Back home again against Indiana. Time to get that Bucket back to where it belongs. Purdue holds a lead in these games played for the Bucket winning 60 of the 95 games with 3 ties. Overall, Purdue leads the series 74-42-6 having scored more than a 1,000 points more than they’ve given up. With last year’s game being canceled (twice) this will be the first game of the decade between the two teams.
Taking a look at the size and experience of the Indiana Lines and LBs and seeing how they match up against Purdue's equivalents.
- After a one week respite of facing a small O-Line, Purdue is back to facing one of the larger lines as Indiana comes in averaging 321.4 lbs. They also one of the more experienced teams Purdue’s faced with an average of 3.4 years of experience. Their size puts them well above average for the B10, their experience puts them just slightly above average for the B10. Collectively, they will have just 95 starts among them. Three players are full multi-year starters with an additional player, Haggard, a part time starter previously. Last week, Katic started instead of Carpenter. If that happens again, the Experience stays the same, the weight will drop to 319.8 but the starts will increase to 101.
- This week’s Purdue’s projected D-Line (Kalaftkis, Johnson, Dean, Jenkins) averages about 282.5 lbs. per man. That size puts them slightly below average for the B10. They will be outweighed by the Indiana line by 38.9 lbs per man on average. Purdue’s average experience is 2.5 years, down slightly again due to the addition of Jenkins. As a unit they have 73 collective starts.
- Purdue’s projected LBs (Graham, Alexander, Douglas) come in at 233.3 lbs, up slightly from last year and are at 3.67 years of experience, also up from last season due to Douglas starting. Their size puts them in the upper tier of the B10 behind just Rutgers and PSU. They have a collective 58 starts between them.
- Purdue’s O-line (Long, Holstege, Hartwig, Witt, Miller) will average 306.0 lbs per man, up by 5 lbs from last year’s 301.0 lbs. but still one of the smaller units in the B10 ahead of just Indiana and Iowa. They average 3.00 years of experience, up nearly a half-year from last season’s 2.6 years. Collectively, they have a decent number of starts, in 123.
- Indiana features a four man front scheme along the D-Line with a LB sized player (“Bull”) playing on the outside. Due to that scheme, they will have ab average sized line at 278.25 lbs, (slightly higher than Northwestern’s) which falls just slightly below the average in the B10. They also have very good experience as they come in with a 4.00 year average which is well above average and will be outweighed by Purdue’s O-line by 17.75 lbs per man. Three of the four starters are multi-year starters with the fourth a partial year starter over two seasons so starts between them is very good at 114..
- Indiana’s uses a DB sized player (“Husky”) as one of their OLBs so they will be one of the lighter units in the B10 coming in at 221.33 lbs . They are below average sized for the B10. They do have excellent experience with 4.00 years at the position which is well above the B10 average. Two of the three starters are multi-year starters so collective starts are good at 69. McFadden at MLB is very good but could be prone to a targeting call.
VegasInsider predicts Purdue by 16.0 points (Opened up at -15.0 points)
MasseyRatings predicts a 31-17 Purdue win
Sagarin (Golden) predicts a 13.79 point Purdue win. (it’s a 24.95 point spread on “Recent”)
CollegeFootballPoll predicts a 11.29 Purdue win.
CollegeFootballNews predicts a 34-13 Purdue win
For those of you who care about recruiting ratings, here are the starter’s Rivals ratings:
Purdue..........................Indiana
QB O’Connell NR..........McCulley 4*
RB Dorue 3*…...............Carr 4* (USC)
WR Wright 4*.................Marshall 3*
WR Bell 4*............……..Swinton 3* (DB)
WR Anthrop 3*.............. Fryfogle 2*
TE Durham 3*.................Hendershot 2*
LT Long 2*......................Haggard 3*
LG Witt 2*...................... Bedford 3*
C Hartwig 4*................... Powell 3* (Stanford)
RG Holstege 2*...............Carpenter 3* (Michigan)
RT Miller 3*......................Caleb Jones 3*
DE Jenkins 3*...................Anderson 3* (Ole Miss)
DT Johnson 3*……….......Elliott 2*
DT Dean 3*........................Kramer 2* (Northern Illinois)
DE/LB Karlaftis 4*.............Bryant 3*
LB Alexander 3*....…........ McFadden 2*
LB Douglas 2* …….….......Cam Jones 3* (ATH)
LB Graham 3*...……….…..Fitzgerald 3* (DB)
CB Brown 3* (KY)..….........J. Williams 3* (ATH)
CB Mackey 3*.....................Mullen 4*
FS Allen 3*......……....…......Matthews 2*
SS Grant 4*..........................Layne 2*
“I must be taken as I have been made. The success is not mine, the failure is not mine, but the two together make me.” – Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
Great Expectations. Seems fitting. This season, Indiana was on many pundit’s radar as “the” upwardly mobile team in the B10. In 2019 for the first time under coach Tom Allen, they had made a bowl game. In the Covid season of 2020, they had given Ohio State their closest loss and would have represented the East in the B10 Championship game had it not been for a late decision by the B10 to revamp the rules to allow OSU the spot, prompting Allen to pull the B10 logos from their uniforms during the bowl game (which they promptly lost).
