by West Lafayette, Ind. — The Mike Uremovich era of Ball State football began Saturday afternoon. But it began with a 31-0 loss to Purdue in West Lafayette. Despite the loss, Uremovich said he doesn’t want the team to lose itself over the loss.
“We need to be a better football team next week than we are today,” Uremovich said. “And we need to be a better team next week.”
Despite the loss, he said he was ‘excited’ to get to take the field for the first time as Ball State’s head coach.
“I was excited to play with them, and I was excited with how hard they played,” he said. “That’s the expectation and the standard. “Even at the end of the game, they kept trying to move the ball and our defense kept playing to get a stop.”
The Cardinals’ first contest of the 2025-26 season began with a slow start. But for the Boilermakers, it was a quick entourage as sophomore QB1 Ryan Browne hit sophomore receiver Arhmad Branch for a 49-yard touchdown catch.
That was the third play of the game.
The first quarter was more of the same as Purdue ended the period leading 21-0. Despite the Black and Gold’s strong start, the Cardinals could not mirror it. They struggled to move the ball as their first four drives ended in punts. Their fifth possession ended in a turnover on downs.
“Everybody played hard,” Uremovich said. “It’s not good enough to play hard.”
Throughout the rest of the afternoon, the Cardinals had some ups and downs. While the offense was able to sustain multiple long drives, each possession ended without points. Ball State kicker Carson Holmer missed two field goals in the loss — 45 and 29-yard kicks.
The contest was also the first game Ball State redshirt senior Kiael Kelly started since 2023. In the loss, he had 63 rushing yards on 22 attempts. In the air, he was 10-for-16 for 87 passing yards. With so many new pieces in units like Ball State’s offensive line, he said he thought they played well for their first game.
“I can’t really complain about how they played. I got out healthy, so that’s all I can ask for,” Kelly said. “They played their tales off.”
During his sprints with the football, Kelly commonly took the hit opposed of giving himself up. In the post-game press conference, he said his main objective is to run hard, no matter the situation.
“I like to run hard, because you never know when it’ll be your last one,” Kelly said. “With me being in the position I was in last year, I didn’t know if I would get in this situation again. I just try to run as hard as I can for my team and for myself.”
Uremovich said there were too many times where the offense got ‘behind the sticks,’ and that didn’t help the unit find any momentum. He also said this didn’t help Kelly, especially in times when he had to give up the opportunity to pass and instead moved to his legs.
“Making [him convert] on a third and long, it’s hard for anyone to function there,” he said.
Defensively, the Cardinals struggled to make plays. However, they did find a small rhythm in the second half. That included a sack from a new Cardinal, senior defensive end Nathan Voorhis.
“I think we just kept each other up,” he said. “Nobody lost their head and the senior class and the leaders helped calm everybody down.”
The 31-0 defeat is the second-biggest loss in the nine-game series between the Cardinals and Boilermakers, with the Cardinals still being winless. Despite that, Voorhis, Kelly and Uremovich all want to see the team take something from the defeat.
They also want to see the team continue to work on being a complete team.
“[We] need to find the confidence to execute every play. It’s gonna take consistency,” Kelly said. “I feel like today, we weren’t consistent offensively. A lot of that came with me missing throws or having misreads. I feel like I have to do better at getting us in better positions to be successful.”
Contact Zach Carter via email at zachary.carter@bsu.edu, zachcarter039@gmail.com or via X @ZachCarter85.
