Ryan Walters received 24 games and two seasons to prove himself as the Purdue head football coach.
Just five victories in that time brought it to an end.
For the first time since getting fired by the Boilermakers once the 2024 season came to a close, Walters will return to West Lafayette, Indiana, as the University of Washington defensive coordinator for a Friday night game.
While he coached against Purdue in 2025, and shared in a 49-13 victory in Seattle, returning to his former workplace stirs another set of emotions.
"I'd be lying if I said it wasn't different," Walters said. "I could give the whole coach cliche and say it's just another game. But there is different feelings. I don't really know how to describe it because it is different, it's unique. There's good and bad experiences there. You're going to a place that is familiar."
In 2023, he took over and won four of a dozen games, beating Virginia Tech 24-17, Illinois 44-19, Minnesota 49-30 and Indiana (pre Curt Cignetti) 35-31. This was considered progress made.
However the following season, the Boilermakers beat up Indiana State 49-0 in the opener and proceeded to lose 11 games in a row.
Five were blowouts. Three were shutouts. Two came in overtime.
They lost to both Oregon State and Oregon.
The final coaching deathknell for Walters was a season-ending 66-0 beatdown from Indiana (with Cignetti on board).
He left as the Illinois defensive coordinator to take over at Purdue. He replaced Jeff Brohm, who exited following six seasons to become the Louisville coach.
Walters assumed control of a Big Ten football program that finished 8-6 after it faced and lost to LSU 63-7 in the Citrus Bowl with an interim coach.
With a 5-19 coaching record at Purdue, he was dismissed by athletic director Mike Bobinski, who's no longer at the school either. The AD retired this past summer.
Three days after the 2024 season ended, Bobinski announced Walters' firing, saying he no longer had confidence in the direction the program was headed.
Walters next did what every suddenly out of work football coach from a cold Midwest state would do in December -- he gathered up his wife and kids and headed for Florida and Disney World.
Not long after that, Jedd Fisch and the UW coaxed him to Montlake, where he's been for two seasons.
Ironically, Purdue now employs Barry Odom as its coach. The brother of UW linebackers coach Brian Odom. The person who hired Walters to join him at Memphis and Missouri. And the guy who gave Walters his first opportunity to become a defensive coordinator.
He returns to his former place of employment with a Husky team saddled with a three-game losing streak (3-3 overall, 0-3 Big Ten) while the Boilermakers (3-3, 2-1) bring a two-game win streak to Friday's match-up.
Walters no doubt will take a moment to look around and then it's down to business in trying to beat his old team in his former town.
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