So, entering this season, with a Senior laden class, they were preseason darlings and ranked #17 entering their opener against #18 Iowa. Then….reality hit. Four plays into the game, the Iowa running back ripped off a 56 yard TD run. On the second play of the ensuing drive, IU QB Penix was picked off for a TD by the Iowa secondary. In the 2nd quarter, Iowa puts together an 8 play, 78 yard drive for a TD to go up 21-3 before picking off another Penix pass for a TD to lead 31-3 at halftime. And that, was probably the high point of their season. They’ve since gone on to lose 8 conference games and come into Saturday’s contest with a 2-9 record. Which reminds me of another good quote from Dicken’s book:
“Take nothing on its looks; take everything on evidence. There’s no better rule.” – Charles Dickens – Great Expectations.
Coming off another injury from last season, Penix never looked totally comfortable, outside of a win against Western Kentucky. His backup, former 4* transfer from Utah, Tuttle, is not nearly as mobile and took a beating, being knocked out of games on two different occasions (2 different injuries). Their backup, true freshman Donavon McCulley, was rated the #4 Dual-Threat QB coming out last year but so far, he’s been barely a single threat (running). After being largely ineffective, McCulley was pulled last week for walk on QB, Grant Gremel, who finished the game 5 of 12 for 60 yards and a TD. McCulley’s QB rating for that game may be the lowest I’ve seen for a starter at 6.1 (AOC’s lowest rating this season was against Wisconsin at 119.1.) McCulley still carried the ball on 16 occasions for 72 yards (4.5ypc). In an effort to get their playmakers the ball, IU also used their TE, Hendershot, as a Wildcat QB for a number of plays.
Which leads us to the running back position. Stephen Carr transferred in from USC and has been the bell cow (600 yards, 3.87/ypc), however between injuries and transfers, Davion Ervin-Poindexter, a walk-on, has taken over the mantle of starter. Carr is “suspected” back fortheir bowl game the Bucket Game but at this time is probably a game day decision. Again, McCulley is gaining more yards on the ground regardless.
When IU does throw the ball, they have last season’s B10 Wide Receiver of the Year winner in Ty Fryfogle on the outside. Fryfogle’s stats from last game was 1 reception for -3 yards (certainly didn’t help McCulley’s QB rating). Their other top receiver is the Tight End, Hendershot. The two are pretty much in a dead heat as far as receptions per game (4.0 to 3.6) and receiving yards per game (44.8 to 44.7).
Not to single out someone due to their name but Fryfogle seems to be a perfect fit for IU. One of it’s most memorable alums is convicted child pornographer, Jared Fogle and, of course, many of their fans serve Fries. How could he go anywhere else? 😊
As a team, Total Offense is ranked 122nd (out of 130 teams) nationally with only Iowa (124th) worse in the B10. They average 297.7 yards per game or about 30 yards a game less than Northwestern. Breaking it down, they are 109th nationally and 10th in the league in Rushing Offense and 129th and last in the league in Pass Efficiency. Their Scoring Offense is ranked 121st nationally, 12th in the B10 and the Red Zone Offense comes in at 107th nationally and 10th in the B10. They’ve managed to give the ball away 20 times and have a Turnover Margin of -1.00.
Defensively, they’ve had their moments this season but overall has been a disappointment from where they had been over the past two seasons. A number of key players have been injured and, from observation, a number of players are either worn down or have ceased to give it their all. BTW, MLB, McFadden is not one of those as he still flies around the field like a missile.
