2022 Purdue Press Conference: Season Review

[BabaYaga]

West Lafayette, Indiana – The 2022 Purdue season ended in disappointment as a number of winnable games were lost but the future seems bright in what was a rebuilding year for this Purdue team. Coach BabaYaga will take the stage with a statement and then address the media if they have any questions.

 

"This was a tough season but an expected season. We thought that we could have pushed for bowl eligibility but a few plays per game really cost us. We were a very young team on the defensive side of the football as we were starting two freshmen in the secondary and had some tough luck at the wide receiver position. At the end of the day, our guys played hard and it comes back on me when we aren't winning those close games.

 

Look, we had the lead in the 2nd half of nine of our games this year and we were 4-5 in those games including losing the lead in the fourth quarter four times for a loss. We allowed two teams to score in the last two minutes to win.

 

This team was really close to having a good season. It is back to the drawing board for us next year and I'm confident that the improvements will be seen."

 

Coach BabaYaga now opens the floor for questions from the media.

[tsweezy]

Do you expect next season will be back to playoff contention, another rebuilding year like this one, or something in between?

[BabaYaga]

Great question. I'm looking forward to next season as I think it will be different from this past year in a myriad of ways. Looking back at our run to the playoffs we had 17 seniors starting that season which is ideal for that singular season, but not as ideal when you look toward the next year. I think that we will be able to build on this year mainly due to returning experience.

 

Offensively we return our top three running backs one of which played WR for part of the year. We return 6 of our top 7 wideouts, we return 3/5 of our offensive line and we have guys ready to step in that are young who will be really good for us. We will be young on the defensive line but all those guys are so similar it didn't matter who we trotted out there this season. Our starting linebackers were all underclassmen this year so they gained some valuable experience and as previously mentioned we started two freshmen in the secondary and only lose one corner. We will likely be all underclassmen in the secondary next year besides one corner spot.

 

We are graduating just seven starters this year and only two of them really made a big impact on the team.

 

While we will still be very young, we expect next year to make a bowl game and push for a Big Ten conference title as we will improve at 20 of the 22 spots on the field.