My thoughts on the Illinois game below. Probably the most boring game I have ever attended. Two defenses that were content with letting the opposing offense try to play the short game and utilize each down to get downfield. I like defensive matchups but this was rough.
QBs - This position has obviously and understandably been hashed over and over again this week so I am going to try to focus on the actual performance rather than the QBs' and their abilities or limitations. Purdue started this game wanting to exploit Illinois' overall defensive strategy, which made me shudder because it was essentially Diaco-fense. Bend but don't break by leaning on 3-4 guys as pass rushers, having rangy LBs (normally Hansen but it was Barnes this game) play sideline to sideline and have the secondary in zone coverage.
On the first drive it was clear Purdue was going to simply take what Illinois gave them. Plummer was 9-11 for 67 yards. All but one of those passes was within 5-7 yards of the LOS. It was smart because Illinois corners were lined up 10 yards off the LOS and took steps back on each snap. The bend but don't break strategy worked for Illinois in this game though unlike Diaco-fense last year. More on that shortly. In the second drive it became clear that Plummer was going to have to go downfield a little more. Illinois' corners were still lined up far off the LOS but were stepping forward in tight man coverage instead dropping into zone. Plummer did punish them with a nice 19 yard sideline pass to Wright. That combined with a short field thanks to the defense, put Purdue in the red zone again.
So how did Illinois make the bend but don't break work when Purdue struggled so much with it last year? Illinois has the personnel for it. The Illini front 4 (or 3 depending on where Carney/Gay line up) are all very experienced and physically developed OLB/DE Carney (Sr, 22 years old, 275 lbs), DT Perry (Sr, 23 years old, 315 lbs), DE Woods (Sr, 22 years old, 290 lbs), and OLB/DE Gay (Sr, 22 years old, 250 lbs). They were able to hold down the LOS and allow Barnes to play sideline to sideline and put the 5 or sometimes 6 DBs in zone coverage. Meanwhile Purdue last year was already not really suited for a 3-4 base along the DL and lost Watts early which compounded the issue.
Purdue tried several different approaches to Illinois' defense in the redzone. On the first possession it was a dive play that went poorly due to a missed block by Holstege on Isaiah Gay who tackled Downing for a loss. Purdue then tried a screen which Wright dropped (I don't think he was getting much anyway), Plummer then hit Durham across the middle for 5 but it wasn't enough. In this case Plummer didn't have much choice but to check down to Durham. The zone coverage had blanketed everyone else. On the second possession Brohm tried a Downing toss play to start it off. Unfortunately Long was looking upfield for his lead block and missed Barnes who snuck behind him. Downing shed his tackle but was slowed down enough for the corner and safety to finish up after 5 yards. Purdue tried another screen play to Durham on 2nd down but Barnes snuffed this one out so well Plummer just decided to tuck it and ran for a yard. Brohm tried to load up the line with TEs to convert the 3rd & 4 but Downing was only able to get 2.
After the second stalled drive it was pretty clear that, in order to move the ball, Plummer was going to have to hit tight windows. Unfortunately, you could tell he was feeling this pressure. Purdue's 3rd drive started just before the 2nd quarter which easily came to be Plummer's worst quarter so far this season. Again Plummer was accurate early in this game. He was 9-11 but he was accurate on all 11 throws (one was a bad drop by Wright and another Plummer tried to hit Durham in a tight window. The pass was where it should be but the Illinois defender hit Durham as he was catching it and knocked it out of his hands).
On the next 5 possessions, that mostly took place in the second quarter, he went 2-8. His only 2 completions were hitch passes to Miller and Anthrop short of the sticks. Most of his incompletions were also short of the sticks. Slant and crossing route passes that he had been hitting all season were now behind his receivers or too far out in front. Illinois started putting corners in tight man coverage and Plummer was pretty visibly rattled. The poise that he had shown in the Oregon State game was gone. The sack he took from Carney was also on him. He had a decent pocket but bailed on it. Durham and I believe Downing were blocking Carney decently well but once Plummer fled the pocket they would have had to hold him to prevent the sack.
Thus came the decision to play O'Connell, and he stepped up well. I said this last year but I think the reason he won the job last year was his poise. Whether under pressure or in late game situations the guy stays as cool as a cucumber. In the Oregon State game it looked like Plummer had started to get some poise of his own. He evaded multiple sacks while still looking downfield and completed passes. Saturday that poise was gone and he was pretty clearly rattled. Not necessarily because of pressure from DL I don't think, but rather the pressure to stretch the field.
