So I was unfortunately at a wedding during much of the second half and OT, so I have not watched much of the collapse, and have just seen a few highlights so far. Regarding the defense and its weaknesses, my main takeaways are that:
1) Yes, this is still a far from great defense, and we have serious trouble stopping the rushing attack. That doesn't bode really well for going up against a team like Michigan, but hopefully if we load up to stop the run and dare them to pass the ball, that will lead to a sustainable matchup and our offense can out pace them.
2) But, I think we need to calm down on the dooming about how awful the defense is. Clearly, we were capable of doing our usual bend-don't-break defense in the first half. I think we have to be ok with accepting that this was just a really fluky situation that deserves considerable blame for what happened. A QB switch late in the week with a completely different style of play that we had not really seen any tape of. Our DC trying to get cute and experiment with new plays during a blowout. A former defensive coach who did seem to be in his former protege's head and was calling the plays to counter what he knew the opposing DC would do. A key injury. A recent former player who appears to have been focused on deciphering our calls. All of the emotion that seems to have built up between these programs over the past 2 years. This clearly wasn't your random football game between random opponents. It was a Perfect Storm that built up.
And we survived.
So, all that to say, I am thrilled to be at 5-1. I think we should still feel like we should be favored to win this game this coming Saturday, though it certainly won't be easy. I feel like there's no reason why we can't be in a similar situation as the Penn State game when we go to Oregon in a few weeks. We would need to play our absolute best game and get a few breaks to win, but we probably won't get blown out. Then, if we are 6-2 with four games to go, I think we cap off a very special season with a strong run down the stretch.
It would have been nice to go into the Michigan game having beat Purdue by 30. But I still feel like we should win, and I am going to show up on Saturday planning for us to do so.