With the three non-conference games in the books--25 percent of the way through the season--let’s do a check-up on Purdue’s to-do list entering the season as the Boilermakers take the lid off Big Ten play on Saturday at home vs. Illinois.

"We're looking forward to a conference game number one of nine in a row here at home coming up," said Jeff Brohm, whose team is exactly where most pundits thought it would be after three games: 2-1. "We're excited to get that under way. We know from here on out we have got to play well to win. We have got to keep working hard on making improvements and getting better, continuing to try to play as hard as we can, just be more efficient in some of the things we're doing."

Here is a look at seven areas the program needed to enhance/focus on in 2021, as the Boilermakers look to get back to a bowl.

How has it gone so far? We rate Purdue on the following areas of focus using a scale of 1 (poor) to 10 (excellent).