O'Connell did a great job hitting receivers in zone coverage. Illinois bailed on man coverage when he came in but he still managed to hit ARY, Wright, and Sheffield just as they were between zone coverages. He was just accurate enough to be successful. His deep ball to ARY would have been a TD had he not overthrown it slightly forcing ARY to dive for it. That resulted in Purdue having to deal with Illinois' redzone defense again. This time Brohm tried to have O'Connell find a hole in zone coverage again but Illinois tightened up with the help of the endline. That throw he tried to ARY in the back of the endzone was his best option. The safety just made a nice play. AOC made it happen on the last drive though. Illinois was in good zone coverage and O'Connell hit Sheffield just as he was in the small gap between two zones. The throw was behind Sheffield but it had to be. Had O'Connell hit Sheffield on the numbers on that play it would have been deflected away or possibly even picked by the safety.
RBs - Obviously a statistically brutal day for the backs. Purdue was in a tough spot for this game on the ground. Carney and Perry in particular pose pretty serious challenges. Both received All-Big Ten honors last year and are projected NFL draft picks. The focus on them prevented the OL from getting to the second level to block the LBs in the run game. Unfortunately Downing and Cross are not dynamic enough yet to avoid LBs in that situation. Not trying to pile on Downing or Cross here. Both are being relied upon way earlier than they were supposed to be. Downing did have some nice physical runs in this game including a 3rd and short where he had to run through a LB. The second half stats were really brutal but Purdue only attempted 5 carries and the yardage from them was quickly wiped out by a sack on O'Connell. Will cover the run game a little more in the OL section.
WRs - All that depth at receiver really showed on Saturday. Wright proved why he is worth being patient with. He had one bad drop early but that play wasn't going anywhere anyway. If that was what he needed to refocus then by all means. He had 3 receptions that were absolutely critical to Purdue's victory. The 19 yard sideline reception leading to the second FG and the back to back receptions on the game winning drive. One was on a 3rd & 7 and you could tell he knew the defender was there to hit him but he made the catch anyway. His 27 yard fade route and catch came on the very next play as well.
AOC appears to have a good connection with ARY as he looked to ARY's direction often. He caught passes in each of O'Connell's drives including that awesome diving grab that seemed to spark the offense. Too bad he didn't get the TD for his efforts, AOC looked to him twice more on that same drive. One sailed out of the endzone and the other was the interception. Solid day for Sheffield, obviously the TD but he also made a big catch on 3rd & 13 leading up to that unfortunate pick in the endzone. It wasn't a very accurate throw by AOC as Sheffield had to leap and get it but he did it knowing a hit was coming.
Anthrop continues to be available to make a play when you need him to. Thompson was quiet but 1 of his only 2 receptions was very important. Plummer threw to him on 3rd down, 8 yards short of the yard to gain during that first drive. Thompson juked the safety and managed to get the YAC necessary for the first.
TEs - Purdue pretty clearly missed Durham. Not only in the passing game as Plummer clearly lost form without his reliable TE, but the run blocking took a serious hit without him. He really is a tremendous blocking TE. G. Miller had a better game all around than he has had this far. Got some crucial catches and threw a few nice blocks but I think it was clear that the coaches don't want to lean on him as a blocker anymore. He did it to himself but that is a brutal way for Bilodeau to start his career.
OL - Upon review I still believe the OL put out a decent game on Saturday. As I detailed above Illinois has a solid front 7. I watched the Illinois Maryland game a little bit on Friday and thought that Perry in particular was going to be a problem. He was really disruptive in that game for against the Terps. Purdue's OL did a good job of limiting him to one tackle. I do think the effort to contain him and Carney did prevent the OL from getting to the second level in the running game especially when Durham left the game. Downing and Cross did get to the LOS cleanly for the most part on Saturday but LBs Barnes, Tolson, or S. Brown usually stopped them at the second level.
I did see four costly missed blocks. One was the aforementioned missed block by Holstege that led to the TFL on Downing on the first drive, I also mentioned a miss block by Long on the second possession, Miller and Long missed a block on the long sack on Plummer. and Holstege missed his block allowing the sack on O'Connell. This was far from a flawless game but I think they did decently well against an underrated front 7.
