Reusse: Mark Coyle’s handling of Ben Johnson is his latest mistake in a tenure full of them

The Gophers were playing a two-game series against Kansas during U.S. Bank Stadium’s small March window for baseball. The home team came back from seven runs down and won 10-8 on Tuesday night.

Things didn’t go quite as well during Game 2, although the Gophers communications staff did lead off its game report with a ray of sunshine:

“Junior Easton Richter went 1-for-4 with a double for the Minnesota Golden Gophers in a 29-1 loss to the Kansas Jayhawks on Wednesday.”

Who could have imagined that in fewer than 12 hours that would no longer stand as the silliest passage to be found among fresh material at Gophersports.com?

The glory of Richter’s double was replaced in absurdity at 1:07 a.m. Thursday, when the Gophers sent out a three-paragraph statement from athletic director Mark Coyle announcing that men’s basketball coach Ben Johnson was fired.

The challenge was where to start with Coyle’s silliness:

“The expectation for our program is to compete for championships and, unfortunately, we have not done that in the last four years.”

Let’s check that one: Talking Big Ten, it actually has been the last 28 years since the last championship. And they took that one away from us in 1997 because too many of Clem Haskins’ players turned in the same paper for health class on the menstrual cycle that was written by office worker Jan Gangelhoff.

Counting Clem’s title (as I do loudly), those lofty expectations cited by Coyle have produced three Big Ten titles since Johnny Kundla was a star for the Gophers. And Johnny died in 2017 at age 101.

“We … have one of the best practice facilities in the nation and play games in a historic venue. We have everything that’s needed to be successful."

OK there, tiger, who needs NIL money when you have a spiffy practice gym only a 15-minute walk from the “historic venue” in the cold of winter? And that venue — Williams Arena — is now “prehistoric” in the world of sports arenas.

St. Paul is lobbying for big improvements to a hockey arena that’s 25 years old. NBA owners-to-be Marc Lore and Alex Rodriguez are going to demand a replacement for 35-year-old Target Center. And Mr. Coyle, your dump is about to turn 100.

Everything you need is there, other than money to buy transfers and recruits, a tradition of winning, an appealing arena and a dedicated fan base.

There also should be a mention of the form shown by Coyle in firing people. The first was Tracy Claeys as the football coach after a 9-4 season in 2016.

The embarrassment that time was the Gophers' 17-12 upset of Mike Leach and Washington State in the Holiday Bowl — and there were Coyle and U President Eric Kaler standing next to one another on the sideline, looking on TV as though they were watching a herd of kittens get run over by a semi.

More recently came the firing of Lindsay Whalen, the all-time greatest Minnesota women’s basketball player, getting fired as coach with the Big Ten tournament in town.

And now came Johnson — who never had a chance here with the resources provided to him — met at the airport at midnight, fired, with a brief announcement on the website at 1:07 am.

When it comes to firing coaches, Coyle has the bedside manner of Boris Karloff. OK, normally that would be a dated reference, but this is Gophers men’s basketball, where the average loyalist who remains saw plenty of black-and-white Karloff movies in their youth (as I did at the Fulda theater).

Coyle has promised a much stronger commitment to buying basketball players in the future. He stated that in a Chip Scoggins column before firing Johnson, and will be repeating that claim through the hiring of the new guy.

What keeps being mentioned is the $20.5 million schools such as Minnesota will start paying athletes in major sports next fall. P.J. Fleck is still going to get 70 percent of that to reward football players who help him stay in the middle of the 18-team Big Ten.

If men’s basketball gets half of what’s left, that would be $3.25 million. The Gophers had $1.2 million in NIL money this season, with $500,000 going to Dawson Garcia. He stayed as a bargain, since point guard Elijah Hawkins left for $750,000 at Texas Tech and Pharrel Payne for $650,000 at Texas A&M.

The tab to compete was estimated at $4 million in NIL this season (which didn’t guarantee a winner). That will be over $5 million with the new money infusion for 2025-26.

The next coach will have a slightly better chance than the almost-zero shot that Johnson had to succeed.

As for his final season, my view is that 6-3 stretch in the middle of the Big Ten schedule was one of the most incredible sights in this melancholy first quarter-century for the Gophers.

The talent on this slapped-together collection was closer to Big Sky than Big Ten.

So, congratulations, Ben. You earned that $2.9 million buyout by somehow having a strong five weeks with Dawson and the Who Dat? gang.