10 Observations Minnesota-Purdue

MINNEAPOLIS — Here’s what has us talking after Purdue’s 27-20 loss at Minnesota on Saturday evening.

1 – Purdue beat Purdue. Stop me if you have heard this before: The Boilers lost the turnover battle: 4-1. One of the turnovers was a pick-six in the fourth quarter right after a Gopher TD had tied the game. Minnesota scored 10 points off the turnovers. Purdue is -9 on the season in turnover margin. On and on it goes each week.

“I think we only got one, so minus-two in the turnover margin, plus penalties in a crucial situation, it’s going to be hard to win games, especially in this conference,” said Barry Odom. “So, yeah, disappointing. Very, very frustrated with that, and we improved in a lot of areas, but it does not matter. You win or you lose. And we lost.”

2 – Purdue uncharacteristically was undisciplined vs. the Illini, committing eight penalties last week. The yellow flags persisted tonight. A killer sequence came in the fourth quarter, when DT Demeco Kennedy was flagged twice for face mask penalties to keep the Gopher drive alive that eventually resulted in a tying TD. The Boilers finished with a season-high nine penalties for 71 yards.

“That’s too many (penalties),” said Odom. “The two sticking out in my mind and will forever, the two on the third downs, on the face mask on the quarterback. You are tackling high, you got to go lower, especially on a big quarterback, and anything around the head and neck area, they’re going to call, which it certainly was. I’m not disputing the call, but I think there is some fundamental teaching that goes along with that. There’s an understanding to get free past the blocker and have a chance to get the quarterback down somehow, some way, number one, we’ve got to sink our hips in the tackling in those situations. And we didn’t tonight.”

3 – Purdue dominated the stats (444 yards to 262), should have won … but it didn’t. The program hasn’t won a Big Ten road game since 2022. It hasn’t won a Big Ten game–period–since 2023. Does this team know how to finish? How to win? When key plays have to be made, they aren’t.

“I want give Minnesota credit,” said Odom. “They made crucial plays at crucial situations to win the game. We did not. So, you get third-down stops on defense, and you have face masks two different times when you would have been off the field, and then obviously the turnovers … .”

4 – Purdue was moving the ball with aplomb in the second quarter, advancing to the red zone. Then, it resorted to a gimmick play–and Devin Mockobee threw an INT on a halfback pass. Why call that play then? Why? Just stick with the conventional offense. It was working fine. No need to get cute. The gaffe cost Purdue at least three points … maybe seven. Later, Ryan Browne tossed a pick-six (his second INT of the night) midway through the fourth quarter of a tie game–a crusher. He was hurt by numerous drops–again–by the wideouts in going 21-of-40 for 203 yards.

“Just like any other play or deceptive that we’ve called, the look was there,” said Odom. “Call it, run it. Even after we snapped the ball, it was wide open. He didn’t lead him the right direction. Unfortunate.”

5 – Purdue’s secret weapon: No. 2 QB Malachi Singleton. He capped Purdue’s first drive of the game by jetting 40 yards for a TD jaunt on 4th-and-2. He came in during the third quarter and picked up a big first down with a six-yard run in the red zone. And he had some nice runs later in the second half, and even threw a pass. Using Singleton in various packages has been a nice wrinkle.

6 – Feed Mockobee. This was his best game since running for 126 yards vs. Southern Illinois, notching 98 yards on 21 carries to move into fourth place on Purdue’s all-time rushing chart. He entered the game with 265 yards rushing in two games vs. the Gophers. Purdue finished with 253 yards rushing vs. a Gopher D that was No. 9 in the nation vs. the run (79.0 ypg) entering the day.

7 – The communication breakdowns in the secondary were sobering in the previous game vs. Illinois. How would the pass defense look this week? Better. We saw 12 PBUs with three by Tony Grimes. Purdue got an INT, its first of the season, and its first since November 2, 2024, against Northwestern. Credit Myles Slusher, who snagged the ball after it was tipped by Smiley Bradford.

8 – How about the Purdue rush D? Minnesota had just 13 yards rushing at the half and finished with only 30 on a night it basically gave up on the run. The Boiler d-line played its best game of the season with six TFLs and two sacks–save for penalties.

9 – CJ Nunnally continues to shine. The Akron transfer has started the last four games, getting better and better. He came into tonight with three sacks and 3.5 TFLs. Tonight, Nunnally had a sack and two TFLs.

10 – On to Northwestern, which has won three in a row and is coming off a stunning 22-21 win at Penn State. No one said this would be easy. Anything Purdue can build on from tonight?

“When you play with great effort and you give yourself an opportunity to win games, the margin of error, how slim and thin it is,” said Odom. “We understand how important every rep in practice is, and those habits will continue to show up on game day. A lot of lessons out there. The opportunity to learn from those and correct them and fix them, we’ve got six short days to get it right … .”