The biggest thing that the OL did well was the pass blocking towards the end of the game. O'Connell for the most part was kept clean and not pressured. He threw away the pass immediately before the TD pass and had that one sack but all that passing wouldn't be possible without solid blocking from the OL.
DL – There is not enough praise that can be given to Johnson and Lewis. Each made several plays in the run game to stuff all the dives Illinois tried. Which is impressive because Illinois is very experienced on the OL. All 5 of Illinois’ OL starters were 22 or 23 years old, have 30+ starts over their careers each, and Lowe and Kramer received All-Big Ten honors and figure to be NFL draft picks this spring. Throw in McCray being hard to bring down and this was a stout running attack.
Johnson had two back-to-back big plays on 2nd and 3rd down to force Illinois’ first FG. Lewis had a huge TFL leading up to Illinois’ missed FG. He blew past his blocker to hit McCray for a two-yard loss. Facing the 2nd & 12 Illinois struggled and had to try the FG ultimately. Each had other big plays but those were just a couple huge moments that Purdue absolutely needed. These two were also clearly very gassed at the end of this game. Purdue wants to rotate these two with Deen and Washington often to keep all 4 as fresh as possible. On the last couple plays though they still gave their all. On the final 3rd down for Illinois Lewis got into his stance slowly holding onto his hips. He still managed to shed the OG and force an early throw from Peters. Great effort.
It’s been interesting to see how each team deals with Karlafits. Illinois’ offensive strategy of dive right and dive left largely removed him. Not much any DE can do there but he still found a way to make some big tackles. He also had that big strip sack that forced Illinois into a punt. Vederian Lowe also did a really good job blocking Karlaftis. So far, the best I have seen this year. He did well enough that I wouldn’t mind if the Colts took him in the draft depending on where he is projected.
For all the talk about the move back to 4-3 being beneficial, I do think Mitchell is better suited as a 3-4 OLB. He struggles in the run game on the edge. Much like in the Oregon State game, he was completely removed from a play. On the first play, in the second possession of the second half, Norwood dived right. The interior DL did a good job mucking it up but Palczewski (I think) pushed Mitchell so far upfield that the right edge was wide open. Brown tried to come in and make the tackle but missed and Norwood got 17 yards before Grant brought him down. Mitchell did have a nice play on that sack on Peters in which Deen got hurt. Purdue ran a double stunt up front. Karlaftis used his brute strength to free up Deen by pushing both the LT and LG inward while Mitchell got a great jump on the right sight forcing the RT and RG to double him freeing up Johnson. Had Deen and Johnson not gotten there fast enough Mitchell probably would have gotten the sack.
Jenkins didn’t fair much better. In fact his big pass deflection was made possible because Lowe had so thoroughly beaten him that Jenkins just stepped back to prepare for a pass. To his credit, he did make the play. I did see Sulivan line up opposite Karlaftis a few times in this game. I do wonder if that is what the coaches go with particularly in running situations. Mitchell is still probably the best pass rusher of the three but he and Jenkins are a liability against good OTs in the run game.
LBs – Thought the LBs were going to have to have a good game for Purdue to win this one since Illinois likes to run pull and crash blocks like Purdue does. To my surprise they were largely quiet. Alexander had that big play on that screen attempt and he and Douglas made a couple nice stops filling gaps. Illinois did do a good job getting to the second level with blocks I noticed. Often, they would double either Lewis or Johnson then have one OL peel off and look for Douglas or Alexander. It worked several times but there were several other plays where Johnson and Lewis shed the remaining blocker once the double team went away. Once again, a credit to Lewis and Johnson for staying at it. Graham was largely removed for the same reason as the DEs. Since he lines up on the outside hip of the DEs he wasn't there for most of the dive plays. He did have arguably a TD saving tackle on that 38 yard run by McCray and had to hustle to make it.
DBs – Mackey and Brown weren’t leaned on too heavily in this game since Illinois ran it all day. That being said each made a couple big plays. On that 2nd & 12 following Lewis’ big play, Mackey made an excellent pass deflection to break up a pass past the sticks to Williams. The pass interference call on him was a bad one imo. The receiver was already falling down and Mackey was looking back at the ball. Was glad to hear the commentators agree that was a bad call. One of these bad PI calls has to go our way soon, right?... right?! Brown had a good day as well aside from that missed tackle in run support. He had a big pass break up in the end zone that ultimately led to Illinois punting from the 34-yard line.
