COLUMBUS, Ohio — When the Gophers’ first Big Ten road game disintegrated into a 42-3 beatdown at the hands of No. 1 Ohio State on Saturday, head coach P.J. Fleck went into his own version of blowout mode at Ohio Stadium.

As the game’s final minutes took excruciatingly long to play out, Fleck covered his mouth to disguise what he said to star safety Koi Perich on the sideline. It was a big-picture chat that he preferred to not have lip-read.

“It was just conversations about leadership and how to respond to this and moving forward,” Fleck said postgame. “It wasn’t about the game. It was about moving forward from here. The demands of the leadership moving forward. It’s critical for any team. You need to be able to respond to the things that. When you do get beat up in a fight, you’ve got to

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