That’s Our Bucket – The IU Predicto

The Predicto is back for a season-ending discussion of Bucketastic proportions.

It’s rivalry week or “hate week” or whatever you call it. And dammit, I love this week so much. No matter what kind of season you’ve had, you put it all aside for the moment and do your best to tear your neighbor from limb to limb. We Americans love the idea of battering our neighbors. Perhaps it’s left over from the Civil War (the real one, not that nonsense in Oregon) that makes me want to brawl with the dumbass across the street who insists on running his leaf blower long into the darkness of night. Regardless, that hate is perfectly acceptable this week.

For some reason, the way the slate of games works out this Thurs, Fri and Sat feels like it couldn’t be much better. There are interesting or compelling matchups each day, culminating in possibly the best Saturday of college football games of the season, rivalry or otherwise. Thursday has the Egg Bowl, Friday has UVA-VT, TT-Texas, Iowa-Nebraska, the Apple Cup, and the battle of Florida. And then as I said, it only gets better. Saturday at noon has, of course, the most important game of the weekend, The Old Oaken Bucket Game. You better have multiple TVs at the ready because at the same time, you’ve got OSU-UM, Clemson-South Carolina, Georgia-GT and, fine, Northwestern-Illinois. That’s a lot of hate in the nooner slot.

The 3:30 window has two heavyweight battles, with the Iron Bowl on one TV and the battle for Paul Bunyan’s axe on another. At the same time, the corpse of Rutgers football shambled into Happy Valley to be led to slaughter. Woof.

I can’t wait for it all.

Meanwhile, ESPN is over here recycling their hate week crap, conveniently omitting Purdue-Indiana but somehow including Louisville and Kentucky. Yeah, real storied rivalry there between two programs who have never done anything and never will. Waahoo.

Purdue and Indiana have played 121 times, passing Kansas-Mizzou last year since they went dormant in 2011. There are only six rivalries that have been played more than the Bucket. Can you name them? Three you should be able to get, but the other three are impossible.

The impossible ones are UNC-UVA (battle of the Burberry scarves and long-sleeve brooks brothers button-up shirts worn with khaki shorts), Auburn-Georgia (longest rivalry no alums care about) and, get this, Cincinnati vs Miami of Ohio. Snore.

The ones you should know are Oregon-Oregon State (hippies!), Cal-Stanford (nerds!) and Minnesota-Wisconsin.

But that’s enough about my excitement over college football’s best weekend. Let’s talk about Purdue-IU and the Old Oaken Bucket, a series Purdue leads 74-41-6.

 

1) Favorite Bucket memory

Michael: Back when I was at Purdue, Purdue beat the crap out of IU and the fan section (of which I was a member) started chanting "Ball State was better". It was amazing and something I still take great joy in being a part of.

Boilerdowd: Rushing the field after Brees & co clinched the Rose Bowl...second place was watching Rod Woodson single handedly beat IU (I wasn’t even at that one).

Dave: Ironically, I don't have to pretend that I've never lived in Bloomington because I actually don't remember any of those Bucket games from the other side. (Growing old has its privileges.) What I do remember, vaguely, is 1986, being at the Bucket game with friends from high school, watching Purdue hold off a 6-4 Indiana team to keep the Bucket (Leon Burtnett wasn't very good, but his teams were 4-1 in Bucket games), watching people run onto the field, looking at each other and shrugging ... why not? And once we got down to the field and started running, we just ... ran across the field and left. Look, these were times when football fun was scarce, OK? We didn't know what to do.

As a bonus, when I went home for Christmas break, my best friend and I at the time got tickets to the All-American Bowl in Birmingham, which was not that easy to do at the time (I assume we got them through the IU ticket office). Then we decided we'd figure out how to get there. My friend suggested that I ask my dad if I could take the car (we had a van as well, the car was older and I could drive it on occasion, so this was only mildly awful and not the abjectly terrible idea it might seem); our backup plan was ... to take a Greyhound, lol. Also I think we asked on the day of the bowl (!!). Somehow, my dad gave in, so we drove to Birmingham on December 31 and discovered that a) the South wasn't immune to bad weather in December (hello, cold rainy night) and b) a lot of stuff closes after midnight on New Year's Eve, so good luck finding something to eat after the game. Also c) let me tell you how much it sucked to drive in a strange city at night with no GPS. I got us lost several times. Also we barely had enough money for the hotel room. It was quite an experience. It did lead to my dad taking us to bowl games the next couple of years, so that was nice.

Aneesh: Undoubtedly, the 2008 Bucket game at Ross Ade. It was my sophomore year at Purdue, a bunch of my closest high school friends that went to IU were up for the weekend, and it was Joe Tiller's last game as Purdue coach. The team (and crowd) sent him into his Wyoming-based Wizened Elder stage of his Boilermaker career in style, with a 62-10 win that didn't feel that close. Curtis Painter threw for 5 touchdowns (to 5 different receivers) and 450 yards, Kory Sheets ran for 3 touchdowns, and everyone in the crowd was deliriously cheering for like an hour after the game as Tiller gave his farewell speech. Might be my favorite Purdue football memory from my time on campus, especially after Cowboy Joe's passing.