This was Marvin Grant’s kind of game and he really stepped up to the challenge. Since the Illinois OL did a good job getting to the second level and blocking Alexander and Douglas there was a decent amount of pressure on Allen and Grant to make tackles. This is where Grant can really shine. I do think Purdue fans will just have to accept that Grant’s aggressive run support will lead to him getting beat in the passing game. He bit really hard on another play action pass in this game giving up a first down pass on a fade. Allen wasn’t quite involved since he is more of a pass coverage safety. He did have a few nice tackles in run support as well though. He did have one really bad missed tackle on the 38-yard run by McCray. Got completely juked out of his shoes.
STs – Another big day by Fineran. Purdue simply doesn’t win without his FGs on Saturday. Glad to see Ansell have a good day punting. Not sure what was going on in the first few games but he went from 2 punts going 40 yards in the first 3 games to 4 of his 5 going 40 in this one. Including one bomb that went 54 yards.
Overall, am I discouraged or encouraged by this review? A little bit of both. Plummer’s inability to beat zone coverage and general inaccuracy in the 2nd quarter played Purdue right into Illinois’ strategy. Aidan stepping in really saved Purdue from an embarrassing loss. He isn’t the most accurate QB ever but he at least knows what he has to do and where to put it against zone coverage. Just a matter of him getting it there. The running game is concerning especially seeing how the OL was completely unable to block at the second level once Durham was out. Again, not to pile on Downing and Cross since they are being relied upon way too heavily but I do think Horvath or Doerue could have gotten a couple 10+ yard carries on some of those runs. Like I said Downing and Cross got to the LOS untouched most of the game, just couldn't get past the LBs.
The encouraging thing is that Purdue managed to win despite playing to Illinois’ strengths and all the injuries it has suffered. The guys on the Solid Verbal Podcast always say good teams win their clunkers. Not sure this is a good team yet but this was definitely a clunker. Illinois is also not completely devoid of talent. It is just super concentrated in the front 7 on defense and the OL on offense. There is a reason why Illinois beat Nebraska and hung close with Maryland and Purdue. They are just severely one dimensional on offense. When playing against them you have to force them to throw to get back into it and Purdue couldn’t make the big TD play in the second quarter to do that. A win is a win. Hopefully we can do just enough to win again this weekend.
QBs - This position has obviously and understandably been hashed over and over again this week so I am going to try to focus on the actual performance rather than the QBs' and their abilities or limitations. Purdue started this game wanting to exploit Illinois' overall defensive strategy, which made me shudder because it was essentially Diaco-fense. Bend but don't break by leaning on 3-4 guys as pass rushers, having rangy LBs (normally Hansen but it was Barnes this game) play sideline to sideline and have the secondary in zone coverage.
On the first drive it was clear Purdue was going to simply take what Illinois gave them. Plummer was 9-11 for 67 yards. All but one of those passes was within 5-7 yards of the LOS. It was smart because Illinois corners were lined up 10 yards off the LOS and took steps back on each snap. The bend but don't break strategy worked for Illinois in this game though unlike Diaco-fense last year. More on that shortly. In the second drive it became clear that Plummer was going to have to go downfield a little more. Illinois' corners were still lined up far off the LOS but were stepping forward in tight man coverage instead dropping into zone. Plummer did punish them with a nice 19 yard sideline pass to Wright. That combined with a short field thanks to the defense, put Purdue in the red zone again.
So how did Illinois make the bend but don't break work when Purdue struggled so much with it last year? Illinois has the personnel for it. The Illini front 4 (or 3 depending on where Carney/Gay line up) are all very experienced and physically developed OLB/DE Carney (Sr, 22 years old, 275 lbs), DT Perry (Sr, 23 years old, 315 lbs), DE Woods (Sr, 22 years old, 290 lbs), and OLB/DE Gay (Sr, 22 years old, 250 lbs). They were able to hold down the LOS and allow Barnes to play sideline to sideline and put the 5 or sometimes 6 DBs in zone coverage. Meanwhile Purdue last year was already not really suited for a 3-4 base along the DL and lost Watts early which compounded the issue.
