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Big Ten

We have arguably more talent than the 2018-19 elite 8 team which won a share of the Big Ten title.
Overall collection of talent I could agree with that. We don’t haven’t a carsen type on our team but we do have a good system in place with solid players. I may be underestimating us but the blowout losses have me wondering how big ten play will go.

I come to bury the playoffs, not to praise them

Oregon was lucky to beat OSU the first time. OSU lost their starting TE and LT in the game, had 2 turnovers and had a terrible OPI called on Smith on the last drive and still almost won the game.

The second game played out with a more normal game script with no injuries and OSU cruised to the win. OSU was always the better team.

With that said, Oregon did get screwed with the seeding because Ohio State, Oregon and Texas are the 3 best teams in the country after UGA lost their QB.

Oregon should have had Penn St's easy draw of playing Boise St in their first game.

Gene Keady was underpaid

Purdue Salaries (1987) - found this from the Exponent in 1987 while I was looking for something else. A decent salary back then, but basketball coaches have come a long way since. To think that Gene made less than Fred Akers and significantly less than Steven Beering! I imagine that ratio for basketball coaches:college presidents has now flipped (and then some) for major conference schools. Also, love the ad to watch the Purdue-Louisville football game at Quincey's. That was my first football game as a student. We ended up tying the Howard Schnellenberger coached team.
Nick Saban was highly underpaid tbh. The amount of kids who enrolled after Bamas success and the money that was brought in…he should have been paid a lot more!

Big Ten

That’s why it’s still into pick an arbitrary cutoff, you always need context. But I’ll say this … since Underwood got his two seasons to rebuild Groce’s mess and finally got his guys in there (2019-20), Purdue and Illinois have easily been the two best programs overall, and they both appear to be in very stable and healthy spots with the coaching staffs they have in place.

If you look at the top 2 spots in the regular season standings and the top 2 in the BTT since then, you see more Purdue and Illini than anyone else, and our programs very easily have the best overall records, too.

2020 RS: WISC, MSU, UMD (all tied)
2020 BTT: N/A

2021 RS: MICH, ILL
2021 BTT: ILL, OSU

2022 RS: ILL, WISC, PUR
2022 BTT: IOWA, PUR

2023 RS: PUR, IND, NU
2023 BTT: PUR, PSU

2024 RS: PUR, ILL
2024 BTT: ILL, WISC
Yes for sure. Not debating that!

So far, looking like Illinois is better built this year (I hate admitting it 😂)

I come to bury the playoffs, not to praise them

An unrelated bitch- fest to add here- I’m LOLing at Finebaum’s hypocrisy in spectacularly failing to rationalize the almighty SEC’s face plant this year….

Yo, Paulie— You relished the truth that the better teams won in those years when the SEC dominated— why the denial and cowardice now?

Despite Texas’ survival (who is nowhere near a traditional SEC school), the results this season are incontrovertible: The Big Ten is the superior league!
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I come to bury the playoffs, not to praise them

Meh- you’ll never convince me the polls got it right in 1994, when Penn State was head and shoulders above everyone else, or when the pollsters gifted a co- championship as a lame lifetime achievement award to Tom Osborne when Michigan was easily the nation’s best team….

Beyond these and other pollster screwups— In a pure, altruistic, meritocracy-based world, you would be totally correct….

BUT

… there are waay too many boatloads and boatloads of cold hard $$$$ to be made: by both marginally-deserving Indinia- type upstarts getting a taste of the national limelight— and the gargantuan level of social media bliovating by college fans— for this Pandora’s box to ever be closed again!

Big Ten

Four Full seasons. But why stop at 5? Let’s look at 8!
That’s why it’s silly to pick an arbitrary cutoff, you always need context. But I’ll say this … since Underwood got his two seasons to rebuild Groce’s mess and finally got his guys in there (2019-20), Purdue and Illinois have easily been the two best programs overall, and they both appear to be in very stable and healthy spots with the coaching staffs they have in place.

If you look at the top 2 spots in the regular season standings and the top 2 in the BTT since then, you see more Purdue and Illini than anyone else, and our programs very easily have the best overall records, too.

