Golden Nugz

A quick look at some news and notes that have broken over the last week

It’s summer. The offseason is here. But news does keep leaking in. So here is the most recent version of the Golden Nugz with some of the stories you may have missed from the last week.

Gopher Men’s Track Finishes 7th at NCAA Championships

We updated you on the results through the first day of the men’s competition last week where Kostas Zaltos won the Hammer Throw NCAA Championship and Minnesota sat in first place through the first six events of the Championships. Minnesota has two more entries in their respective finals on Friday where the 4×100 relay team would finish in 7th place and Hakeem Ford would finish in 10th place in the triple jump. The Gophers finished with 25 team points and trailed only Texas A&M, USC, Arkansas, Auburn, New Mexico and Oklahoma. It was the best finish for the men since they won the NCAA Championship in 1948.

Dawn Plitzuweit Gets an Extension

The Minnesota Golden Gophers announced that women’s basketball coach Dawn Plitzuweit received a two year extension that will now keep her in charge of the Gopher women through the end of the 2031-32 season. Additionally if she leads the Gopher women to the NCAA Tournament in 2026, she gets an extra year on her deal through the end of the 2032-33 season. Plitzuweit will recieve a raise of roughly 7 percent to bring her base salary to $900,000 from $800,000 last season for 2025-26, with annual increases of $30,000 for each additional season. She will rank 9th out of the 17 schools who announce coaches salaries in the Big Ten.

Minnesota is 45-27 overall under Plitzuweit, and she has led the Gophers to back-to-back postseason championship-game berths for the first time in program history (2024 WNIT, 2025 WBIT).

Gopher Women Add Finau Tonga to Complete Roster

Coach Plitzuweit added her 15th and final roster member last week with the announcement that San Jose transfer forward Finau Tonga will play for the Gophers in 2025-26. She will be a grad transfer and will have one year of eligibility/

Tonga is listed as a 6’2 forward and started 16 games for the Spartans last season. One of the most efficient players in the country, she scored at a 58% clip averaging 8.7 points per game. She was the Spartan’s second-leading rebounder with 5.2 per game. Prior to two seasons with SJSU she played wo years at Tonga spent two seasons at Salt Lake Community College and played one season at St. Mary’s.

She should be another big bench option behind Sophie Hart and give the Gophers additional depth. The roster is now complete with the full 15 players as shown below.

Gopher Hockey Announces full Non-Conference Schedule

The Gophers announced their full slate of non-conference opponents and dates last week. Minnesota will open the season at home against former WCHA foe Michigan Tech. It will be the first meeting between the Gophers and Huskies since the end of the WCHA in 2012.

Minnesota then will play a Thursday/Friday series against perennial power Boston College at 3M Arena At Mariucci the following week.

The Gophers hit the road for the first time traveling up to Grand Forks for a series at North Dakota before returning back home to close out October with a home series against Minnesota-Duluth.

After a pair of Big Ten series to be announced, the Gophers close out the home portion of the non-conference schedule by hosting Long Island for the first time ever on Nov. 14-15. The Sharks are in their sixth season of NCAA Division I men’s hockey.

The final non-conference matchup of the regular season will take place either Nov. 28 or Nov. 29 (depending on the upcoming NHL schedule announcement) at Ball Arena in Denver where the Gophers will face the Denver Pioneers in the annual U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame game as they meet for the first time since March of 2013.

Minnesota also announced they will play an exhibition game once against in Bemidji against Bemidji State on January 2nd. It will be in the middle of the US World Junior Championships that will be taking place in Minneapolis and St. Paul this winter.

The full schedule with dates:

Oct 3-4 vs. Michigan Tech

Oct 9-10 vs. Boston College

Oct 17-18 @ North Dakota

Oct 24-25 vs UMD

Nov 14-15 vs. Long Island

Nov 28 or 29 @ Denver (Hockey Hall of Fame game)

January 2 @ Bemidji State (Exhibition game)

Gopher Men’s Basketball Adds a Pair of Walk-ons

The Gophers announced a pair of guard walk-on’s earlier this week who will join the roster for next season.

Maximus Gizzi is a 6’1 grad student guard who played four years at Huntington University and Marian University. With Huntington University last year, Gizzi was the Crossroads League’s Defender of the Year, an All-Defensive Team honoree and an honorable mention. Before his time at Huntington, Gizzi was with Marian University from 2020 to 2024, where he was an All-Crossroads League Second Team selection, All-Crossroads Defensive Team selection, and a three-time NAIA Scholar-Athlete.

Max Lorenson is a 6’2 freshman guard from Eden Prairie. He finished his high school career as the fourth all-time leading scorer in Eden Prairie HS history with 1,568 career points. He was a three-time all-conference selection, a two-year team captain and a four-year varsity letter winner. Lorenson averaged over 26 points per game as a senior with the Eagles, bettering his 17.2 points his junior year. He led the Eagles in scoring in his sophomore, junior, and senior seasons.

Minnesota now has a full 15-man roster as they begin summer workouts and get ready for the fall.

Volleyball Adds a pair of Highly Ranked Recruits

Monday was the first day that the class of 2017 could commit to schools in NCAA volleyball and the Gophers added a pair of nationally ranked players.

Tessa Larkin is a 6’1 outside hitter from Phoenix, Arizona and is ranked the #6 player in the nation by PrepVolleyball and the #8 national prospect by PrepDig. Larkin was invited to the USA U19 camp this summer which was coached my Minnesota head coach Keegan Cook.

Minnesota also got a commitment from setter McKinley Moser from Waverly, Nebraska. She is a 5’9 inch setter and is ranked the #118th player in the country.