J Money: I haven’t attended all that many but I was at Kyle Orton’s send-off, a 63-24 shellacking of Indiana in Ross-Ade that finished off Gerry DiNardo as IU’s head coach. The game didn’t mean that much, as that season had been the peak where Purdue crested at #5 in the nation before tumbling down to 7-5. But there was a certain catharsis in annihilating IU at will.

2) Should the bucket game be rotated to Indy every few years? 

Michael: No, because the home crowd really makes this series. If it's in Indy I don't think it'll have the same atmosphere.

Boilerdowd: Yes...trying it out makes a ton of sense. God’s Country, Bloomington, Indy...repeat. I think it would be a ton of fun. At least give it a six season trial.

Dave: No, leave it as is. The main reason is that the NFL decides who plays in NFL stadiums, so trying to play at Lucas Oil might mean a Thanksgiving Day game one year, a Friday game another, etc. etc. It would be convenient as heck for me, but tickets would be an interesting thing to work out - the SEC can do this with Alabama-Auburn because SEC fans will show up for an 8 AM conference call on Monday morning if it's about college football. I'm not sure that would happen here. OTOH playing indoors in late November? That does have some appeal.

Aneesh: People who are suggesting this (A) don't have this rivalry embedded in their bones, and (B) don't realize that Purdue has absolutely nothing to gain in this scenario. Sure, old fogeys might get to watch the game from an indoor stadium, but there's no chance they fill anywhere close to Lucas Oil's 70,000-person capacity and it would bring more casual IU fans out of the woodwork than a game on either campus. Get out of here with this nonsense.

J Money: I’m a huge fan of rivalry games being on campuses so I say no.

 

3) What other profession could you see Tom Allen doing?

Michael: Life coach, high school social studies teacher, handyman. I dunno, it's hard to picture any coach out of their profession, since they tend to be such psychos about their job.

Boilerdowd: High school football coach.

Dave: Obviously comedy.

Aneesh: Clocksmith.

J Money: Gold’s Gym manager.

 

4) Have you ever injured your Penix?

Michael: Well this one time me and my Penix were hanging out in a dive bar in Alamosa, Colorado when we were approached by this mob who insisted on starting something with my Penix. Well, next thing I know we're prone on a freshly repaved parking lot having little memory (outside of the pain) of how we got there.

Boilerdowd: In high school I was dared to jump over a high rod iron fence...dang it...none of your business.

Dave:

Aneesh: [REDACTED]

J Money: I was young, I needed the money.

 

5) don’t answer 4. 

 

6) Prediction for the 2019 edition of this game.

Michael: Uhh...can I answer the Penix question again? I think IU wins, 34-26.

Boilerdowd: D Bell or Hopkins catches the game winner with mere seconds left on the scoreboard. One last look at this injury-laden squad before we see a renewed bunch in the Spring. Purdue 33, IU 31.

Dave: Indiana is a 7-point favorite on DraftKings, which I think is interesting given that the injury gods saw the disparity between the teams and did their best to even things up last week. If Scott isn't able to play, IU will have to rely on their passing game ... which is probably not a good thing for the Good Guys, with Whop Philyor set to return after having been targeted twice in the Penn State game. (It wasn't called either time because Big Tenteen refs are abysmal.) But if Scott were healthy, Purdue's run defense would have to ... (looks up some stats) never mind that.

Anyway. With Purdue out of bowl contention (their APR ain't great, Bob) about five weeks after we might have assumed them to be so, given the injuries so far this season, there's one thing left to play for, and it happens to be something worth keeping around. Here's the list of Purdue head coaches who've won their first three Bucket games:

• Mal Edward

• Alex Agase

• Joe Tiller

Let's add one more to that list. David Bell will find some space in the weak Indiana secondary (Tiawan Mullen can't stick to him all day), and the Good Guys will salvage something tangible from this season. Purdue 37, Indiana 25

Aneesh: I began the season thinking that IU would run roughshod over Purdue's C team, but these last few weeks have showcased how vulnerable IU can be. If this were in Memorial Stadium, I'd say an easy IU win...but with AOC and David Bell and Big George leading the charge in Ross Ade, and win a close one. Purdue 33, IU 30.

J Money: There are few games I want more. A win here retains the Bucket, gives us a 5-7 season (and if 5-7 with everyone injured is a “down” year, then fine) and puts a dent in IU’s excitement for this year. I have all sorts of reasons to expect it, too. IU isn’t as good as their seven wins might suggest, they’re also banged up and Jeff Brohm is a much better coach than Tom Allen. But I can’t shake the nagging feeling that Purdue just doesn’t quite have enough in the tank this year. I hope I’m wrong. IU 27, Purdue 23.