Illini Fan Reaction - Purdue 31, Illinois 24: So...You Wanted a Football Season During a Pandemic, eh?

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- Purdue quarterback Aidan O’Connell, who set school records for passing yardage in a season (2,741), touchdown passes in a season (26) and passing yardage in a game (447) at Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, Ill., hardly made a mistake in a 31-24 victory over the overmatched home state Illinois squad Saturday.

The last time an Illinois offense had four or more turnovers in a game was Tim Beckman’s first season in 2012 when the Illini had six giveaways in a 52-24 loss to Louisiana Tech.

The Illinois pass defense allowed for a second-straight 300-yard performance through the air and O’Connell didn’t have an incomplete pass until deep into the second quarter as he was able to consistently find open receivers down the middle of the field.

The Illini had a chance, only down seven with three minutes to go in the game, to send the game into overtime but four straight incomplete passes from inside the Purdue 15-yard-line gave the Cannon Trophy back to the rivals from West Lafayette.

"We still didn't make enough plays, the turnovers hurt us. The passing for Purdue, their touchdown passes continued to hurt us defensively," Illinois head coach Lovie Smith said. "But the team I thought played hard from the start and we gave ourselves a chance to win but you have to make plays at the end to win football games and they made more plays than we did.”

The 2020 campaign was the season Illinois coaches were pointing toward as a turnaround year for a program that hasn’t had a winning season in a decade and has more seniors on its roster (25) than the previous two years combined (21). At 0-2, Illinois is now not doing anything on the field to be proud of and may be part of a COVID-19 outbreak as well.