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Welcome to this week's “BOILING OVER,” GoldandBlack.com’s weekly information-clearinghouse and analysis column meant for our site members and site members only. We appreciate everyone’s cooperation in helping us keep what is sometimes delicate or proprietary information confined to this message board. This feature allows us to be more flexible in our reporting, to our readers' benefit, and we lose that ability if we can't keep this feature secure and the value of our site's membership at its peak. Additionally, we address recruiting and hiring processes in-depth and often without filter in this feature and we do it behind a subscription-protected barrier for a reason, in hopes of avoiding situations where our reporting can impact the recruiting process, which can happen occasionally.
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PURDUE FOOTBALL RECRUITING
Huge weekend for Purdue ...
• Among the visitors will be each of the Boilermakers' two newest commitments: 2022 wide receiver Zion Steptoe and 2023 QB Rickie Collins up from Baton Rouge. The usual smattering of commitments will be in Ross-Ade Stadium, too: Joe Strickland, Brady Allen and the whole crew. JP Deeter's coming up from Texas and Kentrell Marks down from Cleveland, among others.
• Coming with Collins will be newly offered four-star 2023 corner Jordan Matthews, the QB's high school teammate.
• 2023 corner Jeremiah Collins of Louisville Male has an early offer..
* Elijah Reed — another Louisville DB — too. He'll be at the game Saturday, as well. He’s a 2022.
Purdue would seem to still be very much in the market for a corner, which we thought Jordan Buchanan might have filled, but guess not.
• Another game-day visit for West Lafayette's Mo Omonode, who still has a live offer from Purdue, though the guess here is that Purdue would like an answer sooner rather than later.
• Luke Burgess — the 2023 offensive tackle from New Palestine — will be back for his second game-day Purdue visit of the season. He has an offer.
There will be many more, but assuming all these guys show up, that's quite a list.
PURDUE BASKETBALL RECRUITING
The Ohio guard and long-time target will be back for his second visit since the recruiting world started spinning again. He's been offered but we've heard mixed things about where Purdue stands here, everything from "not likely" to "yeah maybe" to "there aren't enough scholarships." One thing to make note of is that Purdue definitely wants guard Dravyn Gibbs-Lawhorn and Purdue doesn't have many scholarships for that class.
Purdue did keep up appearances with Rice during the fall evaluation period, as Terry Johnson went to his school to watch him. Not sure Matt Painter did, but he may have.
It's still difficult to foresee Koch going anywhere but Iowa, but he'll be back for his second Purdue visit this weekend. He's given Iowa, Purdue and IU equal time this fall when it's come to visits.
That he has not yet committed to the Hawkeyes — his dad played there — suggests perhaps some open-ness and the possibility exists this could become a national sort of recruitment and pry him open even further, but this could also just be a recruiting joyride for the 2024 forward.
He is worth the effort.
Not counting Myles Colvin, who's just sort of part of the landscape now, Purdue had one uncommitted visitor at last weekend's scrimmages: Franklin 2024 guard Micah Davis. (BN)
PURDUE FOOTBALL
Meant to do this during the bye week, but a bit of a PFF data dump on Purdue through six games ...
• Purdue currently ranks 25th nationally In PFF's grading system in tackling efficiency, grading just an eyelash behind Alabama. To editorialize, that's unbelievable.
• Purdue is 36th nationally with its pass-rushing grade. That's a credit to George Karlaftis but also the new system and Brad Lambert's play-calling.
(On a side note: Did you see what Purdue did on Jalen Graham's near-sack right after the TJ Sheffield turnover? It slid Karlaftis inward upon the snap and that drew the tackle inside and allowed Graham to blow off the corner to create the sack. A good example of how they've weaponized No. 5.)
• Purdue's worst unit grades come in run-blocking and surprisingly run defense.
• Purdue's two highest-graded offensive players are David Bell and Aidan O'Connell. Greg Long is its highest-graded offensive lineman. Purdue's second-best graded wide receiver? T.J. Sheffield.
• Aidan O'Connell's grade on play-action drop-backs is pristine. He's 29-46 for 412 yards and a touchdown on those snaps and Purdue averages nine yards per attempt.
Purdue is using playaction on roughly a third of their snaps.
Throwing deep, his grades even better; he's 10-of-20 for 303 yards and a touchdown and an interception on those 20-plus-yard throws.
• I've never seen a grade on PFF as high as David Bell's on 20-plus-yard throws. I don't know what perfect is on their scale, but this might be it. Bell has been targeted 12 times deep and caught eight for 290 yards and two scores.
Milton Wright grades very well in this category too. He's caught three of six deep targets for 75 yards.
• George Karlaftis is Purdue's No. 1-graded defender, with Branson Deen second among high-volume-snaps players. The separation between those two and everyone else is pretty significant. Karlaftis has accounted for 30 pressures this season and Deen 18 on just 240 snaps.
• Purdue has generated eight quarterback pressures from its secondary or secondary-adjacent players, which is my way of cooking the numbers to include Jalen Graham.
• Cam Allen and Graham have been docked for missing seven and six tackles, respectively, weighing down the grades of two of Purdue's most impactful back-half players.
PURDUE BASKETBALL RECRUITING
According to his father, Purdue commitment Braden Smith has been cleared for full activity after a months-long recovery from surgery on his foot. That was always the expectation, for him to be cleared well in advance of his senior season, and that's what's happened. (BN)
GOLD AND BLACK LIVE
Join us tomorrow at 2 p.m. for our 'Gold and Black LIVE' show with guests Buddy Baker as well as Evan Boudreaux and Dr. Tim Ratliff to discuss this weekend's Hammer Down Cancer game.
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