Still Total Defense isn’t terrible as it comes in ranked 68th nationally but 11th in the league. Rush Defense is ranked similarly at 62nd nationally and 9th in the league. Pass Efficiency Defense is not quite as good at 79th in the nation and 12th in the league.
Scoring Defense takes a tumble as it comes in much lower at 104th nationally and 13th in the league. Red Zone Defense also is poor, ranked at 113th nationally and last in the league. From those stats, it appears that opposing teams are getting shorter fields from which to work with, thus not racking up the yards but scoring nonetheless.
IU does seem to be able to gum up the short yardage plays, even against larger lines like Minnesota’s this past weekend. Should Purdue be put in a similar situation, with AOC’s accuracy, it’s probably better to throw as opposed to running for the 1st down.
One aspect which IU is doing well (one of the few) is that they aren’t hurting themselves with penalties as they rank 8th in the nation in Penalties Per Game (4.36) and 9th in the nation in Penalty Yards Per Game (39.0). Those are good for 2nd and 3rd respectively in the league. The 8.9 yard per penalty average would suggest that the Hoosiers have more of the Pre-Snap variety than they do the Personal Foul infractions.
Another area where they are doing well, and in fact lead the league, is in Blocked Punts, in which they have 3. With Purdue’s punting situation being as it is, that could be something to watch out for.
Purdue survived the End Zone of Death that is Wrigley Field configured for a football game and came out with a solid win against an opponent which had caused problems for the Boilers in recent memory.
To be filed under “Way Too Long” category:
Purdue enters a regular season game with 7 wins under their belt. The last time that happened was 2007 (unfortunately Purdue closed that regular season with 3 losses before beating CMU in the Motor City Bowl).
Also, in that same category, a win on Saturday would give Purdue 8 regular season wins, something they haven’t done since the 2006 season (they also played 13 games during the regular season that year with the last game at Hawai’i). The 8 wins would be behind the 9 wins in 2003, match Purdue’s Rose Bowl season (albeit an 11 game season) and also match Tiller’s first two teams (1997 & 1998) however they went on to win their bowl games and finish with 9 wins. Before those teams, you then have to reach back to Jim Young’s squad of 1980 to see that many wins in a single season (I put the “single season” caveat in there just in case DH2 might be reading)
So, welcome to the 200 yard club, Mr. Wright. Unfortunately, there’s no special sport coat or secret handshake (that I’m aware of) honoring membership, but all the same, it’s a special honor. At the outset of the season, his 213 yards receiving in a game would have planted him 5th in Purdue’s all-time list of top receiving games…except his counterpart, Mr. Bell, has generated two games above that number so Wright’s performance is at best 6th All-Time. BTW, Bell’s two 200+ games looks to have pushed Brian Alford out of the Top 5 (he had two 200+ games as well) and also Kyle Ingraham’s 209 yard performance against IU in the 2004 Bucket Game. With the 3 scoring receptions, Wright is the team leader in TDs.
A bit outshined by Wright’s performance, David Bell continued his push towards the top of the record books with another 100 yard game and now stands exactly 100 receiving yards away from John Standeford’s 2002 record for a season. Bell is already in the Top 5 for Career Receiving but would need an additional 921 yards receiving to take the top spot away from Standeford. However, he only needs another 162 yards to move up to #4 ahead of Brian Alford.
AOC now leads the league in Completion Percentage and Completions Per Game, ranking #5 nationally in each category. His 289.9 yards per game is good for 3rd in the league and 14th nationally. More importantly, he has not turned the ball over since the Wisconsin game and only has a turnover in one of the previous six games. With two games to go AOC will likely finish at the top of Purdue’s record book in Completion Percentage for a Season as he stands at 72.7%. David Blough holds the record at 66.0%. O’Connell will also likely move ahead of Robert Marve in Career Completion Percentage as he trailed Marve by a 10th of a percentage point coming into the season (63.8% vs 63.7%). With Saturday’s performance, he’s now pass Kyle Orton for 14th in Season Passing Yards. He’s just 313 yards away from pushing Mark Hermann out of the Top 10 in that category. He would need 806 yards (not out of the realm of possibility) to make in to the Top 5.
