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There's really no need for an introduction here. We all feel the same way today. At long last the Purdue fan base is united. For all the wrong reasons though. A 16-23 loss to Indiana for the second year in a row for the first time in 20 years. That's depressing. So did anything go well for the Boilermakers? Is there anything the team can build upon during this long offseason of fan complaining and moaning? Let's take a look.
The Good
- Akeem Hunt continues to show us all why he's going to be missed. The offensive line was pretty brutal yesterday, more on that later, but Hunt made something out of nothing on numerous plays. Hunt finished with 171 yards on 19 rushes including the only big offensive play of the day for Purdue which was the 82 yards touchdown run.
- The tackling by the defense was sure and honestly might've been the best they've done all year. The offense continually put them in awful situations by committing four turnovers. The defense even did a really good job on Tevin Coleman holding him to 130 yards on 29 rushes while also managing to keep him out of the endzone.
The Bad
- Punting was not great today as it was a game of field position that Purdue somehow lost. Thomas Meadows punted four times and averaged just 30.8 yards. That's not what you want especially when your offense is anemic and does basically nothing all day.
- Danny Ezechukwu being ejected while I thought it was an awful call you just can't put yourself in a situation for a referee to make that call. It's a judgement call of course but you want to not even give the referee the option to screw up the call. He has shown real promise though as the season wore on so he's someone I'm looking forward to watch next year.
- Having to listen to Chuck Long. Enough said.
The Ugly
- Where to begin here? How about the fact that the offense managed a pathetic 123 yards passing on 19 completions. There was absolutely no separation by the receivers and there were no moves made after the catch either. Danny Anthrop apparently was the only receiver who could get separation against any DB. His absence was obvious as the season moved on.
- The regression of the offensive line was just as obvious and even more depressing. This offensive line was a question mark going into the season but had held up surprisingly well. They had struggled in the second halves of games against Michigan State and Nebraska especially but you can overlook that and still see growth. Yesterday though against an awful IU defense Austin Appleby had little to no time to throw and Akeem Hunt was given little to no running lanes to get through. This was the most disappointing aspect of the game to me.
- The defensive line did a poor job of getting to the young IU quarterback who apparently is the next Johnny Football if you listen to the sideline reporter from the BTN. Purdue had a great chance to rattle a young QB and take him out of the game but instead gave him time and emboldened him to play a decent enough game to win.
I could keep going but I just can't. I don't have the heart to continue to write about what went wrong yesterday. To sum it up it was everything. Other than Akeem Hunt no one individual really stood out. Purdue's got a lot of work to do this offseason if they hope to have a different fate next season. I've got at least two more Purdue football posts coming later this week. One is going to be a general thoughts on the season type of post and one is more of a rant about the football team in general. Stay tuned for those. Should be a super fun off-season.