Speak With Data

Coming into this past weekend, I knew something special was happening around Purdue football. It was different in the way fans talked; it was different in the sellout of the student section. Driving into West Lafayette, it became clearer. The IM Fields and frats were nearly full of cars... at 11:00am for a 4:00pm kickoff. Walking into the stadium, I was amazed when a couple friends and I (they are current students, thus we were in the student section) were having trouble finding seats just before kickoff. Once we finally found spots, this was our view: Figure 1: Are these people sure they're in the right stadium? Despite the consensus that this game would not end it our favor (and it didn't), there was a newfound passion among Purdue faithful. With a lead at halftime, that passion doubled. Despite struggles in the second half, people remained in the stadium until the final seconds ticked down (and not just the Michigan fans). It's a new day for Purdue football. Now...

Since my brother-and-law is currently a student at Mizzou, last weekend my wife, some of my wife's family, and I (later joined by some of our friends from band and ΚΚΨ) headed down to Columbia for a football game. We expected Purdue to be tested by a team that has dominated the SEC East in recent history, but struggled last season. Then something else happened. Figure 1: A Different Kind of Purdue Game My Purdue fandom has been dominated by falling short in big moments under Hope, then falling short on any moment under Hazell. (I'm in the Mechanical Engineering Class of 2015 - that should give a reference of what how little I know of successful Purdue teams.) I'm not sure how to react to something like this. Other than by being in awe of some of the numbers. Declawing the Tigers Purdue's defense was fantastic in Columbia on Saturday. The Tigers' offense, coming into the game , was not a bad group, and expectations were for a shootout. Instead, Mizzou mana...

The first home game for Brohm went exactly how you expect Big Ten-MAC games to go: we dropped 44 on THE Ohio (and only gave up 21). For those in West Lafayette, I hope you enjoyed some discounts at UBS on Monday (before their owner realizes 5% per touchdown is a terrible idea with an offensive minded coach).  For the rest of you, here is some nice analysis (and bad puns) available for the great price of $0.00 (Touchdown Monday discounts accepted any day of the week). Blough-ing Away Doubts Once again, two quarterbacks played. However, unlike last week where the Boilers played rather similarly with either, Blough's performance separated him from Sindelar. Figure 1: Drives by Each Quarterback (Sparks and Blough Split a Drive Without Passing) With Sindelar in (excluding the final drive in which he took a knee to finish the game) Purdue's offense was hardly efficient, scoring 2.5 points per drive and managing only 4.89 yards per play. Blough led the Boilermakers d...

This year, I'm going to be debuting a new feature of a weekly summary, by the numbers, of the previous weekend's Purdue football game. It may also include general musings on the season and/or thoughts about the next opponent. Starting with the opener in Indianapolis against the Louisville Cardinals... Overall Performance In a game where Louisville was favored heavily, Purdue nearly shocked the Cardinals. Alone (and not including the fact the Boilers lost the game towards the end rather than Louisville winning it) that is impressive for a team with few expectations for this season. But comparing the performance of the Boilers to the expectation of points scored by (Football Outsider's Offensive S&P+) and against (Defensive S&P+) by last year's Louisville squad something rather interesting reveals itself... Figure 1, Score Compared to 2016 S&P+ for Louisville (1,2) ...Purdue played significantly better than an average team would have been expect...