Total Offense has continued to creep up and now ranks 52nd nationally and 6th in the league. Rushing Offense still is an issue and ranked 127th and last in the league but is offset somewhat by Passing Efficiency which is ranked 33rd and 2nd in the league.
Scoring Offense is still behind at 84th nationally and 9th in the league. Red Zone offense is 72nd and 6th in the league. Again, Purdue is moving the ball as shown in the Total Offense but hasn’t been scoring on a commensurate rate.
On a positive, Scoring Offense over the past 6 games comes in at 28.0 points per game. That number would put Purdue a little higher (67th nationally) in the rankings and considering that stretch covered four games against highly ranked opponents, it looks even better.
Indiana’s Tom Allen has reported 30+ players have had issues with injuries during the season. What’s unclear is how many are out (it’s not 30+). Several defensive players were helped off the field on Saturday. Some may or may not return. Their 2-deeps released did not indicate any players out of the starting lineup from the week prior.
Speaking of not returning, one of Indiana’s wideouts, Jacolby Hewitt, entered the portal over the weekend. His 8 receptions places him down on the list (8th) of IU WRs, however he did return kicks ranking 5th in the B10 on 10 returns with a 22.6 yard average and a long of 72 yards. He’s the sixth player this season to enter the transfer portal (including one Sampson James).
In Allen’s Monday Press Conference, he noted due to the injuries a number of players have been pressed into playing earlier than expected and, without much depth left, have had to play a lot more snaps than what would be ideal. In other words, players are pretty worn out. (That’s a shame.) I never like to put much stock in “body language” but a number of the IU players seem to simply be playing out the string and don’t seem to be putting forth the same level of effort we saw earlier in the year.
Indiana fans will be quick to point out IU’s strength of schedule is ranked #1 by Sagarin. That same site has the #2 toughest schedule belonging to Purdue. (BTW, Nebraska is #3, tough league)
Indiana normally plays their home games on turf. They are 0-1 this year playing on natural grass. 1-1 in 2020 and 1-3 in 2019 (only win was the OT game at Purdue).
Weather for Saturday is predicted to be partly cloudy with temperatures in the low 40’s at kickoff. There is a 6% chance of rain. Winds should be light at 7 mph. Could not expect better weather this time of year and a dry field with low winds should bode well for the Boilers.
Get the Bucket back to where it belongs and hope Tom Allen didn’t sleep with it his bed. But just in case, bring some Purell.
Finally, before I forget: POTFH
How 'bout them Boilers! Let’s play football!
Taking a look at the size and experience of the Indiana Lines and LBs and seeing how they match up against Purdue's equivalents.
- After a one week respite of facing a small O-Line, Purdue is back to facing one of the larger lines as Indiana comes in averaging 321.4 lbs. They also one of the more experienced teams Purdue’s faced with an average of 3.4 years of experience. Their size puts them well above average for the B10, their experience puts them just slightly above average for the B10. Collectively, they will have just 95 starts among them. Three players are full multi-year starters with an additional player, Haggard, a part time starter previously. Last week, Katic started instead of Carpenter. If that happens again, the Experience stays the same, the weight will drop to 319.8 but the starts will increase to 101.
- This week’s Purdue’s projected D-Line (Kalaftkis, Johnson, Dean, Jenkins) averages about 282.5 lbs. per man. That size puts them slightly below average for the B10. They will be outweighed by the Indiana line by 38.9 lbs per man on average. Purdue’s average experience is 2.5 years, down slightly again due to the addition of Jenkins. As a unit they have 73 collective starts.
- Purdue’s projected LBs (Graham, Alexander, Douglas) come in at 233.3 lbs, up slightly from last year and are at 3.67 years of experience, also up from last season due to Douglas starting. Their size puts them in the upper tier of the B10 behind just Rutgers and PSU. They have a collective 58 starts between them.
- Purdue’s O-line (Long, Holstege, Hartwig, Witt, Miller) will average 306.0 lbs per man, up by 5 lbs from last year’s 301.0 lbs. but still one of the smaller units in the B10 ahead of just Indiana and Iowa. They average 3.00 years of experience, up nearly a half-year from last season’s 2.6 years. Collectively, they have a decent number of starts, in 123.
