Purdue looks to avoid mistakes against ball-hawking Illini
After opening the season with three losses in a row, Purdue now enters this week’s trip to Illinois as a team with a two-game winning streak and coming off a bye.
The Fighting Illini haven’t found much success lately, so part of the focus this week for coach Jeff Brohm and his staff is getting his team focused for what it will face this weekend.
“(Illinois) is 3-2. They lost two games and had a chance to win both of them — had a lead on Penn State in the second half and was up on South Florida the second half — so they definitely are a good football team that has improved. We’ll have to play well and do all the small things in order to have a chance to win,” Brohm said.
Part of having that chance will be the ability of depth players to take on a greater role when needed. That’s been an iffy proposition for the Boilermakers this season. Some prominent names, like quarterback David Blough, have thrived when thrust into a starting role. Others have fared less well, and Brohm spent the extra week of practice watching a live scrimmage and tackling drills, seeing who was doing the work needed to get ready.
“These guys have to work hard to improve, and they have to be ready when their time is called. Otherwise, there’s going to be lapses like we’ve had this year, people that aren’t ready,” Brohm said. “That’s on us as coaches as well, but definitely the players have to understand that it’s going to be important for them between now and when their time comes that we give them as many live situations as we can.”
It should be an interesting week to watch the play-calling. Blough has been a big reason for the Boilermakers’ winning streak, and part of that is improved decision-making. Brohm has acknowledged that the play-calling was too conservative early in the season, and it’s getting more aggressive. Look for Purdue to again push the vertical passing game and try to spring Rondale Moore and the rest of the receivers in space.
On the other hand, Illinois’ defense definitely presents its risks. The Illini are tops in the Big Ten in turnover margin, and while David Blough has just one interception in 151 pass attempts, Illinois is averaging two interceptions per game defense.
“They are going to play pressure, get up on you, challenge every throw and when they play zone, they are going to play their typical Tampa 2 zone with their eyes on the quarterback and hope that they bait you into throwing it up the field and they are going to react and pick it off,” Brohm said. “They have done a good job of getting turnovers. We have to be aware of it. We were not great in practice (Sunday) — we threw some contested balls that would have been picked off in a game — so ? we have to practice the ball security and make sure that we’re not giving the other team another opportunity to convert by turning the ball over and for us, we have to win that battle.”