Because the 2015 Big Ten football schedule is out and it still looks like a 1994 Big Ten football schedule for Purdue, if Purdue had had the balls to schedule a non-con game with Nebraska. (Which they did not. Thank goodness.)
We noted Rutgers' tough-looking go of a first season in the Big Ten in 2014 last week, but 2015 looks to be doing them no favors, either. Again, obviously no Big Ten season is every easy, per se, so what you need to look for to make these determinations is those brutal stretches. Those packs of games where a precious month goes by and you feel like you've just tried to cross West State Street at 1:15 AM while people are careening past the Chauncy mall. (That's what you get at this blog -- local flavor!)
Your head is kind of spinning and you have no idea what just happened, but you know your helmet is on crooked and your bones hurt. RU has that sort of stretch again in 2015, as from 10/24 to 11/14 they go:
vs OSU
@ Wisc
@ Michigan
vs Nebraska
Fun times! We know it all too well.
Purdue, though, as I mentioned, continues to be like the youngest child in a family of 14 kids. We don't get to play with any of the new things until everyone else has had a turn. So far, no Rutgers and no Maryland until at least 2016. I don't suppose that really matters to anyone.
In 2015, the Boilers will go @ MSU, vs Minn, @ Wisc, vs Neb, vs Ill, @ Northwestern, @ Iowa, vs IU. Their non-con games will be @ Marshall, vs Indiana State, vs ND and vs Bowling Green.
2 comments:
I'm looking forward to the @Maryland game as it's only a hour from home.
Purdue has played Nebraska exactly once: they won 28-0, in West Lafayette in 1958. For context, that Jack Mollenkopf team went 6-1-2, with its only loss at #6 Wisconsin; they beat four ranked teams (MSU, ND, Illinois, and Northwestern) and then tied Indiana to finish the season at #13.
Nebraska, by contrast, finished 3-7, managing wins over Penn State, Iowa State, and Pitt. Oklahoma crushed them 40-7 in their season finale. That was Year 2 of the Bill Jennings Experiment; he never broke .500, and was the last Cornhuskers coach in that category. (Related Nebraska trivia: former coach and AD Potsy Clark, 6-13 in two seasons, also coached Detroit (NFL, that is) and Butler. He was successful, too, winning an NFL title in 1935, and posting winning records with both teams.)
The last time that school down south played Nebraska, it was a nationally-televised game. I remember this because we were up in Detroit for my birthday to go see the Tigers play - a long rain delay meant we went back to our grandparents' place instead of waiting it out, only to find Indiana on the tee-vee. (This was 1978, so it was even more unusual than it would be today.) Nebraska won 69-17.
BUT. While that was the last in a four-game series that Nebraska swept, that series broke a 10-game unbeaten streak that Indiana compiled against the Cornhuskers: that man Jennings was involved, as was Clark and a few others. Indiana's all-time record against Nebraska is 9-7-3, with seven wins coming in Lincoln.
Given the likely outcome of the next matchup, it's understandable that both schools would want to postpone the next meeting. (Unfortunately, that's not an option for the Good Guys.)
Purdue has never faced Rutgers; they've not played Maryland during the regular season and have just the one bowl game against them (the 24-7 loss in the Sunshine Bowl ... er, Champs Sports bowl after the 2006 seasons).
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