Purdue tried several different approaches to Illinois' defense in the redzone. On the first possession it was a dive play that went poorly due to a missed block by Holstege on Isaiah Gay who tackled Downing for a loss. Purdue then tried a screen which Wright dropped (I don't think he was getting much anyway), Plummer then hit Durham across the middle for 5 but it wasn't enough. In this case Plummer didn't have much choice but to check down to Durham. The zone coverage had blanketed everyone else. On the second possession Brohm tried a Downing toss play to start it off. Unfortunately Long was looking upfield for his lead block and missed Barnes who snuck behind him. Downing shed his tackle but was slowed down enough for the corner and safety to finish up after 5 yards. Purdue tried another screen play to Durham on 2nd down but Barnes snuffed this one out so well Plummer just decided to tuck it and ran for a yard. Brohm tried to load up the line with TEs to convert the 3rd & 4 but Downing was only able to get 2.
After the second stalled drive it was pretty clear that, in order to move the ball, Plummer was going to have to hit tight windows. Unfortunately, you could tell he was feeling this pressure. Purdue's 3rd drive started just before the 2nd quarter which easily came to be Plummer's worst quarter so far this season. Again Plummer was accurate early in this game. He was 9-11 but he was accurate on all 11 throws (one was a bad drop by Wright and another Plummer tried to hit Durham in a tight window. The pass was where it should be but the Illinois defender hit Durham as he was catching it and knocked it out of his hands).
On the next 5 possessions, that mostly took place in the second quarter, he went 2-8. His only 2 completions were hitch passes to Miller and Anthrop short of the sticks. Most of his incompletions were also short of the sticks. Slant and crossing route passes that he had been hitting all season were now behind his receivers or too far out in front. Illinois started putting corners in tight man coverage and Plummer was pretty visibly rattled. The poise that he had shown in the Oregon State game was gone. The sack he took from Carney was also on him. He had a decent pocket but bailed on it. Durham and I believe Downing were blocking Carney decently well but once Plummer fled the pocket they would have had to hold him to prevent the sack.
Thus came the decision to play O'Connell, and he stepped up well. I said this last year but I think the reason he won the job last year was his poise. Whether under pressure or in late game situations the guy stays as cool as a cucumber. In the Oregon State game it looked like Plummer had started to get some poise of his own. He evaded multiple sacks while still looking downfield and completed passes. Saturday that poise was gone and he was pretty clearly rattled. Not necessarily because of pressure from DL I don't think, but rather the pressure to stretch the field.
O'Connell did a great job hitting receivers in zone coverage. Illinois bailed on man coverage when he came in but he still managed to hit ARY, Wright, and Sheffield just as they were between zone coverages. He was just accurate enough to be successful. His deep ball to ARY would have been a TD had he not overthrown it slightly forcing ARY to dive for it. That resulted in Purdue having to deal with Illinois' redzone defense again. This time Brohm tried to have O'Connell find a hole in zone coverage again but Illinois tightened up with the help of the endline. That throw he tried to ARY in the back of the endzone was his best option. The safety just made a nice play. AOC made it happen on the last drive though. Illinois was in good zone coverage and O'Connell hit Sheffield just as he was in the small gap between two zones. The throw was behind Sheffield but it had to be. Had O'Connell hit Sheffield on the numbers on that play it would have been deflected away or possibly even picked by the safety.
RBs - Obviously a statistically brutal day for the backs. Purdue was in a tough spot for this game on the ground. Carney and Perry in particular pose pretty serious challenges. Both received All-Big Ten honors last year and are projected NFL draft picks. The focus on them prevented the OL from getting to the second level to block the LBs in the run game. Unfortunately Downing and Cross are not dynamic enough yet to avoid LBs in that situation. Not trying to pile on Downing or Cross here. Both are being relied upon way earlier than they were supposed to be. Downing did have some nice physical runs in this game including a 3rd and short where he had to run through a LB. The second half stats were really brutal but Purdue only attempted 5 carries and the yardage from them was quickly wiped out by a sack on O'Connell. Will cover the run game a little more in the OL section.
WRs - All that depth at receiver really showed on Saturday. Wright proved why he is worth being patient with. He had one bad drop early but that play wasn't going anywhere anyway. If that was what he needed to refocus then by all means. He had 3 receptions that were absolutely critical to Purdue's victory. The 19 yard sideline reception leading to the second FG and the back to back receptions on the game winning drive. One was on a 3rd & 7 and you could tell he knew the defender was there to hit him but he made the catch anyway. His 27 yard fade route and catch came on the very next play as well.
