Three and Out: Purdue's loss to Wisconsin
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Wisconsin earned its 17th consecutive win over Purdue Friday night, dominating the first half of both teams’ Big Ten opener, then weathering a third-quarter glimmer from the hosts, en route to a 38-17 victory. The Boilermakers drop to 1-3.
Wisconsin QB Tanner Mordecai ran for two touchdowns against a Purdue defense that’s been carved up by the quarterback run the past few weeks. Braelon Allen ran for two others.
Hudson Card and Tyrone Tracy ran for scores for Purdue.
Three more turnovers for Purdue, though one was a picked-off Hail Mary to end the first half and another was a re-fumbled fumble recovery of a play that at first appeared dead. Either way, that’s seven turnovers in two weeks.
Three takeaways …
• When it mattered in the first half, Purdue just wasn’t competitive at the line of scrimmage, on either side of the ball. That’s not a new development between these two programs, but again, the more things change, the more they stay the same.
Wisconsin mashed Purdue with the run game — again, the quarterback doing the most damage with the option and on offense — starting 8-of-8 on third down — and Card had no time to throw, forced into scrambles time and again.
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It wasn’t until Purdue went into hurry-up mode in the third quarter — and perhaps Wisconsin went into prevent-minded defense playing from ahead that the Boilermakers started moving the ball and scoring.
• Game conditions mattered, but Purdue showed some life running the football in scramble mode. Perhaps two-minute game is something they can mix in every now and then from here on out.
• Purdue’s got to give Card more time. When he has time to set his feet and make throws, he’s pretty good. There’s not a whole lot of rush-negating offensive fodder being shown to this point (screens, draws, etc.).
