When Purdue hosts Nevada this weekend, it will be looking for just its fourth win over an FBS opponent since the start of the 2013 season. But while the program has been mired in misery for a few years now, it has excelled in one area: producing starting quarterbacks. Even for traditional SEC powers.
Hard as it might be to believe, two former Boilermakers will be starting in the SEC this weekend: Danny Etling at LSU and Austin Appleby at Florida. Both were displaced as starters in West Lafayette and were on the team at the same time as current Purdue starter David Blough.
"Purdue has always been the cradle of quarterbacks, and will continue to be that," coach Darrell Hazell said on Tuesday. "It's a proud moment for the Boilermakers."
It's also an odd moment. Does it say more about Purdue's success in finding and developing quarterbacks or more about the problems the SEC has had in doing the same?
Etling started the final seven games of his freshman year in 2013 and the first five contests in 2014. After a loss to Iowa, he was pulled in favor of Appleby, who started the rest of the season and the first three games of 2015 before being replaced by Blough. Etling transferred after the 2014 season, and Appleby left as a graduate transfer following last year.
"It's always difficult when you have good players at one position," Hazell said of the quarterback competition. "But we're always going to do what's best for Purdue football at that point in time."
Neither transfer garnered a lot of attention at the time. But Etling has taken over at LSU for the ineffective Brandon Harris. He is 25-for-44 for 315 yards and two touchdowns, with an interception, so far for the Tigers.
"Danny's as talented as any college quarterback I've ever coached," said John Shoop, who tutored Etling, Appleby and Blough as Purdue's offensive coordinator in 2013-2015. "He can make all the throws and he is incredibly bright. Uncommonly bright."
Appleby is expected to take over this week for the injured Luke Del Rio. The 6-foot-4, 240-pounder had 19 touchdowns and 19 interceptions during his Purdue career.
"Austin's an amazingly competitive guy who is just uncommonly strong," Shoop said. "He's like Ben Roethlisberger, big and strong. He has short-area quicks and can really work that pocket."
Appleby turned some heads in West Lafayette and elsewhere this week when he said to reporters about his Florida experience, "I've never been around a place where our coaches truly care." Hazell declined to comment when asked about Appleby's remarks.
Purdue has changed starting quarterbacks midseason in every one of Hazell's first three years. Blough is averaging 323 passing yards through two games, most in the Big Ten. But he also threw five interceptions last time out in a home loss to Cincinnati, and he has six picks on the year against three touchdowns.
Yet quarterback arguably has been the least of the Boilermakers' many concerns during the Hazell era, at least from a skills standpoint. Though switching signal-callers so often was disruptive, the team has continued to recruit the position well. Blough made the Elite 11 finals in high school, and his current backup, redshirt freshman Elijah Sindelar, is a well-regarded prospect.
What's more surprising is how much LSU and Florida -- each located in some of the most fertile recruiting hotbeds -- have struggled finding any sort of consistency under center the last several years.
Les Miles is on the hot seat in large part because of his team's offensive struggles. Ross Dellenger of The (Baton Rouge, La.) Advocate detailed the strange disconnect between LSU's quarterback recruiting and its style of play earlier this month. Meanwhile, Florida's quarterback play has pretty much been spotty since Tim Tebow left Gainesville, and was a big reason why Will Muschamp failed as the coach. Will Grier looked like the answer last year before he got suspended for testing positive for a performance-enhancing substance and then transferred. Del Rio got off to a solid start before getting injured, but like Appleby he's a transfer, not a homegrown product.
Since the start of the 2013 season, here's how the following teams rank in the FBS in passing yards:
Purdue: 90th
LSU: 97th
Florida: 100th
Improved quarterback play in the Big Ten is one reason the league has made gains of late on the SEC, which saw several of its teams have issues at the position last year. Two of the most talent-rich SEC programs had to rely on arguably the Big Ten's least-talented team to solve their quarterback problems. Purdue is desperate to beat anybody but has stocked three Power 5 teams with starting quarterbacks. Strange days.