The Minnesota Gophers believe they can one day make the College Football Playoff

CHARLOTTE, NC – On Wednesday afternoon, an Arizona State team projected to finish last in the Big 12 nearly reached the final four in the College Football Playoff, falling 39-31 to Texas in a double-overtime thriller in the Peach Bowl.

Twelve days earlier, Indiana, a program with a 3-24 Big Ten record from 2021-23, finished a Cinderella season with an 11-2 record and a 27-17 playoff loss to Notre Dame.

The larger playoff field is a game-changer — and expectation lifter — in college football. The Big Ten, for example, landed four teams in the 12-team field. Trainers are seeing a prize no longer reserved only for the upper crust.

“It’s a real goal for us,” Gophers coach PJ Fleck said Thursday. “When you start seeing some of the teams that weren’t just in it, played in it, everybody has a chance. I’m not saying it can happen every single year, but absolutely (it’s possible). … We talking about it with our players. We talk about how close we were this year.”

Fleck points to the Gophers’ 3-4 record in one-score games this season as how close and how far the Gophers were to that goal. Included in that was a 26-25 home loss to Penn State on Nov. 23 — against the same Nittany Lions team that advanced to the playoff semifinals.

Quinn Carroll, a senior offensive tackle for the Gophers, will play his final collegiate game Friday. He gave a glimpse of the players’ aspirations.

“At the beginning of the season, that was our goal,” Carroll said. “Ever since January, when we knew this was going to be the new rule with a 12-team playoff, with our schedule and with how talented we are … we can play with anybody. Looking back on a lot of games this year, when you lose by one point, two points, three points, you understand that we could have and probably should have been there.”