Purdue notched a blowout win over Minnesota, 45-17 on Saturday at Ross-Ade Stadium. Purdue (3-2) mounted enough of a lead in the first quarter to hang on for the victory. The Boilermakers’ explosive offense used big plays to take down Minnesota (1-5). Purdue had four plays of 20 yards or more on its way to victory. With 2:47 to go in the third quarter, Akeem Hunt ran 30 yards, the Boilermakers’ biggest gain of the game. The big play set up an 11-play drive that gave Purdue a 45-3 lead after Raheem Mostert ran 25 yards to paydirt.
It’s Week 6. Believe it or not, we’ll be midway through the 2011 Big Ten football season at the conclusion of Saturday’s slate of five Big Ten games. This week, BTN has Indiana hosting undefeated Illinois at a special time, 2:30 p.m. ET, and Northwestern entertaining perfect Michigan at 7. Don’t forget, Dave, Gerry and Howard will be on-site at Ryan Field at 6 p.m. ET for an hour-long Countdown To Kickoff show. Use our GameFinder to find your BTN game and track all of the action on our Big Ten scoreboard. Watch our latest Big Ten Blast here and check out Brent Yarina’s Week 6 Preview in this post.
Penn State coach Joe Paterno is getting rid of his cane and says he’ll be on the sidelines this week. That’s just one of the tidbits you can hear in the audio from the weekly Big Ten Conference football coaches teleconference with reporters. Read the selected tweets from @B1Gfootball at the conference office, then listen to any of the 12 Big Ten football coaches now.
Every week during the football season, Brent Yarina posts his latest Big Ten Power Rankings. Week 5 marked the opening of Big Ten play, and Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin all remained undefeated. As for the power rankings, they are not meant to mimic the Big Ten standings. What fun would that be? They aren’t scientific, either. They’re simply Brent’s thoughts on where each Big Ten team stands after its latest game and entering its next contest. Agree? Disagree? Tweet @BTNBrentYarina.
(AP) Michael Floyd had 12 catches for 137 yards and a touchdown to help Notre Dame defeat Purdue 38-10 on Saturday night. Cierre Wood ran for a career-high 191 yards, Jonas Gray rushed for 94 yards and Tommy Rees passed for 254 yards and three touchdowns for the Fighting Irish (3-2). Notre Dame outgained Purdue 551 yards to 276 in its most dominant performance of the season. It was a season-high yardage total for the Irish and their third game with at least 500 yards of offense. Caleb TerBush completed 10 of 15 passes for 101 yards and a touchdown for Purdue (2-2). But the Boilermakers also committed 13 penalties for 118 yards. Read the full AP recap, check out the box score and see our Big Ten scoreboard.
