Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Bucket Week


Both Purdue and IU's football programs are struggling to not kick the bucket this week.

Hey-yo! Lamest lead sentence ever?

Truth is, it's bucket week and there's really nothing else for either program to be thinking about. No bowl games, no postseason practices... and in Bill Lynch's case, maybe no job after this. So in a good way, it allows the players, fans, alumni, mascots, training table workers, janitors, vendors, etc., to all focus on their rival. All energy goes into this game this year... all hate, including "International IU Sucks Week," featured on Facebook. (Which, sadly, IU fans are joining so they can tell Boilermakers that they suck. There's even a complete toolbag on there who keeps saying "Got 5?" And can you guess where he went to college? Not IU.)

Courtesy, Chad
Okay, so I'm stretching here, trying to give this game more boost. Thing is, though, while it really doesn't mean much.... it still kinda does. That absolute last thing we want to see the season end with is a loss to IU. IU football is terrible. Don't misunderstand, Purdue football is a mess right now. A true mess. Beyond the injuries, the coaching staff seems, at times, overwhelmed. The players don't seem well-prepared. It's giving us this sinking feeling that Purdue football is completely sliding back into the irrelevance of the pre-Tiller era.

But you still can't lose to IU. Simply cannot happen.

Some factoids about the bucket game to chew on:

  • Purdue is 11-2 in the last 13 bucket games. 
  • The two losses ('07 and '01) were by a combined nine points.
  • The 11 wins were by a combined 304 points (or 27.6 ppg)
  • Purdue won 15-14 in 1989.
  • Purdue won 1-0 in 1894 (interestingly, a year after winning 60-0)
  • From 1892 to 1910, the two played 13 times, with only one of those being at Indiana.
  • IU's last bucket win in West Lafayette was in 1996. We were at that game and Purdue wore all-black (which was a novelty back then) and IU wore all-white (not a good look). 
  • Bill Lynch is 1-2 against Purdue, with one of those losses being the 62-10 blasting in Joe Tiller's last game. One surmises that Lynch's win over Purdue the previous year is one of the reasons he has held onto his job. Much like at Purdue, if you can beat the rival, the old alums are happy. Lynch could win this game on Saturday and be 2-2 against Purdue. Not bad.
  • The last post-Thanksgiving matchup was 1995, when Purdue went down to Bloomington and Mike Alstott curb-stomped the Hoosiers, 51-14. 

I actually don't have a lot of great memories of the Purdue-IU rivalry from my days on campus because I started 0-2 against IU (losses in '94 and '96). I like seeing all the spirit (hate?) brewing on campus right now. Let's hope our Boilers take out their frustrations of an infuriating season on the Hoosiers.

7 comments:

T-Mill said...

Appropriate you said Mike Alstott curb-stomped them in 1995. That was Collletto's best day coaching. He gave the ball to Alstott all day and let him run over Hoosiers.

BoilerUpAT said...

We will take out an entire season of frustration on the poor Hoosiers Saturday. Our team is the healthiest its been in a while, our offense is actually starting to move the ball and our Defense is very physical. All spell big problems for IU. They can't run the ball, and rely on the pass. Our secondary is coming to life, and our pass rush is pretty good. Kerrigan send off? YES. He will eat Chappell for lunch and destroy his will to live in his last game in Old Gold and Black. I can't wait for us to commence this ass kicking.

BTFU
POTFH

Unknown said...

The last post-Thanksgiving game was 11/24 in 2001...I remember hearing we lost in the airport, on my way back to Purdue from home.

BoilerPaulie said...

Of note: Freshman cornerback Ricardo Allen has had two interceptions returned for touchdowns in as many weeks. Rod Woodson holds the career record at Purdue with three.

He's got time to catch up, but why not just do it this Saturday?

Anonymous said...

how do you win a football game 1-0?

BoilerPaulie said...

ledman24, That's a good question. I have a book called "The Handy Sports Answer Book" and I remembered reading about the evolution of scoring in it before, so I looked it up. This doesn't definitively answer your question, but maybe it offers some explanation:

"Scoring was fairly informal at first. One point was usually awarded for advancing the ball past the goal line, either by kicking or carrying it over. In 1883 the first real scoring system was put in place, with five points being awarded for field goals, two points for touchdowns, and four points for kicking the point-after through the uprights; obviously the emphasis was still on kicking.

The next year, touchdowns were changed to four points, the point-after conversion to two points, while field goals remained five points. As the game moved farther away from its English roots, the rules reflected the new emphasis on carrying the ball, not kicking it. In 1898 the value of a touchdown was raised to five points and the point-after was reduced to one. The field goal stayed at five points until 1904 when it was lowered to four points; and in 1909 it was reduced again to its current three points. The touchdown was finally raised to its present value of six points in 1912."

So I'm not totally sure, because it mentions nothing about safeties, but maybe we were still mysteriously following the 1-point touchdown rules in 1894? it's possible, since the NCAA wasn't founded until 1910, and the forward pass didn't exist until 1906.

lordredeagle said...

according to http://www.cfbdatawarehouse.com/data/div_ia/bigten/purdue/opponents_records.php?teamid=1516

the 1-0 game was an IU forfeit, which could explain the odd score.