Northwestern and Purdue both plan to start quarterbacks who were playing off the bench until last Saturday, but Tony Stauss and Brandon Kirsch will be under center following very different performances.
The Wildcats (2-6, 0-4 Big Ten) started Stauss in last week’s 49-0 blowout at Penn State in place of freshman Brett Basanez, who fractured his left fibula in the Cats’ 45-42 loss at Minnesota. It was Stauss’ first start since the season opener at Air Force, another 49-point loss.
Northwestern coach Randy Walker was hopeful this week that Basanez, who started every game for NU between Air Force and Penn State, would be healthy enough to start Saturday. But Walker said Wednesday that while Basanez’s injury is healing and making progress, the quarterback is still sore and likely will not play.
“We’ll see how he looks tomorrow, but I don’t think it would be in his best interest to play, and probably not in ours,” Walker said. “I think he could go out and play, but he would be very limited.”
Walker hasn’t entirely ruled out the possibility, but Stauss and true freshman backup Derrell Jenkins took all the snaps with the first team at Wednesday’s practice.
Kirsch, the true-freshman, officially replaced Kyle Orton as the Boilermakers’ signal caller last week against Michigan. Kirsch saw his first significant playing time off the bench in Purdue’s Oct. 5 loss to Iowa after Orton left the game with a concussion. The next weekend he relieved Orton midway through the second quarter, with Purdue down 24-0 to Illinois and sparked 31 straight Boilermakers points.
In his start, Kirsch completed 17-of-33 passes for 172 yards and ran for 81 yards in Purdue’s heartbreaking 23-21 loss to the Wolverines.
“He really kept us off balance,” Michigan coach Lloyd Carr said of Kirsch. “He would break out there and keep the chains moving.”
Purdue coach Joe Tiller said that he would prefer that Kirsch goes the distance, as he does not like to rotate his signal callers as he has frequently this season.
“I have always though that if you have two, you have none,” Tiller said. “If you are always shuffling them, it’s hard for any player to get into a groove, but I think it’s probably more different for the quarterback than any other player on the field. So that’s why I don’t want to shuffle.”
Inches to go: Joe Tiller is 5-0 against NU since taking over as Purdue’s head coach. … Orton and Kirsch have been sacked a combined 18 times this season. … In last year’s matchup, a late NU rally fell short and the Cats fell out of the Big Ten race with a 32-27 loss. … Safety Dominique Price (ankle) and offensive lineman Jeff Roehl (ankle) were both injured in he first half of last weekend’s loss at Penn State. For Saturday, Price is listed as questionable and Roehl is listed as probable.
