights unseen in Chicago for years; McCarthy, picked 10th by the Vikings and playing his first NFL season, is at best an enigma.

This was thrown into stark relief this weekend, because Williams unleashed a pair of signature plays on Saturday night to rally the Bears past Green Bay and into sole possession of the NFC North lead. Already, the 22-16 victory has been dubbed by some as the NFL’s game of the year.

Less than 24 hours later, McCarthy’s season might have ended on what threatens to be his signature play in Minnesota — a sack with less than 20 seconds left in the first half that resulted in a fumble recovered and returned for a touchdown by former Gophers safety Tyler Nubin.

That pulled the nearly dead Giants to within 13-10 at the half, and Max Brosmer led the Vikings to a 16-13 victory on Will Reichard’s fourth-quarter field goal.

“These guys have continued to fight and find a way to win three in a row,” head coach Kevin O’Connell said.

For most outside the locker room, it didn’t feel like a win — let alone a three-game winning streak. That’s because a) the Vikings aren’t going to the playoffs and b) after McCarthy played well in victories over Cleveland and Dallas, he was wonky enough Sunday to cast additional doubt on his viability as an NFL-caliber quarterback.

And his season is likely done because of a right hand injury.

Afterward, O’Connell praised McCarthy’s progress and was complimentary of the way he played against the Giants.

“He’s looked like he has really found a place of decisiveness, of ownership of the offense,” O’Connell said. “So, yes, it’s a bummer.”

McCarthy was betrayed Sunday by some shoddy receiving from Jordan Addison — who dropped a discretely placed pass in the end zone — and Jalen Nailor, who tipped two catchable, if not perfect, passes into the hands of Giants defensive backs Paulsen Adebo and Jevon Holland.

Holland ran his interception 92 yards for a touchdown, only to have it called back because of a neutral zone infraction by teammate Abdul Carter. Otherwise, the Vikings would have been down 10-3, and McCarthy would have been statistically responsible for two turnovers that turned into touchdowns.

O’Connell supplied something of an alibi for the fumble, McCarthy’s sixth in nine games. Apparently, McCarthy hurt the hand on the previous drive, which ended when the quarterback scrambled 12 yards for a touchdown.

McCarthy, his coach said, didn’t know the hand was badly injured. On the ensuing drive, O’Connell said, “We ran the ball, and then tried to throw a simple receiver screen, and I’m not sure he was even able to grip the ball.”

One wonders why O’Connell had McCarthy throwing with 24 seconds left in the half with a 13-3 lead, but with the playoffs out of the picture, he probably wanted to see what the quarterback could do in an end-of-half situation. If that was the case, McCarthy responded in the worst possible way, injured hand or not.

So, now what?

It has been suggested in this space that this season can’t be a referendum on McCarthy’s future in Minnesota, and the sentiment remains. The young signal caller has made a lot of good plays for the Vikings this season; had last season been his first, maybe he would be playing a little more like Caleb Williams in 2025.

But after 11 touchdown passes against 12 interceptions, six fumbles, a 4-4 record and three significant injuries — four if you count the preseason game injury that ended his 2024 season before it started — there are a ton of questions to be answered.

From here, especially if McCarthy doesn’t play again this season, he hasn’t been good enough to have already earned the starting job in 2026. Unless this team decides to take a left turn into a rebuild, the Vikings must acquire a viable option before training camp begins.

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Along with advising youth hockey players to never pass the puck in front of their own net, kids are taught from a young age that you never want to give up a goal in the first or last minute of a period.

Allow an early goal and it sets a bad tone for the remaining 19 minutes. Allow a late goal, and you have to head to the locker room with the idea that “we’re losing” in your heads.

So even though the Minnesota Wild and Edmonton Oilers played 40 more minutes of hockey on Saturday afternoon, the goal scored by Ryan Hartman with 7.2 seconds left in the opening period ended up being the game-winner, and clearly put some bad thoughts in the Oilers’ heads in the moment.

“Anytime you get a late goal in a period, that’s always a big momentum shift, especially if they’re the ones who scored last,” Hartman said, after he carried the puck into the offensive zone, passed back to defenseman Jake Middleton, then got a pass back from Middleton to execute a picture-perfect give-and-go play.

“So (we) went from coming into the period tied, to coming out of the period ahead, so, yeah, it’s a lot easier playing ahead,” said Hartman, who came into Sunday’s showdown with Colorado having scored four times in the previous four games.

“Usually when we talk about him playing his best hockey is when he’s moving his feet and skating. His puck decisions have been strong,” Wild coach John Hynes said this week, calling Hartman a “willing skater.”

His two previous goals came in tight on the goalie, and with a solid frame that makes him hard to move away from the crease, Hynes said that Hartman is most valuable in the vicinity of the opposing goalie.

“I think he’s getting to the interior of the ice from an offensive standpoint, which is where he’s strong,” Hynes added. “And I think when he’s playing at the top of his game again, I think his puck decisions and his puck play set (him) and his linemates up for success.”

The win over Edmonton marked the 23rd time in 36 games in which the Wild scored first.

Briefly

Ben Jones’ stint with the Iowa Wild was akin to a cameo appearance. Sent down to the Wild’s AHL team on Friday after four players previously on injured reserve were, Jones was recalled to the NHL club on Sunday to add some forward depth. Jones, who has played 20 games at the NHL level this season, skated for Iowa on Saturday night in Illinois as they beat the Chicago Wolves 1-0 in a shootout. Jones was held scoreless on his shootout attempt.

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PHOENIX — The Gophers football program is working towards promoting C.J. Robbins to defensive line coach, the Pioneer Press learned on Sunday.

Head coach P.J. Fleck has a track record of elevating existing coaches on his staff to bigger roles and is expected to do so again with Robbins, who has been the U’s rush ends coach since February.

Robbins would replace Dennis Dottin-Carter, who was dismissed as D-line coach Dec. 5 after one season in charge of that position group. Over the last few weeks, Robbins has been the acting defensive line coach going into the Rate Bowl against New Mexico at Chase Field at 3:30 p.m. Friday.

In turn, the Gophers will look externally to full Robbins’ current gig. Minnesota has another vacancy at outside linebackers/nicklebacks after Kevin Kane left Friday to become Purdue’s defensive coordinator.

Robbins was a graduate assistant at Minnesota in 2020-21 before coaching stints at South Dakota (2022), Kent State (2023-24) and briefly at Central Michigan (2025). He played at Northwestern and became a captain of the Wildcats. He played in 40 games, with 62 total tackles and three sacks from 2013-16.

The Gophers’ current staff had a bevy of assistants who have climbed the ladder under Fleck at Minnesota, most recently Danny Collins going from safeties coach to defensive coordinator for 2025 and former U linebacker Mariano Sori-Marin, who’s route has been defensive analyst (2023) to nickels/assistant linebackers (2024) to full linebackers coach (2025).

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