Not being a smart ass, but based on what? We had several starters along the d line that was out for the open scrimmage, a good portion on the ends. We don't know how good our ends will be until we see them at game time, a few have a good amount of experience, they are not scrubs. Your rushing attack will have a harder time than your passing attack, that is something we are actually pretty decent at, middle of the line should be ok and linebackers are not newbies. The ends, well again, will have to prove themselves even though they have experience, just not star power till proven. We did lose a very good db in Roberts, and I will not say we will be the same without him but who we do have has plenty of experience and very proven. Roberts may very well be one of the better lock down corners to come out of Marshall.
I think sometimes we look at the other teams and say "well they lost 4 starters out of the front 7, no way can they be any good now", in reality with how much they rotate, the 2 deep tends to be the same talent wise, with most the questions on the backups to the previous years back ups. Offensively I don't think we will miss too much but Cato was Cato, hopefully Birdsong and Appleby both can settle in a bit this year with strong Olines. Here's to a good game and those who make it to Huntington, you will not find a more hospital place with good people.....mostly.
I'd probably argue the other way and believe Purdue would (should) have the ability to move the ball on the ground.
First off, there are 3 new starters along the D-Line and, as you mentioned, they did play a fare amount last season as reserves and they might be close in talent but still, there's a reason they weren't the starters last year. Marshall's projected D-line this year represented the #12, 13th, 14th and 21st tacklers from last season. If they were rotating in that much and equally split time, you might expect them to have a little higher numbers. Also, they'll face a Purdue line that should outweigh them by about 32 lbs per man. Purdue's O-line will be similar in terms of size and experience to the Northern Illinois line Marshall faced in last season's bowl game. In that game, UNI's top two running backs averaged over 5 yards per carry.
Marshall also technically returns one starter from last year at LB. McKelvey is also coming off of his surgery year. They too are probably considered a bit undersized and while I'm confident they make up for their size with their speed and quickness, the lack of size can wear a player down over the course of a game. The projected starters represent the #4 and #16 tacklers from last season with McKelvey not playing.
Last season, Marshall's ability to defend the run might be a bit skewed. They ended up ranked 53rd in the nation in rushing defense, which is good but just slightly above average (62.5). However, when you look at the teams they faced, their opponents were below average collectively in running the ball. The best team they faced was UNI at #16 in Rush Offense, from there they faced MTSU (#30) and UAB (#31) but it really dropped off after that. The average Rushing Offense rank for their opponents came in at 71.33.
Now you could compare that to Purdue's Rushing Defense which statistically wasn't as good (Ranked 91st) but the average of Purdue's opponents Rushing Offense rank was 49.55. In fact, Purdue held 8 of their 12 opponents to below or right at their season rushing averages. They just happened to face a lot of good rushing teams.
A second reason why Marshall's Rushing Defense might have looked better was Marshall's offense. As prolific and as sudden as Marshall was in scoring the ball, other teams generally had to abandon the run and become one-dimensional in their offense. I haven't charted all of the games however my suspicion is that teams probably had some success running the ball early in the game and then went away from that as the game progressed.
The third reason, and one which dovetails into the above point, is that with opposing teams having to pass more, it allowed Marshall's defense to really key in with their pass rush and generate a good number of sacks. Of course, unlike the NFL where sack yards are taken away from Pass Yards, the NCAA counts them as rushes, thereby reducing the yardage allowed total for the game. If you'd add back in the 254 yards Marshall got from their 38 sacks, their Rush Defensive rank would drop from 53rd to 78th last season.
So really the key for Purdue will be to establish the run and keep Marshall's offense off the field. Simple. vbg
Anyway, only 8 more days and we can do away with all of the speculation and see what happens on the field.
