Join the Doc's game day live blog, covering every game, all day long.

Purdue 26, Ohio State 18. There was a headline out of Buckeye territory Friday, "Ohio State coaches show patience with QB," that takes on a completely different complexion 24 hours later. On Friday, Terrelle Pryor could still be sold as the raw, inexperienced super recruit getting by on his immense talent while learning the finer points of the position as a sophomore on the track to superstardom; the Buckeyes were still a top-10 team with the Big Ten title and the BCS in their sights.

But after his performance today -- two interceptions, two fumbles, five sacks and fewer points on the board by his offense than any other team has managed this year against the worst scoring defense in the Big Ten -- the question on Pryor is fundamentally altered, from "When is he going to fulfill the hype?" to "Will he ever fulfill the hype?" The argument is no longer about schemes or the play-calling being "too conservative," but whether Pryor can really play at a championship level with any consistency at all. The obvious regression this season, and especially today, has left him looking much less like "The Next Vince Young" than "The Next Todd Boeckman."

Except even Boeckman, Pryor's much-maligned predecessor, never lost a game like this, to a rebuilding bottom dweller riding a month-long losing streak. It's not like Purdue was a snake in the grass or anything; the Boilermakers hadn't been blown out this year and had thrown scares into Oregon and Notre Dame, but the other losses in their five-game skid included Northern Illinois, Northwestern and Minnesota. And they'd barely scored at all in either of their last two losses to the Buckeyes, evidence of the gaping chasm in talent levels. In every way, the afternoon was Ohio State's worst nightmare, and in no more glaring way than watching the shine coming off its up-and-coming quarterback until further notice.

It also strips even more luster from the Tao of Tresselball. Through the barrage of criticism for his team's big-game failures -- six high-profile losses in a row to fellow top-10 teams -- the virtue of Jim Tressel's tenure has been that the Buckeyes never lose a game like this. Where, say, USC dominates elite competition but has also managed to drop five games to unranked opponents as a double-digit favorite in the last four years -- including two straight losses immediately following the Trojans' blockbuster wins over Ohio State the last two years -- OSU hasn't blown a game against an obviously inferior team in ages. The closest it came was a stunning home loss to Illinois in 2007, but the Illini ended that season in the Rose Bowl.

Today's loss, then, ranks easily as the worst of Tressel's nine-year tenure. No other really comes close: If not the worst overall team in the Big Ten, Purdue was arguably the worst defense, at least, and Ohio State's offense did nothing until a frantic comeback at the end of the fourth quarter made the score look somewhat close. It wasn't, and for the first time since 2004, Ohio State is obviously not an untouchable power in the conference. It's just another middling offense hoping to grind out enough yards and limit mistakes enough to give the defense a chance to win it.