Postmortem 2015: Purdue

Excerpt from 101 Purdue Football Jokes:

Q: How bad was Purdue football in 2015?

A: When 2015 Purdue football sits around the house, 2015 Purdue football SITS AROUND THE HOUSE.

But seriously, folks, Purdue football was awful in 2015. After a slight improvement in Darrell Hazell's second year as coach in 2014, the Boilers regressed and now we're just marking time until Hazell's buyout becomes cheap enough that the AD pulls the plug on this disaster.

Rather than go through the season game-by-game, let's just hit some of the peaks and valleys. Purdue finished the season 2-10 (1-7), which is not good at all.

Highlights

• Purdue 55, Nebraska 45. The Boilers intercepted Ryker Fyfe four times (three by Anthony Brown) and managed to score touchdowns with the resulting good field position. This was the first home B1G win for Darrell Hazell.
• Purdue 38, Indiana State 14. Purdue did not lose to an FCS team, which is good. Three of the six total Purdue victories in the Darrell Hazell era have been against FCS teams.
• Somewhat close games were played by Purdue against Michigan State (21-24) and Northwestern (14-21), two pretty good teams.
• Freshman RB Markell Jones played pretty well.
• At the Minnesota game, in which it was garbage time about midway through the third quarter, I got to see a ref tell a Minnesota coach that a player was not lining up correctly. Then I got to see the coach yell at the player. I appreciate that the ref did not call a penalty which would have prolonged the game.
• The offensive and defensive coordinators were both fired.
• The earth did not crash into the sun.

Lowlights

• Purdue was soundly defeated (17 points or more) in six out of twelve games this season.
• Purdue lost every road game.
• Illinois 48, Purdue 14!
• It seems logical to think that the more a QB plays, the better he would get. This did not happen in 2015 (or 2013 or 2014). Just like in 2013 and 2014, a QB switch in 2015 was not the solution to the problem (although it was worth a try). Purdue could have Drew Brees come back, and he would throw about 50% and get sacked ten times a game in this offense.
• S&P+ Rankings: Offense 84, Defense 79.
• Recruiting is bottom of the barrel.
• Too many other things to list.

The Future

In last year's article, I created a graph based on the win improvement from 2014 to 2015. As you can see, things were looking pretty good for the Boilers. By 2019, the Boilers would have a perfect season.

Projected Win Graph made after 2014

As with any projection model, it needs to be updated once more data exists. Based on the pattern of a two win improvement followed by a one win decrease, I have created a new graph.

Updated Win Projection Graph

As you can see, the 2015 Purdue football season has really upset the optimistic predictions from last season. Now it will take until 2032 for the Boilers to go undefeated and win twelve games.

I'll end with another excerpt from 101 Purdue Football Jokes:

Q: How many 2015 Purdue Football does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

A: To get to the other side.