AOC appears to have a good connection with ARY as he looked to ARY's direction often. He caught passes in each of O'Connell's drives including that awesome diving grab that seemed to spark the offense. Too bad he didn't get the TD for his efforts, AOC looked to him twice more on that same drive. One sailed out of the endzone and the other was the interception. Solid day for Sheffield, obviously the TD but he also made a big catch on 3rd & 13 leading up to that unfortunate pick in the endzone. It wasn't a very accurate throw by AOC as Sheffield had to leap and get it but he did it knowing a hit was coming.
Anthrop continues to be available to make a play when you need him to. Thompson was quiet but 1 of his only 2 receptions was very important. Plummer threw to him on 3rd down, 8 yards short of the yard to gain during that first drive. Thompson juked the safety and managed to get the YAC necessary for the first.
TEs - Purdue pretty clearly missed Durham. Not only in the passing game as Plummer clearly lost form without his reliable TE, but the run blocking took a serious hit without him. He really is a tremendous blocking TE. G. Miller had a better game all around than he has had this far. Got some crucial catches and threw a few nice blocks but I think it was clear that the coaches don't want to lean on him as a blocker anymore. He did it to himself but that is a brutal way for Bilodeau to start his career.
OL - Upon review I still believe the OL put out a decent game on Saturday. As I detailed above Illinois has a solid front 7. I watched the Illinois Maryland game a little bit on Friday and thought that Perry in particular was going to be a problem. He was really disruptive in that game for against the Terps. Purdue's OL did a good job of limiting him to one tackle. I do think the effort to contain him and Carney did prevent the OL from getting to the second level in the running game especially when Durham left the game. Downing and Cross did get to the LOS cleanly for the most part on Saturday but LBs Barnes, Tolson, or S. Brown usually stopped them at the second level.
I did see four costly missed blocks. One was the aforementioned missed block by Holstege that led to the TFL on Downing on the first drive, I also mentioned a miss block by Long on the second possession, Miller and Long missed a block on the long sack on Plummer. and Holstege missed his block allowing the sack on O'Connell. This was far from a flawless game but I think they did decently well against an underrated front 7.
The biggest thing that the OL did well was the pass blocking towards the end of the game. O'Connell for the most part was kept clean and not pressured. He threw away the pass immediately before the TD pass and had that one sack but all that passing wouldn't be possible without solid blocking from the OL.
DL – There is not enough praise that can be given to Johnson and Lewis. Each made several plays in the run game to stuff all the dives Illinois tried. Which is impressive because Illinois is very experienced on the OL. All 5 of Illinois’ OL starters were 22 or 23 years old, have 30+ starts over their careers each, and Lowe and Kramer received All-Big Ten honors and figure to be NFL draft picks this spring. Throw in McCray being hard to bring down and this was a stout running attack.
Johnson had two back-to-back big plays on 2nd and 3rd down to force Illinois’ first FG. Lewis had a huge TFL leading up to Illinois’ missed FG. He blew past his blocker to hit McCray for a two-yard loss. Facing the 2nd & 12 Illinois struggled and had to try the FG ultimately. Each had other big plays but those were just a couple huge moments that Purdue absolutely needed. These two were also clearly very gassed at the end of this game. Purdue wants to rotate these two with Deen and Washington often to keep all 4 as fresh as possible. On the last couple plays though they still gave their all. On the final 3rd down for Illinois Lewis got into his stance slowly holding onto his hips. He still managed to shed the OG and force an early throw from Peters. Great effort.
It’s been interesting to see how each team deals with Karlafits. Illinois’ offensive strategy of dive right and dive left largely removed him. Not much any DE can do there but he still found a way to make some big tackles. He also had that big strip sack that forced Illinois into a punt. Vederian Lowe also did a really good job blocking Karlaftis. So far, the best I have seen this year. He did well enough that I wouldn’t mind if the Colts took him in the draft depending on where he is projected.
For all the talk about the move back to 4-3 being beneficial, I do think Mitchell is better suited as a 3-4 OLB. He struggles in the run game on the edge. Much like in the Oregon State game, he was completely removed from a play. On the first play, in the second possession of the second half, Norwood dived right. The interior DL did a good job mucking it up but Palczewski (I think) pushed Mitchell so far upfield that the right edge was wide open. Brown tried to come in and make the tackle but missed and Norwood got 17 yards before Grant brought him down. Mitchell did have a nice play on that sack on Peters in which Deen got hurt. Purdue ran a double stunt up front. Karlaftis used his brute strength to free up Deen by pushing both the LT and LG inward while Mitchell got a great jump on the right sight forcing the RT and RG to double him freeing up Johnson. Had Deen and Johnson not gotten there fast enough Mitchell probably would have gotten the sack.