- Indiana features a four man front scheme along the D-Line with a LB sized player (“Bull”) playing on the outside. Due to that scheme, they will have ab average sized line at 278.25 lbs, (slightly higher than Northwestern’s) which falls just slightly below the average in the B10. They also have very good experience as they come in with a 4.00 year average which is well above average and will be outweighed by Purdue’s O-line by 17.75 lbs per man. Three of the four starters are multi-year starters with the fourth a partial year starter over two seasons so starts between them is very good at 114..
- Indiana’s uses a DB sized player (“Husky”) as one of their OLBs so they will be one of the lighter units in the B10 coming in at 221.33 lbs . They are below average sized for the B10. They do have excellent experience with 4.00 years at the position which is well above the B10 average. Two of the three starters are multi-year starters so collective starts are good at 69. McFadden at MLB is very good but could be prone to a targeting call.
VegasInsider predicts Purdue by 16.0 points (Opened up at -15.0 points)
MasseyRatings predicts a 31-17 Purdue win
Sagarin (Golden) predicts a 13.79 point Purdue win. (it’s a 24.95 point spread on “Recent”)
CollegeFootballPoll predicts a 11.29 Purdue win.
CollegeFootballNews predicts a 34-13 Purdue win
For those of you who care about recruiting ratings, here are the starter’s Rivals ratings:
Purdue..........................Indiana
QB O’Connell NR..........McCulley 4*
RB Dorue 3*…...............Carr 4* (USC)
WR Wright 4*.................Marshall 3*
WR Bell 4*............……..Swinton 3* (DB)
WR Anthrop 3*.............. Fryfogle 2*
TE Durham 3*.................Hendershot 2*
LT Long 2*......................Haggard 3*
LG Witt 2*...................... Bedford 3*
C Hartwig 4*................... Powell 3* (Stanford)
RG Holstege 2*...............Carpenter 3* (Michigan)
RT Miller 3*......................Caleb Jones 3*
DE Jenkins 3*...................Anderson 3* (Ole Miss)
DT Johnson 3*……….......Elliott 2*
DT Dean 3*........................Kramer 2* (Northern Illinois)
DE/LB Karlaftis 4*.............Bryant 3*
LB Alexander 3*....…........ McFadden 2*
LB Douglas 2* …….….......Cam Jones 3* (ATH)
LB Graham 3*...……….…..Fitzgerald 3* (DB)
CB Brown 3* (KY)..….........J. Williams 3* (ATH)
CB Mackey 3*.....................Mullen 4*
FS Allen 3*......……....…......Matthews 2*
SS Grant 4*..........................Layne 2*
“I must be taken as I have been made. The success is not mine, the failure is not mine, but the two together make me.” – Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
Great Expectations. Seems fitting. This season, Indiana was on many pundit’s radar as “the” upwardly mobile team in the B10. In 2019 for the first time under coach Tom Allen, they had made a bowl game. In the Covid season of 2020, they had given Ohio State their closest loss and would have represented the East in the B10 Championship game had it not been for a late decision by the B10 to revamp the rules to allow OSU the spot, prompting Allen to pull the B10 logos from their uniforms during the bowl game (which they promptly lost).
So, entering this season, with a Senior laden class, they were preseason darlings and ranked #17 entering their opener against #18 Iowa. Then….reality hit. Four plays into the game, the Iowa running back ripped off a 56 yard TD run. On the second play of the ensuing drive, IU QB Penix was picked off for a TD by the Iowa secondary. In the 2nd quarter, Iowa puts together an 8 play, 78 yard drive for a TD to go up 21-3 before picking off another Penix pass for a TD to lead 31-3 at halftime. And that, was probably the high point of their season. They’ve since gone on to lose 8 conference games and come into Saturday’s contest with a 2-9 record. Which reminds me of another good quote from Dicken’s book:
“Take nothing on its looks; take everything on evidence. There’s no better rule.” – Charles Dickens – Great Expectations.
Coming off another injury from last season, Penix never looked totally comfortable, outside of a win against Western Kentucky. His backup, former 4* transfer from Utah, Tuttle, is not nearly as mobile and took a beating, being knocked out of games on two different occasions (2 different injuries). Their backup, true freshman Donavon McCulley, was rated the #4 Dual-Threat QB coming out last year but so far, he’s been barely a single threat (running). After being largely ineffective, McCulley was pulled last week for walk on QB, Grant Gremel, who finished the game 5 of 12 for 60 yards and a TD. McCulley’s QB rating for that game may be the lowest I’ve seen for a starter at 6.1 (AOC’s lowest rating this season was against Wisconsin at 119.1.) McCulley still carried the ball on 16 occasions for 72 yards (4.5ypc). In an effort to get their playmakers the ball, IU also used their TE, Hendershot, as a Wildcat QB for a number of plays.
