When PJ first arrived on the University of Minnesota campus in 2017, open-to-public practices happened more frequently. That ended in 2020, and the Gophers have been very stingy with bringing them back, ever since.
In 2024, the Gopher football team had one open-to-public practice on its fall schedule. That practice came and went Saturday night, along with an annual diaper drive, one of many reoccurring charity events that PJ Fleck holds in very high regard.
In fact, my educated opinion says that this open-to-public practice only happened because of the annual diaper drive. Fans come to the fall diaper drive, so they can watch open practice. Without the practice, there is no formidable diaper drive.
Minnesota Gophers open-to-public practices are rare occurrence these days
Why are these open practices becoming less and less frequent? ( Of note: The spring game was cancelled back in April, too.) We don’t know for sure… but again, the puzzle pieces aren’t that difficult to put together.
In all likelihood, PJ’s paranoia stems from the Michigan cheating scandal. According to the allegations , Michigan Wolverines former assistant, Connor Stalions (along with multiple other co-conspirators), was illegally filming the sidelines of football opponents, in an effort to steal their plays.
The Big Ten’s original statement (from October, 2023) said there were two teams who brought the Michigan sideline spying concerns to the attention of conference officials. As we wrote back then , there’s a pretty decent chance one of those teams was Minnesota.
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How do we know that is why PJ Fleck is paranoid about holding open-to-public practices? We don’t. But what if I told you that both fans and media members who attended Saturday’s open practice were not allowed to record anything, or even have their phones out? Because that’s what happened.
Gophers were spying on fans during practice, to avoid being spied on
The Gophers were very serious about enforcing their no-recording policy, too. According to Ryan Burns (247Sports), there were members of the Minnesota football staff whose only job that evening was to scan the fan bleachers (with binoculars) for anyone who might be recording something.
I’d also tell you that Minnesota had a staff member tonight with some binoculars looking up into the stands to make sure no one was sitting there recording. Thanks, Connor Stalions.
Ryan Burns – 247Sports
That was during the Gophers ONE open-to-public practice this year. And again, that is expected to be the only such practice this fall.
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We may never know for sure whether or not the Minnesota Gophers were one of the teams that Michigan was caught spying on, or if Fleck & Co were one of the two teams that turned the Wolverines in, originally. But one thing is for sure, Fleck is clearly acting as if it happened to them.
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