{"id":63573,"date":"2024-08-01T05:04:18","date_gmt":"2024-08-01T10:04:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/?p=63573"},"modified":"2024-08-01T05:04:18","modified_gmt":"2024-08-01T10:04:18","slug":"weekly-word-a-key-purdue-breakout-candidate-vegas-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/weekly-word-a-key-purdue-breakout-candidate-vegas-and-more\/","title":{"rendered":"Weekly Word: A key Purdue breakout candidate, Vegas and more"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Weekly Word is GoldandBlack.com\u2019s weekly opinion <\/a><\/strong>column, written by Brian Neubert<\/a>.<\/a><\/strong> In today\u2019s edition, we discuss Purdue football training camp, the Big Ten Tournament and Las Vegas and more. If not evident already, this is opinion content and the opinions solely of the author. <\/p>\n

PURDUE FOOTBALL TRAINING CAMP<\/h2>\n

Each year around this time, this part-by-stander, part-takesmith here likes to pick out some Purdue football players or elements to heap outsized emphasis on and this year will be no different. I\u2019m kidding.<\/p>\n

But yeah, this team goes as far as Hudson Card <\/a><\/strong>can throw it \u2014 another consummate season in which the QB has to raise everyone around him up, and the system and scheme have to help him \u2014 but the less-obvious hot-button guy to me: Will Heldt<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Last season, you saw the power of Ryan Walters\u2019 and his staff\u2019s defensive scheme in what Nic Scourton<\/a><\/strong> did. Kydran Jenkins<\/a><\/strong>, too, but Scourton was Jordan to Jenkins\u2019 Pippen, IMO.<\/p>\n

You saw, too, what it meant to Dillon Thieneman<\/a><\/strong> having those two devils breathing down quarterbacks\u2019 necks. Of his six interceptions last season, three came on third-and-long. Pass rush and secondary play are inextricably linked. Always. People sometimes forget what they mean to one another.<\/p>\n

So that brings this rambling screed to Heldt<\/a><\/strong>, a prospect who looks the part as well as anyone Purdue has recruited the past few years, who plays what should be one of the Boilermakers\u2019 signature positions and roles and now faces quite an opportunity to ascend into something big. <\/p>\n

Transfers are going to factor heavily into everything about this team, but Heldt will be a litmus test of this still-new staff\u2019s developmental chops, because physical ability isn\u2019t going to be an issue for the Carmelite, a central-casting sort of modern edge rusher with towering height, the length of a condor and the look of someone who ought to be like he should be leaping off the top rope to pin Roddy Piper.<\/p>\n

He looked like a big-time prospect in high school and showed some flashes last season playing behind some great players.<\/p>\n

This is a very similar situation to what Nic Scourton encountered a year ago at this time, at the same point in his career, after a similar freshman season. Maybe it turns out as well.<\/p>\n

Penn State, Ohio State and Minnesota heading to Las Vegas for the 2027 Big Ten Tournament.<\/p>\n

FEAR AND LOATHING IN THE BIG 18<\/h2>\n

When the Big Ten held its postseason tournament in New York City years back, it nailed it. That was awesome.<\/p>\n

The energy that night was every bit what Indy or Chicago would have been, and then some, though I say that as someone who rode the Northeast Corridor train back to Newark the night Rutgers beat Indiana, on an NJ Transit train full of Scarlet Knight fans who\u2019d been quite thirsty that evening and didn\u2019t know much yet about winning college basketball games.<\/p>\n

It was a blast.<\/p>\n

But it was also unique. Madison Square Garden is a different animal than T-Mobile Arena in Vegas, host of the 2027 event<\/a><\/strong>, a predictable nod to the Pac-4 being stapled to the existing 14-team conference.<\/p>\n

I understand that a lot of fans will jump at any reason they can find to go to go to Vegas but having covered an MTE in the city before, I vividly remember the utter sterility of it, livened up only by the cocktail waitresses dressed like referees bring drinks into the crowd. Las Vegas is not a college basketball city, the Big Ten\u2019s Midwestern footprint isn\u2019t necessarily accustomed to flying to the event and people who might want to visit Vegas in March probably would prefer to do so the very next weekend, for the opening rounds of the NCAA Tournament.<\/p>\n

And the two L.A. schools, we\u2019ll see. USC averaged 6,300 people at home games last season and UCLA about a thousand more. They can make the drive to Vegas, but will they? The locals love college hoops so much that UNLV got 5,900 people on average at its games last season. That\u2019s less than one-third capacity.<\/p>\n

The idea of a roaming Big Ten Tournament is to expose the Big Ten to its home media markets and different audiences. Understanding that the event would get drowned out in Los Angeles \u2014 a predictable issue \u2014 I\u2019ll point out that Vegas isn\u2019t the SoCal market.<\/p>\n

There are going to be a lot of moments starting this season where Big Ten basketball fanaticism stands out starkly against West Coast Casual. <\/p>\n

This will be one of those moments. Fun, yeah, probably. Strategically worthwhile, not likely. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the first of many reminders to come that if this is going to be all about TV, A) location doesn\u2019t matter as much and B) atmosphere makes for better TV.<\/p>\n

Purdue Flag (Chad Krockover)<\/p>\n

RANDOM THOUGHTS FOR THE WEEK<\/h2>\n

\u2022 Hey, I have a question (maybe one there\u2019s not enough info out there yet to answer): If you\u2019re a football program now permitted to fund up to 105 scholarships\/roster spots, is it better to only do 90, then take 15 scholarships worth of money and add it to the pot being divided amongst your football players? Then, take 15 walk-ons? Will that even be an option?<\/p>\n

If it is an option, that\u2019s an easy decision, IMO. No one needs 105 scholarship players.<\/p>\n

And the walk-on thing \u2014 them apparently going by the wayside in the traditional sense \u2014 is just silly. Why shouldn\u2019t programs be allowed to equip an extra dozen players during the week for practice? If they can\u2019t dress for games, who cares? Same as the NFL.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re worried about Alabama stashing pros as walk-ons, fine, but what recruit worth a damn will sign on as Alabama\u2019s 106th instead of taking a scholarship and de facto salary at, say, Kentucky? Especially now that these dudes can transfer after a year anyway.<\/p>\n

What all these proposed plans fail to recognize is the fact that, yes, you can<\/em> have too many players. Too many capable players, I mean.<\/p>\n

\u2022 What\u2019s happened at Ohio State is actually kind of funny. That losing to Michigan and watching the Wolverines win it all actually was the radioactive spider bite that made the Buckeyes into what should be an unbeatable team this year, bringing in enough money to put together an NIL payroll their new AD said hit $20 million. Remarkable the power losing can have.<\/p>\n

Indiana basketball has a disappointing season and gets an extra million to spend. What if it works?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s funny with the Michigan-Ohio State thing. It\u2019s kinda like politics. One side wins, then the other gets so mad that it mobilizes and wins by any means necessary. And it goes on and on and on.<\/p>\n

The post Weekly Word: A key Purdue breakout candidate, Vegas and more<\/a> appeared first on On3<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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