Here are three things we learned from the Purdue game, two questions we have moving forward and one bold prediction about the future as the Wildcats head into their second bye week of 2024.

1. Northwestern's offense can score.

After not being able to find the end zone in nearly a month, the Northwestern offense finally was able to taste success on Saturday in West Lafayette. The Wildcats' opening drive worked its way deep into Purdue territory before stalling out and setting up a 39-yard Luke Akers field goal. On the next NU possession, redshirt sophomore running back Joseph Himon II did what for two weeks had been the impossible.

With Northwestern facing first-and-10 from their own 49, Himon lined up behind quarterback Jack Lausch in the pistol. Himon took the handoff and broke through the left side of the Wildcat offensive line, ran through an arm tackle and sprinted 51 yards to the end zone for the first offensive touchdown Northwestern scored since Oct. 11.

It was a day that was ruled by the running backs for offensive coordinator Zach Lujan's unit. With top wide receiver Bryce Kirtz missing his second consecutive game and No. 3 receiver Frank Covey IV leaving the game with a knee injury in the first half, Northwestern leaned heavily on their running back duo of Himon and Cam Porter. Two drives after the triumphant return to the end zone, Porter powered his way in from a yard out to put Northwestern up 17-3.

The offense reverted to its prior form for much of the second half, but the running backs were there again when Northwestern needed them in overtime. Thanks to a penalty, NU started their overtime possession on the Boilermaker 40. It took the Cats just two plays to find the end zone for a walkoff touchdown, though. The first play was a dump off to Porter that went for 18 yards, which was followed up by a 22-yard score from Himon after he broke wide open on a wheel route.

"We'd run that two or three times before in the game and one of the guys would take him, then no one ended up taking him, and he had a lot of space," Lausch said of Himon's game-winning touchdown.

As the pair of overtime plays demonstrates, the Cats' tailback tandem actually did most of their damage through the air. Himon was still effective on the ground, taking his six carries and turning them into 78 yards and the aforementioned score. Porter was completely bottled up by the Boilermaker front seven, turning 11 carries into just 17 yards and his short touchdown. Through the air, though, Himon hauled in three passes for 34 yards and the game winner. Porter led the team in both catches and yards, snaring eight passes for 85 yards. They were the first two Northwestern running backs with 100+ yards from scrimmage in the same game since Porter and Evan Hull against Illinois in 2020.

With the receiver room dealing with a rash of injuries and Lausch struggling with consistency throwing the ball downfield, Porter and Himon's ability to consistently turn short throws into big plays was crucial to getting the Wildcat offense out of neutral, and something Northwestern will look to build off of after the bye week.

2. Northwestern is still not a smooth operation.

After back-to-back weeks of blowout losses filled with unforced errors, criticism of the young Wildcat coaching staff was starting to crescendo in Evanston. A win will help quell some of the discontent, but Northwestern still has a long way to go before the Cats resemble a well-organized football team.

First, penalties continue to be a constant issue. For the fourth consecutive game, NU was flagged at least five times for at least 45 yards. For a team that is averaging just 288.1 yards of offense per game, good for 129th in the country, giving away at least 45 free yards per game is severely crippling. Northwestern isn't good enough to overcome consistently beating themselves like they have been for chunks of 2024. No penalty from Saturday sticks out more than Theran Johnson being called for unsportsmanlike conduct for the second week in a row. Last week it was a throat-slash gesture, this week after a Damon Walters pass break-up ended Purdue's overtime drive without any points, Johnson got in the face of Purdue receiver Jahmal Edrine and was flagged. That 15-yard penalty forced the Wildcats to start their overtime possession on the 40-yard line.

After a great stand from the defense, all NU needed was a field goal. Johnson's penalty put Northwestern in a spot where a field goal was no sure thing. Luckily for the redshirt junior cornerback, the offense made quick work of the longer field and the lapse in judgment did not come back to cost Northwestern in the end. Still, a celebration penalty putting Northwestern at a field position disadvantage for the second week in a row is really disappointing for a team that needs to excel at the little things in order to win games.

