So Purdue incurred a tough loss at Minnesota tonight. Wait, I'm sorry, Purdue incurred a tough "loss" at Minnesota tonight.
There are a lot of ways to look at this "loss," one in which those who believe Nevada was a real gut-twister last year were just told by the Minnesota game to hold its beer.
The first way to look at this is the obvious: Purdue got absolutely jobbed. It did. There's no way around that. There's a reason the whole college football world is talking about Purdue tonight, for all the wrong reasons.
It got absolutely hosed by what was quite possibly the worst call I've ever seen in a college football game, and I've seen a lot of mind-blowers. As for the game of football, period, the only penalty or non-penalty this bad and this consequential I've seen involved the Saints of New Orleans a few years back.
Purdue will be getting an apology Monday morning from the Big Ten, because no reasonable person can watch that play and find credible offensive pass interference. Hell, you're hard-pressed to find credible contact, let alone interference, and if a mild, useless swipe of the arm is offensive PI, then there has yet to be a clean completed pass made this season or any season. It was an absurd call, and it cost Purdue a win. It just did. You know it, I know it, P.J. Fleck knows it, the contrarian trolls of the Internet knows it. The official who made the call knew it as soon as he saw the replay. The Purdue-Minnesota officials were the laughingstock of college football tonight.
That's one way to look at it, and if that's your preferred lens to view this "loss" through, you're right to.
The other way to look at it is this: Purdue's defense was helpless for three-and-a-half quarters to stop a Minnesota offense that shouldn't have been taken lightly by any means, but also shouldn't have looked like the '80s 49ers either. Bob Diaco's defense had no answers for most of this game, and that should be deeply, deeply troubling for Purdue. It's hard to explain, because that defense hasn't been great the first three games, but it's been good enough to win with. Its front took some hits with George Karlaftis still limited, Anthony Watts out and DaMarcus Mitchell lost in-game, but nevertheless this was profoundly disappointing.
If you believe that's why Purdue "lost" — that it never should have come down to the end of the fourth quarter at all — then you're right to.
Yet another way to look at it this: This offense, as good as it was, and these special teams, just simply coughed up too many opportunities. The blown end-of-half scoring sequences — one touchdown juggled and the other simply pilfered — were one thing, and it's hard to blame Purdue for the second, because the catch was good, same way Kenneth Major's game-sealing INT at Nevada last year was probably good, but the special teams were another. Two highly makeable field goals gone sideways were nothing short of a disaster.
Purdue reached the red zone seven times and came away scoreless thrice. Three field goals, or just one more touchdown, or any combination thereof pretty much, win you this game.
Opportunities came, and opportunities went, wasting Rondale Moore's return, David Bell's continued brilliance, and a performance from Jack Plummer that should have resulted in a W and Big Ten Offensive Player-of-the-Week consideration come Monday. The game-winning drive he engineered that didn't count was really something.
Instead, the most maddening L one can probably imagine.
So there it is.
The game shouldn't have come down to the final minute, even though Minnesota deserves credit for running roughshod over the Boilermaker defense for most of the game.
But the game did come down to the final minute, and in that final minute, Purdue got the shaft, plain and simple. The apology that'll come Monday, however the Big Ten wants to handle it, will offer no consolation, because this was a big game as it pertained to the trajectory of Purdue's season. There's only so many of these this season and this one really mattered.
You can't say definitively that Purdue played well enough that it should have won, but you also can't argue that Purdue didn't do enough that it should have won.
What a punch in the gut this "loss" was.
There are a lot of ways to look at this "loss," one in which those who believe Nevada was a real gut-twister last year were just told by the Minnesota game to hold its beer.
The first way to look at this is the obvious: Purdue got absolutely jobbed. It did. There's no way around that. There's a reason the whole college football world is talking about Purdue tonight, for all the wrong reasons.
It got absolutely hosed by what was quite possibly the worst call I've ever seen in a college football game, and I've seen a lot of mind-blowers. As for the game of football, period, the only penalty or non-penalty this bad and this consequential I've seen involved the Saints of New Orleans a few years back.
Purdue will be getting an apology Monday morning from the Big Ten, because no reasonable person can watch that play and find credible offensive pass interference. Hell, you're hard-pressed to find credible contact, let alone interference, and if a mild, useless swipe of the arm is offensive PI, then there has yet to be a clean completed pass made this season or any season. It was an absurd call, and it cost Purdue a win. It just did. You know it, I know it, P.J. Fleck knows it, the contrarian trolls of the Internet knows it. The official who made the call knew it as soon as he saw the replay. The Purdue-Minnesota officials were the laughingstock of college football tonight.
That's one way to look at it, and if that's your preferred lens to view this "loss" through, you're right to.
The other way to look at it is this: Purdue's defense was helpless for three-and-a-half quarters to stop a Minnesota offense that shouldn't have been taken lightly by any means, but also shouldn't have looked like the '80s 49ers either. Bob Diaco's defense had no answers for most of this game, and that should be deeply, deeply troubling for Purdue. It's hard to explain, because that defense hasn't been great the first three games, but it's been good enough to win with. Its front took some hits with George Karlaftis still limited, Anthony Watts out and DaMarcus Mitchell lost in-game, but nevertheless this was profoundly disappointing.
If you believe that's why Purdue "lost" — that it never should have come down to the end of the fourth quarter at all — then you're right to.
Yet another way to look at it this: This offense, as good as it was, and these special teams, just simply coughed up too many opportunities. The blown end-of-half scoring sequences — one touchdown juggled and the other simply pilfered — were one thing, and it's hard to blame Purdue for the second, because the catch was good, same way Kenneth Major's game-sealing INT at Nevada last year was probably good, but the special teams were another. Two highly makeable field goals gone sideways were nothing short of a disaster.
Purdue reached the red zone seven times and came away scoreless thrice. Three field goals, or just one more touchdown, or any combination thereof pretty much, win you this game.
Opportunities came, and opportunities went, wasting Rondale Moore's return, David Bell's continued brilliance, and a performance from Jack Plummer that should have resulted in a W and Big Ten Offensive Player-of-the-Week consideration come Monday. The game-winning drive he engineered that didn't count was really something.
Instead, the most maddening L one can probably imagine.
So there it is.
The game shouldn't have come down to the final minute, even though Minnesota deserves credit for running roughshod over the Boilermaker defense for most of the game.
But the game did come down to the final minute, and in that final minute, Purdue got the shaft, plain and simple. The apology that'll come Monday, however the Big Ten wants to handle it, will offer no consolation, because this was a big game as it pertained to the trajectory of Purdue's season. There's only so many of these this season and this one really mattered.
You can't say definitively that Purdue played well enough that it should have won, but you also can't argue that Purdue didn't do enough that it should have won.
What a punch in the gut this "loss" was.
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