After picking up a rebound win last weekend at home in the whiteout game against Washington, Penn State is back on the road this week to take on one of the Big Ten’s cellar dwellers, Purdue. It just so happens Penn State has owned the Boilermakers in the series with the majority of the matchups coming since Penn State joined the Big Ten in the 1990s.
Penn State is 16-1-3 all-time against Purdue. The series dates back to 1951, when Purdue won the first meeting between the two schools in West Lafayette, Indiana. Purdue blanked Penn State 28-0 in the early November meeting. The two schools met the following season (1952) in State College and played to a 20-20 tie for the only tie in the series.
Penn State did not face Purdue again until after joining the Big Ten. After not facing Purdue in each of its first two seasons in the conference in 1993 and 1994, Penn State finally met Purdue in 1995 and started a winning streak with a 26-23 victory. Penn State won six consecutive meetings from 1995 through 2000 before Purdue won back-to-back games in 2003 and 2004, which were two of the worst seasons for the Nittany Lions in the Big Ten era.
Penn State has won 10 straight meetings in the series between 2005 and the most recent meeting in the series in 2022.
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