Minnesota Golden Gophers Find Out TV Times for 2024

© Douglas DeFelice-USA TODAY Sports

The Big Ten Conference, along with their network partners, announced some of the upcoming game times and what networks would be carrying the games on Thursday. The Minnesota Golden Gophers found out about four of their games, the first three of the year and their last game against Wisconsin. 

Minnesota is coming off a rough year after going 6-7 overall and 3-6 in conference play. The Gophers were able to get to six wins after beating Bowling Green in the Quick Lane Bowl. Minnesota only received an invite to the bowl game because not enough teams were bowl-eligible.

Tough Start for the Golden Gophers

Coach PJ Fleck will have lots of work to do if he hopes to improve over last season but unfortunately for Fleck, the Big Ten did Minnesota no favors with the schedule. After the first three games of the season, the Gophers open B1G play with Iowa at home before they head on the road to taken on Michigan. They then bring in USC before hitting the road again to play UCLA in Los Angeles. If that four-game stretch wasn’t bad enough the Gophers end the season with Penn State at home and Wisconsin in Madison. Minnesota needs to win all three of their non-conference games if they want to make a bowl game again.

The Gophers open the season playing a Power Four team from the Atlantic Coast Conference as theNorth Carolina Tar Heels head to Hunting Bank Stadium at 8 p.m. EST on Aug. 29 with the game being televised on FOX. This year’s game will be the second leg of a home-and-home series, with North Carolina winning the 2023 meeting 31-13. The 2024 game will mark just the second time the two teams have met.

Minnesota stays home in Week 2 and brings in the Rams from Rhode Island. This will be the first time these two teams have met. The Rams finished in seventh place last season in the Coastal Athletic Association Football Conference and had a record of 6-5. The Gophers and Rams will kick off at noon EST on Sept. 7 and Peacock will have the game.

In their last week before starting B1G play, the Gophers welcome the Nevada Wolf Pack in from the Mountain West Conference. Like the Rams in Week 2, this will be the first time these teams will face off.  The game will kick off at 3:30 p.m. EST on Sept. 14 and will air on the Big Ten Network.

Battle for Paul Bunyan's Axe

Fleck's team will be heading to Wisconsin the last week of the season for their annual battle for Paul Bunyan’s Axe. The border battle will kick off at noon EST on Nov. 29 on CBS. This will be the 134th meeting between these two teams with Wisconsin holding the all-time series lead 63-62-8. Wisconsin won the game last year 28-14, and since 2000 has dominated the series going 19-5.

This will be the first year that the top two teams in the B1G will play for the conference championship, after the elimination of divisions. That change will make it very difficult for Minnesota to get to Indianapolis.