Which leads us to the running back position. Stephen Carr transferred in from USC and has been the bell cow (600 yards, 3.87/ypc), however between injuries and transfers, Davion Ervin-Poindexter, a walk-on, has taken over the mantle of starter. Carr is “suspected” back for
When IU does throw the ball, they have last season’s B10 Wide Receiver of the Year winner in Ty Fryfogle on the outside. Fryfogle’s stats from last game was 1 reception for -3 yards (certainly didn’t help McCulley’s QB rating). Their other top receiver is the Tight End, Hendershot. The two are pretty much in a dead heat as far as receptions per game (4.0 to 3.6) and receiving yards per game (44.8 to 44.7).
Not to single out someone due to their name but Fryfogle seems to be a perfect fit for IU. One of it’s most memorable alums is convicted child pornographer, Jared Fogle and, of course, many of their fans serve Fries. How could he go anywhere else? 😊
As a team, Total Offense is ranked 122nd (out of 130 teams) nationally with only Iowa (124th) worse in the B10. They average 297.7 yards per game or about 30 yards a game less than Northwestern. Breaking it down, they are 109th nationally and 10th in the league in Rushing Offense and 129th and last in the league in Pass Efficiency. Their Scoring Offense is ranked 121st nationally, 12th in the B10 and the Red Zone Offense comes in at 107th nationally and 10th in the B10. They’ve managed to give the ball away 20 times and have a Turnover Margin of -1.00.
Defensively, they’ve had their moments this season but overall has been a disappointment from where they had been over the past two seasons. A number of key players have been injured and, from observation, a number of players are either worn down or have ceased to give it their all. BTW, MLB, McFadden is not one of those as he still flies around the field like a missile.
Still Total Defense isn’t terrible as it comes in ranked 68th nationally but 11th in the league. Rush Defense is ranked similarly at 62nd nationally and 9th in the league. Pass Efficiency Defense is not quite as good at 79th in the nation and 12th in the league.
Scoring Defense takes a tumble as it comes in much lower at 104th nationally and 13th in the league. Red Zone Defense also is poor, ranked at 113th nationally and last in the league. From those stats, it appears that opposing teams are getting shorter fields from which to work with, thus not racking up the yards but scoring nonetheless.
IU does seem to be able to gum up the short yardage plays, even against larger lines like Minnesota’s this past weekend. Should Purdue be put in a similar situation, with AOC’s accuracy, it’s probably better to throw as opposed to running for the 1st down.
One aspect which IU is doing well (one of the few) is that they aren’t hurting themselves with penalties as they rank 8th in the nation in Penalties Per Game (4.36) and 9th in the nation in Penalty Yards Per Game (39.0). Those are good for 2nd and 3rd respectively in the league. The 8.9 yard per penalty average would suggest that the Hoosiers have more of the Pre-Snap variety than they do the Personal Foul infractions.
Another area where they are doing well, and in fact lead the league, is in Blocked Punts, in which they have 3. With Purdue’s punting situation being as it is, that could be something to watch out for.
Purdue survived the End Zone of Death that is Wrigley Field configured for a football game and came out with a solid win against an opponent which had caused problems for the Boilers in recent memory.
To be filed under “Way Too Long” category:
Purdue enters a regular season game with 7 wins under their belt. The last time that happened was 2007 (unfortunately Purdue closed that regular season with 3 losses before beating CMU in the Motor City Bowl).
Also, in that same category, a win on Saturday would give Purdue 8 regular season wins, something they haven’t done since the 2006 season (they also played 13 games during the regular season that year with the last game at Hawai’i). The 8 wins would be behind the 9 wins in 2003, match Purdue’s Rose Bowl season (albeit an 11 game season) and also match Tiller’s first two teams (1997 & 1998) however they went on to win their bowl games and finish with 9 wins. Before those teams, you then have to reach back to Jim Young’s squad of 1980 to see that many wins in a single season (I put the “single season” caveat in there just in case DH2 might be reading)
So, welcome to the 200 yard club, Mr. Wright. Unfortunately, there’s no special sport coat or secret handshake (that I’m aware of) honoring membership, but all the same, it’s a special honor. At the outset of the season, his 213 yards receiving in a game would have planted him 5th in Purdue’s all-time list of top receiving games…except his counterpart, Mr. Bell, has generated two games above that number so Wright’s performance is at best 6th All-Time. BTW, Bell’s two 200+ games looks to have pushed Brian Alford out of the Top 5 (he had two 200+ games as well) and also Kyle Ingraham’s 209 yard performance against IU in the 2004 Bucket Game. With the 3 scoring receptions, Wright is the team leader in TDs.
