Typically when a well-known figure passes, I tend not to be prone to speak words upon their passing. Me, random dude on my coach, probably isn't the person the figure had the most impact on; that would be there family, their friends, those who they encountered in their profession. I won't say what the Joe Tiller's family, friends, coaching associates, and former players have in recent days.
I also didn't become a Purdue fan until matriculating in 2011; I wasn't following college football during the best days of Tiller, the initial success, the Rose Bowls, the nation aspirations. I can't speak to those emotional connections. But through the process of becoming a fan, interacting with others, and learning more of the history of the program, I came to have a appreciation for the special nature of that moment. A particular appreciation, as my experience with Purdue football has been one defined not by hope, success, and excitement; mine is that of Hope, failure, and a desire for basketball season to start.
Purdue, prior to Tiller's arrival in 1997, was a program wandering in the wilderness. The Boilers, particularly in the 1940s, '50s, and '60s had seen moments of success. The Boilers, in their only previous Rose Bowl season in 1968, started the year ranked #1 in the AP poll; they had multiple unbeaten seasons: 9-0-1 in 1943, 8-0 in 1928 and 1892. But over time, the success faded, to where the decade before Tiller Purdue had remained outside the AP poll, and with a dreadful winning percentage of 30.9%, and had not reached a bowl game since the 1984 season [1].
Then came Tiller, and the spread. Purdue under Tiller had over a winning percentage of 58.2%, reached 10 bowl games (compared to 5 before and 2 after), won a conference title, and produced one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time: Drew Brees. The decline after has produced a total of 2 bowl games (both in 6-6 seasons) and a winning percentage approximating the decade of futility prior to Tiller [1].
How Tiller managed to achieve instant success, of course, is the introduction to the Big Ten of the spread offense; in particular his pass-heavy version of it. Tiller's innovations in the mid-90s of spreading out defenses horizontally via formation and play design were of course parallel to Rich Rodriguez's spread-option and Hal Mumme & Mike Leach's Air Raid; however he should be seen among that group of innovators [2,3]. The biggest illustration of this impact is looking how Big Ten offenses operated before (in this case, the 1995 season) and after (in this case, the 2009 season) Tiller's tenure, as seen in figure 3.
The biggest change was the percent of plays that were passes; in 1995, the average team passed on 40% of plays, with the most pass-happy team (Minnesota, 49%) still running a majority of the time. By 2009, the across the conference 46% of plays were passes, and the most pass-heavy teams (Purdue and IU) were passing on 54% of their plays. This helped to boost yards per play across for the average team (5.3 to 5.6 yards per play) and the worst offensive teams (4.0 to 4.9 yards per play). Completion percentage, and yards per attempt were up for both the average and worst teams as well. Tiller brought the spread to the Big Ten, and the offensive profile of the league changed forever [4,5].
References
[1] https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/schools/purdue/
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Rodriguez
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_raid_offense
[4] http://fs.ncaa.org/Docs/stats/football_records/archive/fbs/1995team.pdf
[5] https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/years/2009-team-offense.html
I also didn't become a Purdue fan until matriculating in 2011; I wasn't following college football during the best days of Tiller, the initial success, the Rose Bowls, the nation aspirations. I can't speak to those emotional connections. But through the process of becoming a fan, interacting with others, and learning more of the history of the program, I came to have a appreciation for the special nature of that moment. A particular appreciation, as my experience with Purdue football has been one defined not by hope, success, and excitement; mine is that of Hope, failure, and a desire for basketball season to start.
Purdue, prior to Tiller's arrival in 1997, was a program wandering in the wilderness. The Boilers, particularly in the 1940s, '50s, and '60s had seen moments of success. The Boilers, in their only previous Rose Bowl season in 1968, started the year ranked #1 in the AP poll; they had multiple unbeaten seasons: 9-0-1 in 1943, 8-0 in 1928 and 1892. But over time, the success faded, to where the decade before Tiller Purdue had remained outside the AP poll, and with a dreadful winning percentage of 30.9%, and had not reached a bowl game since the 1984 season [1].
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| Figure 1, Purdue Before, After, and During the Tiller era [1] |
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| Figure 2, Purdue The Decade Before, After, and During the Tiller era [1] |
How Tiller managed to achieve instant success, of course, is the introduction to the Big Ten of the spread offense; in particular his pass-heavy version of it. Tiller's innovations in the mid-90s of spreading out defenses horizontally via formation and play design were of course parallel to Rich Rodriguez's spread-option and Hal Mumme & Mike Leach's Air Raid; however he should be seen among that group of innovators [2,3]. The biggest illustration of this impact is looking how Big Ten offenses operated before (in this case, the 1995 season) and after (in this case, the 2009 season) Tiller's tenure, as seen in figure 3.
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| Figure 3, Big Ten Offensive Statistics in 1995 and 2009 [4,5] |
References
[1] https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/schools/purdue/
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Rodriguez
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_raid_offense
[4] http://fs.ncaa.org/Docs/stats/football_records/archive/fbs/1995team.pdf
[5] https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/years/2009-team-offense.html
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