Fantastic article. Really appreciate how in-depth you go on our team.
"I knew IU was going to win this game after looking at it and my confidence only waned because…I’m an IU football fan"
I have a feeling our fan base will have that pit in the stomach removed by the end of the year. This is a really talented squad. Our defense has looked shakey in the secondary and we still have only allowed 33 points through 4 games. We have the talent and coaching to get that fixed for the rest of the year.
Agree with the above...this is the kind of in-depth analysis I gladly ponied up for. Well done!
Great read. Well written and very in depth. Loved ithttps://hoosierhuddle.com/2025/09/23/the-reactionary-take-on-illinois/
BEAT PURDUE
thanks, guys!
what a win...let's get another, shall we?
i'll have my iowa preview later this week.
https://hoosierhuddle.com/2025/09/23/the-reactionary-take-on-illinois/
In response to your last statement about DB's and the busted play. Ponds and the staff went into review of that play and it was Ferrells mistake. It was a cover 3 defense where Ponds was supposed to peel off his man to stay shallow and allow Ferrell to take him deep but Ferrell instead erroneously held to his man. Thats likely why PFF placed it on Ferrell.
i missed that...thank you for the heads up. pff typically has a hard time with CB's and I'm not looking at the all 22 so it can be hard to tell.https://hoosierhuddle.com/2025/09/23/the-reactionary-take-on-illinois/
In response to your last statement about DB's and the busted play. Ponds and the staff went into review of that play and it was Ferrells mistake. It was a cover 3 defense where Ponds was supposed to peel off his man to stay shallow and allow Ferrell to take him deep but Ferrell instead erroneously held to his man. Thats likely why PFF placed it on Ferrell.
@iureactionary - I agree. At first, I was kind of shocked both Ponds and coach called it out but if it was clearly a mistake on behalf of Ferrell (which after explanation, it clearly was), I don't see anything wrong with identifying what took place.
Coach has harped on that position because he obviously sees holes that teams like Oregon, PSU or Ohio State in the B1G championship could exploit, so I like that he's getting after it. That being said, if we are able to solve for it in practice and are up big, I say keep pretending its a mistake so we can goat Oregon into throwing into it. 
My son decided to come home from college for the weekend and we watched the game together. He was surprised I wasn’t all nerved up like usual. I told him I thought this might be like the Nebraska game all over again. Felt good to be right.
Could you imagine if we'd have scored those two pick sixes? 77-10?? What is even happening here??
@yothn Goating teams into passes is a hallmark of this defense, its how we almost got those pick 6's this past weekend. Its basically a "fake" high safety look, where the DB pretends to follow the deeper route and crashes the flat while the safety cuts in to cover the deeper receiver
This coaching staff plays chess
Meanwhile The Athletic just put out an article saying not to overreact to IU, and that Iowa is a smart pick. Oh, and you should totally trust the Notre Dame defense against Arkansas, who cares that Arkansas has one of the better offenses in the SEC... Next week Im sure its going to be "yeah Iowa is no good"
@hoosierdaddy Love when the Athletic just hops on the hot trends. They’ve put out a bunch of IU content today.
Love the in-depth coverage and breakdown of the stats. Thanks!