Countdown to Camp: Purdue secondary

Leading into August’s training camp, GoldandBlack.com is breaking down Purdue position by position. Rotating back to defense, we examine the secondary, where Ross Els' has a lot of holes to fill.

Ross Els finds himself in a bit of a conundrum this fall, wanting to install a multiple-DB defense with a Purdue team short on experienced personnel in the defensive backfield.

That’s left him with still a lot of answers to find in training camp, the biggest likely being one of his two starting cornerback positions — junior Da’Wan Hunte will fill one after a solid spring — that has no clear frontrunner.

“Don’t know, wide open,” Els said in mid-June. “And we kept rolling different dudes in (in the spring), not because they’re bad but because nobody jumped ahead enough to say ‘Hey, that’s my spot.’ But there’s a couple, two or three, who will be fine. And those guys will be playing our nickel and dime spot too, so once you’ve identified your top three or four (corners, it’s) who goes inside and who goes outside? But we’ve got time to determine that.

“I’d like them to learn the corner spot, the nickel spot, the dime spot, learn all three of those positions so we can roll people in and out, rather than say ‘You two are the only two who can play nickel.’ But we’ll see how it works out.”

At least Purdue has numbers to throw at the problem, although none are experienced. Sophomore Tim Cason might have gotten the most first-team repetitions during the spring, and at times showed some promise but others — too often really — lost coverage deep. Redshirt freshman Mike Little made some plays in the passing game, but remains undersized. Converted wide receiver Myles Norwood got a shot — and will again — as will J.C. transfer Kamal Hardy, who didn’t catch on right away in the spring, perhaps partly because he battled nagging injury.

Walk-ons Race Johnson and Antonio Blackmon are options, the latter ending the spring as the starting nickel back.

They all were put to a challenge in the spring, with Els frequently placing his defensive backs — he coaches the safeties — in less-than-ideal situations. Not giving any help over the top, for instance, to see whether a corner could stick with a receiver down the sideline.

It’s a reason, perhaps, why Cason struggled at times then, but could look better in the fall.

“If you don’t push them above what they’re capable of doing, how do you know where the line is?” Els said. “And what’s going to happen is that they’re going to get into a game in a situation they can’t handle and you don’t know they can’t handle (it), that’s on us as coaches. So we put them in some really tough situations just to see what they could do, what their limit is.”

Maybe a freshman won’t have the limitations. It’s likely that Josh Hayes, Brandon Shuman and Simeon Smiley will get every opportunity to earn a spot in the two-deep, maybe as a corner or nickel or dime. Purdue’s played freshman cornerbacks before, the last being Ricardo Allen in 2010, but Els says it’s not an easy task.

“People think it’s a corner, just go out there and cover a guy,” he said. “But we do so much with leverage that if they have help, we want you to leverage here. If you have this split, if (the receiver) lined up here; here you have help from a safety; here you have help from a 'backer; here you’re all by yourself. Sometimes that gets a lot for them. And if you get beat at that spot, usually it’s a fight song. But it’s going to be wide open this fall, so it could be a young guy in there.”

Purdue’s a little more settled at its other positions in the secondary, particularly with safety Brandon Roberts set to move to nickel. There, he gives the Boilermakers a speedy athlete with coverage skills — he spent his redshirting season as a corner — who is used to playing between the hashes. And it really likes Hunte at corner, where he showed an ability to step into an expanded role after being the third cornerback, behind now-departed starters Anthony Brown and Frankie Williams, last season.

“You can tell he really wants it and he’s ready to fulfill his role,” said Hunte’s roommate, Leroy Clark.

That leaves returning senior starters Clark and Robert Gregory, although the latter was benched the last three games of the season, as the top safety options entering camp.

But Clark knows he must be more consistent after a season in which he led Purdue in tackles, with 88, but also missed a fair share.

“I can tackle,” he said, “but I need to follow into it more, force fumbles, get the ball back more. And I only had two interceptions, trying to get more than that. I want to be around the ball as much as possible.”’

Senior Austin Logan, who didn’t play last season but started a game in 2014, came on again at the end of the spring, Els said. And newcomer C.J. Parker, said to be a physical, aggressive safety, is a possibility, as is freshman Navon Mosley.

“We’re a long, long way away from being able to play some of the good throwing teams in this conference,” Els said. “But again, we put them in some bad situations to see what they can do, so we get them some help and I think that will help.”

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