Lived in MN for the past 4 years. It is very clearly a Vikings, Twins, Wild town. Literally no one cares about the Timberwolves. You actually find most Gophers fans outside of the cities in smaller towns. Most people I worked with actually went to a MN D2 or D3 school. Not a ton of Gophers alumn. Tons of St Thomas grads and they are very very proud of the fact that they went there….and paid $50k a year.
Certainly an NFL/NHL town. Gophers are in 1st place in the Big 10 west and doing it after pretty much losing all of their running backs to injury that they thought would even play this year. That includes the Big 10's leading rusher from last year who had 160 yards against Ohio State in three quarters in the 1st game of the season before hurting his achilles. Instead of being a big story, the local columnists just talk about the Vikings and rip on Fleck when they do write Gophers. It's weird. If the Gophers hadn't lost so many guys I'd have them big favorites to win out.