Jenkins didn’t fair much better. In fact his big pass deflection was made possible because Lowe had so thoroughly beaten him that Jenkins just stepped back to prepare for a pass. To his credit, he did make the play. I did see Sulivan line up opposite Karlaftis a few times in this game. I do wonder if that is what the coaches go with particularly in running situations. Mitchell is still probably the best pass rusher of the three but he and Jenkins are a liability against good OTs in the run game.
LBs – Thought the LBs were going to have to have a good game for Purdue to win this one since Illinois likes to run pull and crash blocks like Purdue does. To my surprise they were largely quiet. Alexander had that big play on that screen attempt and he and Douglas made a couple nice stops filling gaps. Illinois did do a good job getting to the second level with blocks I noticed. Often, they would double either Lewis or Johnson then have one OL peel off and look for Douglas or Alexander. It worked several times but there were several other plays where Johnson and Lewis shed the remaining blocker once the double team went away. Once again, a credit to Lewis and Johnson for staying at it. Graham was largely removed for the same reason as the DEs. Since he lines up on the outside hip of the DEs he wasn't there for most of the dive plays. He did have arguably a TD saving tackle on that 38 yard run by McCray and had to hustle to make it.
DBs – Mackey and Brown weren’t leaned on too heavily in this game since Illinois ran it all day. That being said each made a couple big plays. On that 2nd & 12 following Lewis’ big play, Mackey made an excellent pass deflection to break up a pass past the sticks to Williams. The pass interference call on him was a bad one imo. The receiver was already falling down and Mackey was looking back at the ball. Was glad to hear the commentators agree that was a bad call. One of these bad PI calls has to go our way soon, right?... right?! Brown had a good day as well aside from that missed tackle in run support. He had a big pass break up in the end zone that ultimately led to Illinois punting from the 34-yard line.
This was Marvin Grant’s kind of game and he really stepped up to the challenge. Since the Illinois OL did a good job getting to the second level and blocking Alexander and Douglas there was a decent amount of pressure on Allen and Grant to make tackles. This is where Grant can really shine. I do think Purdue fans will just have to accept that Grant’s aggressive run support will lead to him getting beat in the passing game. He bit really hard on another play action pass in this game giving up a first down pass on a fade. Allen wasn’t quite involved since he is more of a pass coverage safety. He did have a few nice tackles in run support as well though. He did have one really bad missed tackle on the 38-yard run by McCray. Got completely juked out of his shoes.
STs – Another big day by Fineran. Purdue simply doesn’t win without his FGs on Saturday. Glad to see Ansell have a good day punting. Not sure what was going on in the first few games but he went from 2 punts going 40 yards in the first 3 games to 4 of his 5 going 40 in this one. Including one bomb that went 54 yards.
Overall, am I discouraged or encouraged by this review? A little bit of both. Plummer’s inability to beat zone coverage and general inaccuracy in the 2nd quarter played Purdue right into Illinois’ strategy. Aidan stepping in really saved Purdue from an embarrassing loss. He isn’t the most accurate QB ever but he at least knows what he has to do and where to put it against zone coverage. Just a matter of him getting it there. The running game is concerning especially seeing how the OL was completely unable to block at the second level once Durham was out. Again, not to pile on Downing and Cross since they are being relied upon way too heavily but I do think Horvath or Doerue could have gotten a couple 10+ yard carries on some of those runs. Like I said Downing and Cross got to the LOS untouched most of the game, just couldn't get past the LBs.
The encouraging thing is that Purdue managed to win despite playing to Illinois’ strengths and all the injuries it has suffered. The guys on the Solid Verbal Podcast always say good teams win their clunkers. Not sure this is a good team yet but this was definitely a clunker. Illinois is also not completely devoid of talent. It is just super concentrated in the front 7 on defense and the OL on offense. There is a reason why Illinois beat Nebraska and hung close with Maryland and Purdue. They are just severely one dimensional on offense. When playing against them you have to force them to throw to get back into it and Purdue couldn’t make the big TD play in the second quarter to do that. A win is a win. Hopefully we can do just enough to win again this weekend.
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