Maybe Purdue and Northwestern Will Play On an 80-yard Field

Purdue will play Northwestern at Wrigley Field this November, per a release this morning. Those astute Big Ten football fans with memories longer than a decide may recall that Northwestern tried this before, but it was a game against Illinois so you’ll be forgiven if you forgot about it.

The game was in November 2010 and it featured both teams playing offense in the same direction for the entirety of the game. Why? Because whoever set up the field had the end zone precariously close to the brick outfield wall that so many drunk Chicagoans find endearing.

Here’s how it was set up:

Oooh, yeah, that is close.

One of the things I remember was that they didn’t make this decision until very close to the game.

Normally with a baseball field, you use the widest part of the playing surface for the football field, such as this example at Yankee Stadium:

Of course, you need to have a grown-up size ballpark for this to work, so…should be fun!

Also, my headline might seem like a joke but it’s not without precedent. In 2019, the Raiders and Packers played a preseason game on an 80-yard field because of a hole they were worried about. Would anything really surprise you anymore?