"When I find out what happened, that will be very directly addressed," head coach David Braun said of Johnson's second unsportsmanlike conduct penalty in as many weeks. "We need to be a more disciplined football team in critical moments."

Fittingly for a couple days after Halloween, Northwestern's clock management in the second half Saturday was downright scary. On Northwestern's opening drive of the second half, the Wildcats called a timeout to avoid a delay of game and then mere moments later took a delay of game before fourth down. As the half went on, Northwestern would end up burning all three of their timeouts to avoid delay of game penalties, while still getting flagged for delays twice. One particularly alarming sequence featured NU taking a delay of game on third-and-9 and still having to call their final timeout on third-and-14 to avoid a second flag. Northwestern got away with it in an overtime win, but that doesn't excuse what led to the situation. Not being able to get a play off five times in a sold-out, but not inhospitable, Ross-Ade Stadium is unfathomable. Braun called it "inexcusable," and he's right.

It was positive for Northwestern to get back into the win column on Saturday, but discipline and game management issues continue to pile up week after week for Northwestern with no sign of improvement. Finding a way to run a much tighter ship should be priority number one in Evanston over the week off.

3. The defense is still Northwestern's backbone.

Much has been made of the struggles of Northwestern's offense in 2024, but through it all, defensive coordinator Tim McGarigle and his unit have given the Wildcats hope in almost every game. Saturday was no different.

Just two games ago, this Purdue offense scored 49 points and racked up 536 yards against Illinois. On Saturday, Northwestern limited the Boilermakers to just 20 points. Purdue did go over their season average and gain 337 yards, but as Braun and McGarigle often point out, yards don't win games, points do.

The Cats' defensive effort was led by strong run defense that held Purdue to 47 yards on 23 carries, just a little over two yards per carry. The Wildcats got home for two sacks, as well, one from Aidan Hubbard, to add to his team leading total, and one shared between Michael Kilbane and RJ Pearson. Also leading the way were Johnson, who made seven tackles -- including a key one-on-one, fourth-down stop in the first half to set up Porter's touchdown -- and added a pass breakup. Jaylen Pate lived in the Purdue backfield en route to three tackles for loss.

When Northwestern needed stops, the defense again delivered. McGarigle's group forced a three-and-out to keep the game deadlocked at the end of regulation, and then a turnover on downs on Purdue's overtime possession to make life easy for the sputtering NU offense. Not much has gone according to plan in Evanston in 2024, but the Wildcat defense continues to play hard and exceed expectations late into the season.

1. Why was Ryan Hilinski in the game?

To the surprise of almost everyone, when the Northwestern offense took the field for their second drive of the game, the Wildcats had two quarterbacks on the field. Joining Lausch on the field was sixth-year senior Ryan Hilinski. The two signal callers lined up next to each other in the backfield before Lausch motioned out of the backfield and lined up at wide receiver. Hilinski took the snap and fired incomplete at the feet of AJ Henning.

On NU's next drive, only one quarterback jogged onto the field, but again to everyone's surprise, it was Hilinski. After completing his first pass for a gain of 16, Hilinski airmailed a pass way over the head of Henning on the third play of the series that was easily intercepted by Antonio Stevens. That was the last action Hilinski saw until he was brought in to attempt a Hail Mary at the end of regulation. His heave was actually caught by Hayden Eligon II, but the ball was short of the end zone by 15 yards.

The veteran has sparingly played over the last two seasons and had only logged eight pass attempts all season prior to Saturday. All of those throws came the previous week against Iowa, where he completed five of them for 58 yards. That efficient outing in garbage time evidently gave the Northwestern coaching staff an idea for how to jumpstart the offense.

The decision to involve Hilinski in the offense has been roundly criticized, and the result of an interception does the coaching staff no favors. But it's hard to fault the coaches too much for trying anything in their power to inject life into an offense that hadn't scored a touchdown in two games. Hilinski nominally has the biggest arm of any quarterback on Northwestern's roster and could conceivably push the ball down the field more than Lausch has been able to. But he was unable to execute on either attempt past the sticks this time.

