Gophers' start has fans excited for football

The Minnesota Golden Gophers have jumped out to a surprising 4-0 start before the Big Ten conference season begins, and people are starting to get excited that the program may have turned a corner. Minnesota is one of only three undefeated teams in the Big Ten -- the other two are Northwestern and Ohio State -- so at this point are nothing but good signs for the Gophers.

Despite the early, tangible evidence that his program is moving forward and creating a new identity, head coach Jerry Kill has been very careful to avoid heaping praise on his team (via Fox Sports North):

"I think we've moved it forward for the period of time we've been here. But with that being said we're nowhere close to where we need to be. Nowhere close. I don't do so much with wins and losses, but I think we're certainly better than we were a year ago. We'll find out how much better over the next eight weeks and how much they're going to improve. If we stay the same, results won't be very good. We've gotta continue to make progress."

The Gophers are set to take on Iowa (Sept. 30), Northwestern (Oct. 13) and Wisconsin (Oct. 20) in their first three conference games.