2020 RS: WISC, MSU, UMD (all tied)
2020 BTT: N/A

2021 RS: MICH, ILL
2021 BTT: ILL, OSU

2022 RS: ILL, WISC, PUR
2022 BTT: IOWA, PUR

2023 RS: PUR, IND, NU
2023 BTT: PUR, PSU

2024 RS: PUR, ILL
2024 BTT: ILL, WISC

I come to bury the playoffs, not to praise them

Oregon should be sitting home right now with the national championship trophy after going 13-0 while all the other alleged contenders were taking on losses.

That trophy was true through a good many of our lifetimes, before colleges went pro. The best team with the best record got the national title. Pretenders had to shut up because they hadn’t put up, even when given one last bowl showdown.

No way do 12 college football teams deserve a shot at the national championship after playing 12-game seasons plus conference final exams. That plain sucks. It’s more watered-down than the Titanic. Or the players’ academic transcripts.

What do you tell a team with two black eyes? Nothing. They’ve already been told twice. Anyone with more than one loss deserves no more than bowling in their wife-beater shirts. Three? Slink on to sweet home, Alabama. Pay back your NIL.

Oregon won every time out while Ohio State was gagging twice, including its big league showdown with the Ducks and a massive choke against a five-time loser, yet one rematch win by the Buckeyes over the understandably flat Ducks erased all that. Should an unbeaten team have to face an already conquered victim, a two-loss conference opponent, in the quarterfinal round of some damned playoffs? Hell no.

Want playoffs? Give the unbeaten Big Ten champion a mulligan to make amends for a single loss, fluke or not. Consolation bracket, anyone? Just like the playoffs are now, that would be only fair. And just fair.

Lost members

I was or am hopeful that they have a new moniker on the other site, but you are correct . Hopefully, they will see this and respond. In a blink of the eye, things can change for a lot of people. So many gatherings I took for granted 30 years ago totally unaware of how special those times were and how special they were with family and friends. As I said previously even with the disagreements we share a bond for Purdue and wish for the best and if a poster posts a lot, we get an idea...a perception of that person that lets us know a little about them. Pitbull was another... :(

Pit bull is the most recent one I think. Miss his perspective.
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OT: league competition

Illinois putting up 109 on the road against what has been a pretty good Oregon team is a message to the whole B10 as well as the nation. That Lithuanian freshmen is crazy good. And using the portal well for example, to bring in the Tipton kid, or the well traveled White, has helped them a ton. They have some talent and are well coached. It's a long season, but teams that have to play them twice, look to be at a disadvantage.

I'm glad we play them once and it is at the end of the season. There is time for Purdue to improve and they can regress, but after that statement they are clearly the favorite on 1/3/25.

I'll eat some crow and give Underwood his due as a coach. I was highly skeptical of his build-a-semi-pro-team through the portal approach every year, but he has clearly found a way to succeed with high roster turnover while many coaches have struggled to adapt.

Also love Oregon getting rude welcome to B1G basketball. Someone needs to humble UCLA next.

Lost members

Ha .. Like a "If you're reading this, I'm dead... and IU still sucks" :D
I'm unaware of not liking anyone in the forums. I share more things with some more than others on issues of importance or just general perceptions on a variety of topics, but really think the vast majority of people I find a lot of agreement and that is all you can expect. Each of us has our own understandings based upon our own passive or active experiences that provides differences and yet we all share that common bond. This is a good group of people that I enjoy exchanging ideas with on a variety of topics. I even have Kim whose parents were IU fans and gradually moving towards Purdue seeing ballgames with children having IU sweatshirts and proclaiming child abuse as a result. She is full go Boiler. ...but IU sucks covers a lot of territory . ;)

Lost members

I don't know for sure, but it seems we've lost Boilerbabe and Dakota Girl, as well as the well-respected Illinois fan from the previous group ... and I think some others this year. As I approach 80, life is becoming far more valuable.
I've often thought someone like @Purdue Grad in Texas who is quick and good with the computer would be an ideal person to have a database with our names, address and phone number should we get deathly sick to let him know should we be absent for a while to post an obit and possibly supply addresses if one wanted to send a card to the family but have never offered that perspective to him before. ;)

Braden

Can’t ever remember a game where the team only had 2 turnovers. That’s being focused. 😄

Purdue actually had three last night (zero in the 2nd half), which ties the lowest in program history - done six times previously, including earlier this season against Alabama. And, one of the turnovers last night was a team shot clock violation. Purdue is much harder to beat this way, especially against teams that aren't as efficient in the half-court offense.

Let's see how they do in this department against NW on Sunday - if they come anywhere close to this game, I like their chances.....a lot.
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