A bit outshined by Wright’s performance, David Bell continued his push towards the top of the record books with another 100 yard game and now stands exactly 100 receiving yards away from John Standeford’s 2002 record for a season. Bell is already in the Top 5 for Career Receiving but would need an additional 921 yards receiving to take the top spot away from Standeford. However, he only needs another 162 yards to move up to #4 ahead of Brian Alford.
AOC now leads the league in Completion Percentage and Completions Per Game, ranking #5 nationally in each category. His 289.9 yards per game is good for 3rd in the league and 14th nationally. More importantly, he has not turned the ball over since the Wisconsin game and only has a turnover in one of the previous six games. With two games to go AOC will likely finish at the top of Purdue’s record book in Completion Percentage for a Season as he stands at 72.7%. David Blough holds the record at 66.0%. O’Connell will also likely move ahead of Robert Marve in Career Completion Percentage as he trailed Marve by a 10th of a percentage point coming into the season (63.8% vs 63.7%). With Saturday’s performance, he’s now pass Kyle Orton for 14th in Season Passing Yards. He’s just 313 yards away from pushing Mark Hermann out of the Top 10 in that category. He would need 806 yards (not out of the realm of possibility) to make in to the Top 5.
Total Offense has continued to creep up and now ranks 52nd nationally and 6th in the league. Rushing Offense still is an issue and ranked 127th and last in the league but is offset somewhat by Passing Efficiency which is ranked 33rd and 2nd in the league.
Scoring Offense is still behind at 84th nationally and 9th in the league. Red Zone offense is 72nd and 6th in the league. Again, Purdue is moving the ball as shown in the Total Offense but hasn’t been scoring on a commensurate rate.
On a positive, Scoring Offense over the past 6 games comes in at 28.0 points per game. That number would put Purdue a little higher (67th nationally) in the rankings and considering that stretch covered four games against highly ranked opponents, it looks even better.
Indiana’s Tom Allen has reported 30+ players have had issues with injuries during the season. What’s unclear is how many are out (it’s not 30+). Several defensive players were helped off the field on Saturday. Some may or may not return. Their 2-deeps released did not indicate any players out of the starting lineup from the week prior.
Speaking of not returning, one of Indiana’s wideouts, Jacolby Hewitt, entered the portal over the weekend. His 8 receptions places him down on the list (8th) of IU WRs, however he did return kicks ranking 5th in the B10 on 10 returns with a 22.6 yard average and a long of 72 yards. He’s the sixth player this season to enter the transfer portal (including one Sampson James).
In Allen’s Monday Press Conference, he noted due to the injuries a number of players have been pressed into playing earlier than expected and, without much depth left, have had to play a lot more snaps than what would be ideal. In other words, players are pretty worn out. (That’s a shame.) I never like to put much stock in “body language” but a number of the IU players seem to simply be playing out the string and don’t seem to be putting forth the same level of effort we saw earlier in the year.
Indiana fans will be quick to point out IU’s strength of schedule is ranked #1 by Sagarin. That same site has the #2 toughest schedule belonging to Purdue. (BTW, Nebraska is #3, tough league)
Indiana normally plays their home games on turf. They are 0-1 this year playing on natural grass. 1-1 in 2020 and 1-3 in 2019 (only win was the OT game at Purdue).
Weather for Saturday is predicted to be partly cloudy with temperatures in the low 40’s at kickoff. There is a 6% chance of rain. Winds should be light at 7 mph. Could not expect better weather this time of year and a dry field with low winds should bode well for the Boilers.
Get the Bucket back to where it belongs and hope Tom Allen didn’t sleep with it his bed. But just in case, bring some Purell.
Finally, before I forget: POTFH
How 'bout them Boilers! Let’s play football!
Last edited:
