Purdue is a quality opponent
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Glad you thinking losing is funny. Northwestern has now won nine straight games and eight in a row in the B1G. I'll take the wins no matter how they come.
As for the experienced D, we had two new starting safeties and a true freshman at CB for most of the game. I think they did pretty well, all things considered.
That pretty much applies to everything in life. Time goes by fast. Health, wealth, success can all be quite ephemeral. It's also foolish to think the future is going to be exactly how you expect it.
Purdue is definitely trending upward but they are a couple of good recruiting classes away from putting the team on the ground that a couple of Purdue posters here are describing. If they keep Brohm for two more years, then they might be looking at some Tiller-esque seasons. Their defense was decimated by graduation from last year and are not going to be as strong as last year's unit. They are going to have to win shoot-outs. Our D-Line which is very good was living in Purdue's backfield on passing plays.
Looking at their schedule game-by-game, bowl eligibility is going to require better line play on both sides of the ball than they showed against us.
The difference between their team and our team is that the additional film that other coaches can now see about us does not tell them much they did not already know. Other than the Wildcat Formation Variant, there was nothing there that should have surprised Brohm's staff. The other coaches seeing film of this game is going to really change how they prepare for Purdue.
The announcers kept talking about how Brohm wants his team to be tough. That is the only way they are going to get back to a bowl. By being tough. They are not going to get there with the level of talent they have on the field right now. Not against their schedule.
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It remains to be seen if this is Fitzgerald's best team, or even his second- or third-best team. There are 11 games to go. I'll settle for the win.
LMAO! This comment coming from a perennial basement dweller who's had a couple of decent years. Just remember, this is likely as good as Northwestern will ever get as a fringe Top 25 team, while Purdue is just rebuilding from the worst era in its history. If anyone should be humble, it's a Northwestern fan.
I have a lot of respect for Fitzgerald. He's done an amazing job and is as classy as they come. But the comments on here would suggest Northwstern dominated the game and is a perennial powerhouse, which they're not. Don't act like you're anything close to Ohio St, Wisconsin, or Penn State. What I saw last night from your defense and offense says Northwestern is mediocre at best. Lots of depth with very little speed and average talent of whom Fitzgerald gets the most.
We probably beat five teams in the B1G West last year who supposedly had been recruiting better than Northwestern for years. If you have a top 10-15 class, you've probably recruited very well. Anything above that is basically a crapshoot. Brohm is a clever coach and you might very well beat us down the road, but I'm not impressed by recruiting rankings. And thanks, we will enjoy it while we can.
Reading material for you so you can comprehend not just waht I am saying, but what others are. Good luck the rest of this season. Hope Northwestern does well.
https://www.indystar.com/story/spor...-northwestern-but-big-ten-problem/1143276002/
Our perennial basement dweller has been fairly competitive team in this league since 1995. From the 2000 season on, in other words the 21st century, we've won 21 games more than Purdue, and that includes several seasons of the Joe Tiller era. Find me one poster on this board who suggested Northwestern dominated the game.
You're also not going to find anyone on this board comparing us to Ohio State, Wisconsin or Penn State, either (although we have a pretty good record against Wisconsin over the past 20 years or so). By the same token, don't be talking smack to us when our team has outperformed yours over the past 18 years. If we're perennial bottom dwellers, what does that make you?
That's what I was wondering. This guy looks like he's trying to pick a fight with a ghost. No one is being particularly arrogant on here at all. Now, people are answering back when the one PU fan started talking trash, but otherwise, everyone on here has been pretty even-keeled about the game. We won. We're happy. We didn't dominate and Purdue looked good in some areas and not so good in others. While we all like to think one game gives us insight into the rest of the season, as NU fans, we know to take them one at a time.
I made a living reading and writing for about 40 years. I comprehend things very well. Most people think Purdue is on the upswing. In fact I went on the Purdue board and said as much while wishing them well for the rest of the season. But you apparently think the other teams are going to stand pat while Purdue improves. We still have a lot of young players on our team. Who is to say that Northwestern, Nebraska, Iowa, Minny and even Wisconsin, which is replacing a lot of guys on defense, won't be better next year? Good luck to you as well.
Posts like these are why I follow "the Rock" almost exclusively. When its free, anyone can do it.
Fun fact:
Since conference realignment in 2014, Cats have 5th best conference record, better than Michigan, Penn State and Nebraska.
Purdue, out of 14 teams ranks.....14th.
We've been hearing "enjoy it while you can" from pretty much every Big Ten school for about 23 years now...and we just keep enjoying it. We aren't a powerhouse, and I don't see a single person on here saying we are. But we are a solid and consistent program that is head and shoulders above Purdue over the last 20 years...which I would say is a large enough sample size. I'd even say we are the sixth best program in the conference since 1995 (Michigan, Michigan State, Penn State, Ohio State, and Wisconsin). Probably in the same mix with Iowa and Nebraska. Is that phenomenal? No. But basement dweller? Give me a break.
I respect Purdue and it does appear they are on an upswing, but you just come off like a sore loser who expects Purdue to be a powerhouse within the next few years. Good luck with that.
I just needed to respond to this post because I thought it was funny. Since 2014, Purdue had Hazel at helm, and I believe those years were the darkest years Purdue ever had. Purdue actually has a decent history in football.
As for the game, I thought it was an entertaining game and your defense is so much better than Purdue's. Purdue is young, which sucks, but we are rebuilding.
As for the other posters, please don't think all Purdue fans are that way.
I hope you guys do well the rest of the season.
10-3 vs 7-6 and 31-27 suggests we're closer to OSU, UW, and PSU than Purdue is at the moment. When you guys rebuild, Purdue fans will return to being the insufferable pretentious douchebags characteristic of college fans of successful programs. Looks like they have a head start already.
It's not only college football fans. I've been a Cubs fan for more than 60 years and gotta say that some Cubs fans have definitely gone over to the pretentious douchebag side. Threads about the team seem to be divided into two camps: Some people agonize over every loss and talk incessantly about how everything stinks and the team is going downhill; the other faction thinks Joe Maddon is Christ incarnate and can do no wrong. I haven't decided yet which viewpoint irritates me more.
Some shaky tackling and I think the speed of Moore caught them a little by surprise. I believe 76 of those 202 yards were on one run. I'm not too worried about our front seven at this point. If we're whiffing against Duke (especially since the Cats should be fired up after their whipping last year), I'll be more concerned. I do wish our secondary had another game under its belt before hitting another P5 opponent.
I thought the secondary did very well after Newsome took over the second corner position. I'm not as concerned.
I'm more concerned about getting the offense unstuck. We were shut out in the 2nd half, and that's not good.
Last year, they passed for nearly 350 yards on us. This year our D-Line was in their quarterback's face every time he dropped back to pass. So they were forced to run the ball even though they were way behind. They amassed a lot of yards and got some big runs from that Moore guy (who was pretty scary) and then got more yards when we began on focus on Moore. So, while I wish they did not have 202 yards rushing on us, the fact that they were running when they should have been passing was a part of the reason that they burned up the entire fourth quarter scoreless That plus a six minute 4-minute drill by our offense.
I return to my main thought which is that - other than the division win - there is nothing we can really take from this until we see some more games by both teams.
With detailed narrative explanation. Purdue is an engineering school and you cannot expect them to understand subtext. I say this as an engineer.
They had a 76 yd run by Moore (option play) and 45 yard run by Knox. Most of the other yards were from Blough scrambles.
Well, it was kind of a fun game already this year. Brohm is gonna improve Purdue, so Fitz better get on his horse and up our game too, or we might actually lose to y'all.