We all know that this has been particularly dark period for Purdue football. Thanks to the Jeff Brohm era, the last thirteen years have only been a shit sandwich, the shit-bread being the tenures of Darrell Hazell and Ryan Walters. But one thing I’ve learned as long as I’ve lived in Boiler country, the minions of Purdue Pete are nothing if not pesssimists.
Tonight’s the night to change that.
It doesn’t matter the sport, it doesn’t matter the team, and it doesn’t matter how deep the hole is. In order to climb out, there must be moments when you change the narrative. These moments are always circumstantially-driven, and one is about to unfold in Ross-Ade tonight.
Tonight’s the night Purdue can shake the “terrible” label. The fact is Purdue football is not terrible. It’s actually almost mediocre. Trust me, I’ve followed a lot of truly awful sports teams in my day, and while it may not feel like a big step up, it’s time for the fans to learn to claim their victories.
Purdue fans love to lock in on the negatives; to be fair there’s been a lot of them recently. I’m not trying to tell you the Notre Dame loss wasn’t ugly. But this year, there’s a lot more positives. But if you throw that out, along with the de facto exhibition game against Indiana State, every other game has had a huge positive.
- Wake Forest: Took a team that played it’s way to being ranked to double OT. Cranked out 29 first downs and over 450 yards of total offense.
- UCLA: Found a way to still hang 38 on the board with 488 yards of total offense when the running game had been completely stifled
- Illinois: Ugly game, but still notched the first conference win and first road win in God-know-how long
- Minnesota: Dominated a team coming off a huge win of it’s own (Michigan) making the first time this team won back-to-back conference game is on God-knows-even-longer.
The bottom line heading into tonight is the Boilers are 3-3, and has a winning record in conference play after three games in even-God-may-not-know-low-long. From that, it stands to reason Purdue is a favorite at home for the first time in eons. Case closed…this team isn’t terrible.
But now here comes the circumstances.
Tonight’s the night to change the perception. Tonight, Purdue has a national TV game hosting a big-time program which was in the national championship game three years ago. However, Washington is ripe to be the “big” program against which Purdue can make a statement.
The Huskies are also 3-3, but they were less than impressive against Washington State, and struggled outright against Utah State. Since they hit their conference schedule, they’ve looked progressively worse in each of three straight losses. On top of that, since the westward expansion of B1G Ten, the teams on the coast historically do not travel to “traditional” midwestern fall weather, and 50 degrees, windy, and rainy is about as “traditional” October B1G Ten as it gets.
Despite all that, the Huskies have name recognition which is why they are bringing the national TV spotlight. That’s the same spotlight Purdue needs to move up to being officially “mediocre.”
Tonight’s the night.
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