The Weekly Word is GoldandBlack.com's weekly, obviously, column covering Purdue football, basketball and recruiting, as well as college sports issues, the true meaning of life, or whatever other topics might come to mind in a given week.

This, this is the one where things get strange.

Everything about this year has been different, but to me, it's always been the first Purdue-Indiana game, played without fans and any discernible atmosphere, where the realities of Big Ten pandemic ball would hit home most.

For Purdue tomorrow night, there will be no vitriol, no wall of animosity that may or may not have contributed to the Boilermakers' success winning at Assembly Hall lately.

There will be nothing but those players' desire to beat one another, which may have to come from the fact that many of these guys are friends with the people they'll be guarding, I don't know.

But it will be weird.