Purdue hopes to avoid MSU replay against Iowa
Purdue’s four-game winning streak came to a crashing halt against Michigan State, and the 23-13 defeat puts the Boilermakers’ Big Ten title hopes on life support. With two conference losses and a 4-4 record, the Boilermakers likely need to win out and get some help to reach the title game.
But there’s still a lot on the line, starting with securing bowl eligibility and the best postseason destination possible. And one of the teams they’ll be competing with for both the conference crown and bowl positioning is Iowa.
The No. 19 Hawkeyes come into Ross-Ade Stadium with a 6-2 record, coming off a 30-24 loss to Penn State. Iowa is similar to Michigan State — a top defense combined with an inconsistent offense. That doesn’t give coach Jeff Brohm and his staff much time to correct what went wrong against the Spartans.
“We are going to have to find a way to create some big plays, hopefully get a lead and maybe take them out of their game,” Brohm said. “We were not able to do that the last game and it hurt us.”
Saturday was one of the few times this season that the Boilermaker offensive line got pushed around. Iowa has been doing that to opposing offenses all season long, so this will be a challenging week for the offensive line.”
“They are similar to Michigan State,” Brohm said.
“It’s a Big Ten defense and they are very physical up front. They come off the ball. They knock you back. They get to the pass rusher. They have a ton of sacks this year, and it’s not by blitzing. They create pressure with four guys and they create push, and that’s what we had a hard time with last week and we’re going to have to work hard to improve upon that this week.”
It would also help for quarterback David Blough to avoid mistakes. He’s been excellent this season but seemed to regress against Michigan State with three interceptions.
“We’ve got to work hard to make sure that he maintains that toughness and stands in the pocket and does what he’s supposed to and if it gets too tight in there, he’s got to make plays with his feet and we just can’t turn the ball over, especially when you only have the ball for a little over 20 minutes of the game. You’ve got to take advantage of all your opportunities and we didn’t do that,” Brohm said.