Luke Fickell answers how Graham Harrell firing impacts Purdue game prep

Luke Fickell noted Purdue’s offense could see tweaks after the team parted ways with offensive coordinator Graham Harrell.

Granted, how many changes will Wisconsin actually see in Saturday’s game? That’s up for debate.

Things could change for the Boilermakers, but it’s hard to tell if anything will be drastic by the time the two teams square up on the field.

“I mean, I try not to speculate,” Fickell said. “I try not to worry about anything in anybody else’s program. Obviously, we’re playing them, and we got to prepare to play them. And so there’s some things you’re trying to, you know, figure out, but who knows if it hasn’t been like that the last few weeks, right? I mean, there’s a lot of things you have no idea. It’s just another one of those things. It’s another obstacle in the way, and things that you have to assume and prepare for.”

There’s no simple way to figure it out, according to Fickell. All Wisconsin can do is watch the film, map out a game plan and get to work. That’s whether Harrell is there or not.

“I don’t know if there’s an exact way of trying to find out, well, who’s calling it, who’s I mean, like they’re probably never going to tell you,” Fickell said. “And to me, that’s just, you know, trying not to single out anybody in particular. So it’s obviously a unique situation early in the year. I think it’s a bad part, a little bit, of our game. But again, I’m not there to speculate. I’m not here to judge of any sort. Just here to make sure our guys are prepared in the best way we possibly can.”

Harrell was a third of the way through his second season on staff in West Lafayette. He was on a three-year deal with the program as their highest-paid assistant.

In his coaching career, he also worked on staff at West Virginia, USC, North Texas, and Washington State during the last decade.

However, Harrell’s work at Purdue was not going well, especially to start this season. In 2023, the Boilermakers were 87th in the nation at 23.9 points per game, while posting 380 yards of offense a game. 

Through four games in 2024, they’ve now posted just 21.8 ppg., which is 108th in the country, with 322 yards on offense. That’s despite a 49-point outing in the opener as they’ve put up just 38 points since in three losses, including 7 against Notre Dame, 21 against Oregon State, and 10 against Nebraskathis past weekend.