With the Wildcat receiving corps so depleted due to injury, though, Hilinski's lack of mobility could handicap Northwestern further in situations where reserve wideouts are unable to get open. The formation that featured both Lausch and Hilinski had the potential for some creativity that was not realized in the one snap it was utilized. Lausch is an outstanding athlete and finding creative ways to allow him to make plays with his legs is something fans have been begging Lujan for since Lausch became the starter in September. Lining him up at receiver, not dissimilar from how Northwestern used former quarterback Kain Colter, creates a number of new possibilities for Lausch to make plays with the ball in his hands. Any formation with two quarterbacks on the field is ripe for a trick play, as well, and a play like that could steal yards for a Northwestern offense that has trouble generating them the traditional way against tougher conference opponents.

Whether or not Northwestern goes back to Hilinski at any point this season remains to be seen. Lausch has two years of eligibility remaining, while Hilinski will have to move on once the 2024 season comes to a conclusion. Taking a young, still developing quarterback off the field for a player who has less than a handful of games left in his career certainly seems like an imprudent decision with an eye to the future, but Braun is still trying to make a bowl game in 2024.

2. Can the Cats shock the world?

Coming out of the bye week, Northwestern will have about as stiff a challenge as there is in college football when they welcome the Ohio State Buckeyes to Wrigley Field. Ohio State is currently ranked third in the AP Poll and coming off a very impressive road win over previously third-ranked Penn State. While Northwestern is on bye, Ohio State will host the same Boilermaker squad the Cats just beat.

After three straight disappointing seasons, at least by Ohio State's sky-high standards, the Buckeyes came into 2024 with a self-proclaimed "natty or bust" mindset. Through the first eight games, head coach Ryan Day's team is on the right track. Ohio State's only loss came in a one-point defeat in Eugene to top-ranked and undefeated Oregon.

Ohio State is led by veteran quarterback Will Howard, a transfer from Kansas State. Howard has accounted for 24 touchdowns thus far in 2024. The Buckeyes' fearsome running back tandem of Quinshon Judkins and TreVeyon Henderson has combined for over 1,100 yards and 10 scores on the ground.

As is tradition in Columbus, Ohio State has a stable of wide receivers to terrorize defenses. Veteran Emeka Egbuka is back as the leader of the group, but he has actually taken somewhat of a back seat to freshman phenom Jeremiah Smith who leads the Buckeyes with 678 yards and eight touchdowns.

Not to be outdone, the Ohio State defense allows the second-fewest yards and third-fewest points per game in the country.

That's all to say, a Wildcat win in two weeks would be an absolute stunner. It's hard to find a weakness with Ohio State, and they've clearly established themselves as one of the elite teams in college football. The Buckeyes will be massive favorites at Wrigley Field, and it will take a perfect effort from Northwestern to even have a chance.

Northwestern has beaten Ohio State just once since 1971. That win came in 2004 in one of the most iconic games in the history of the old Ryan Field. Ohio State has beaten the Wildcats 10 times in a row since that game, including a pair of meetings in the Big Ten Championship.

Braun has repeatedly reaffirmed his unwavering belief in his team, and if he and his players can leave Wrigley Field with a victory over OSU, they will have pulled off one of the best wins in Northwestern history.

Theran Johnson will be named All-Big Ten.

Arguably the best development of Northwestern's 2024 season has been Johnson's ascension into an elite corner. The redshirt junior has blossomed into one of the best cornerbacks in the Big Ten this season since taking the mantle as the Wildcats' No. 1 defender on the outside. He leads the Big Ten in pass breakups and has grabbed two interceptions, one of which he returned for a touchdown against Iowa.

Johnson has consistently taken on the other team's best receiver and shown that he belongs in the conversation as one of the elite players in the conference. Northwestern's coaches have raved about Johnson's increasing confidence in 2024, and while that confidence has gotten him in trouble after the whistle the last two weeks, its also guided him to becoming Northwestern's best player in 2024. At the conclusion of the season, Johnson will rightfully be recognized as one of the best players in the Big Ten.