Minnesota Sports Roundup: Vikings head into the bye with some momentum after sweeping Detroit

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Minnesota's Adrian Peterson rushed for 171 yards and a touchdown as the Vikings leveled the Lions 34-24. Christian Ponder threw for 221 yards and two scores as Minnesota swept the season series from Detroit to move to 6-and-4. Jarius Wright and Kyle Rudolph each had a scoring catch in the win. Calvin Johnson made 12 catches for 207 yards and a touchdown for Detroit, which fell to 4-and-5. Matthew Stafford passed for 329 yards, three scores and an interception in defeat. Minnesota now enters a bye week and will play at Chicago on November 25th.

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Minnesota's Donnell Kirkwood rushed for 152 yards and two touchdowns as the University of Minnesota cruised past Illinois 17-3 on Saturday in Champaign. The Golden Gophers have won two-of-three to improve to 6-and-4 on the season and 2-and-4 in the Big Ten. They are now eligible to play in a postseason bowl game

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St. Thomas, Bethel, and St. Scholastica each earned bids into the NCAA Division II national football championship tournament. The Tommies will host St. Norbert this Saturday in a first-round game, while Bethel travels to Concordia-Chicago. St Scholastica opens tourney play at UW-Oshkosh on Saturday.

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Minnesota State-Mankato and Minnesota-Duluth have been selected to play in the NCAA Division II national football championship tournament. The Mavericks earned the region's No. 1 seed and earned a first-round bye. MSU-Mankato will play on November 24th against the winner of this Saturday's Northwest Missouri State-Harding winner. Minnesota-Duluth will play at Missouri Western in an opening round game this Saturday in St. Joseph, Missouri. The winner of that game will take on Henderson on November 24th.

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The University of Minnesota women's basketball team won its own tournament with a 75-60 win over Villanova yesterday at Williams Arena. The Golden Gophers received 20 points from Micaella Riche, who made the all-tournament team. Sophomore Rachel Banham scored 13 points and was named the tourney's MVP Minnesota is 2-and-0 and will host another tournament this coming weekend, with an opening game against Ohio on Saturday.

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The Minnesota basketball team hosts Toledo tonight at Williams Arena. The Golden Gophers opened up the season with a 72-36 rout of American University on Friday. The Gophers will play their first four games at home before taking on Duke on Thanksgiving Day in the Bahamas.

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The Timberwolves wrap up their brief two-game road trip tonight in Dallas against the Mavericks. The T'wolves are coming off an 87-80 loss in Chicago on Saturday. Minnesota sits at 4-and-2 on the season. After tonight's contest, the Wolves will start a three-game homestand on Wednesday.

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Timberwolves forward Chase Budinger will under surgery to repair a torn later meniscus of his left knee. The operation will take place later this week and a timetable for Budinger will be set following the procedure. Similar injuries have taken between two- and six-weeks from which to recover. Budinger injured his knee in Saturday's loss to the Bulls. He is averaging 11.8-points per game for Minnesota so far this season.

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The NHL and Players Association continued labor negotiations Sunday. The two sides met for little over an hour. After four straight days of talks, members of the league and union held an informal lunch on Saturday before resuming labor discussions on Sunday. The NHL locked out the players after the collective bargaining agreement expired in September. Games through the end of November have already been canceled, as well as the Winter Classic on New Year's Day. The Wild were to have played at New Jersey last night.

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Think back on Minnesota football greats: Tarkenton, Nagurski -- Heffelfinger? On this day in 1892, Walter "Pudge" Heffelfinger from Minneapolis became the first pro football player in history, getting paid 500-dollars to play as a "ringer" for the Allegeny Athletic Association. Up to that point, all football players were paid for expenses only. His team beat Pittsburgh 4-0 and Heffelfinger eventually hung up his spikes to coach the Gopher football team and run for Congress.

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