Did You Know That Knute Rockne's First Name Was Actually Pronounced Keh-NUTE?

Jerry McKenna, the sculptor who is the world's foremost authority on legendary Notre Dame football coach Knute Rockne, is in town for a couple of days. After beers and burgers at Herb's Tavern Tuesday night, Jerry spoke of Rockne and referred to him as Keh-NUTE. He stuck that "k" sound on the front of Knute's first name.

"When did you start calling him Keh-Nute?" I asked.

"I always called him Keh-Nute," said McKenna, "because that's how he pronounced his name."

"How come he kept the pronunciation of his first name a secret?" I persisted. "The world called him 'Nute.' He never corrected anybody."

"He didn't have to correct anybody because they didn't call him 'Nute.' They called him 'Rock.' Everybody did."

You can't argue with McKenna. He has personally known the Rockne family for decades. When we were in high school in the 1950's Jerry boldly walked up to the front porch of Rockne's son, who lived in Lakewood at the time, and pounded on the front door just to meet him. Later Jerry actually visited the site of the plane crash where Rockne died in a Kansas cornfield. He also visited the house where Rockne was born in Voss, Norway.

The match up against Purdue University (2-5, 1-2) on the road today was supposed to be an easy win for Ohio State, however the game did not pan out as expected. Instead, the no. 7 ranked Buckeyes lost 26-18 to the Boilermakers, who were just 1-5 coming into the game.

Joey Elliot passed for 281 yards and two touchdowns for Pudue, who dominated the game the first three quarters. He also hit 31 of 50 passes, including two touchdowns and one interception.

Terrelle Pryor just didn't match up, going 17 for 31 for 221 yards, including one touchdown and two picks. Ohio State tried to mount a comeback with Pryor at the helm, but he threw two interceptions and lost two fumbles.

In losing to Purdue, OSU (5-2, 3-1) blew their chance to tie the Big Ten record of 17 straight conference road wins, and were knocked out of the top spot in Big Ten rankings.

Lets start with the bad news for Ohio State Buckeye Nation which is the defense showed that they are human and allowed 14 points to be scored against them. Mind you, the defense still looked dominate and the final points scored by Indiana of the game came as time time expired. Another than the anomaly the Buckeyes actually giving up points, they had shut out their last two opponents in Toledo and Illinois, things went right to script in the Buckeyes win over the Indiana Hoosiers today in Bloomington. Jim Tressel's men outmanned their Big Ten challenger running away with a 33-14 victory which wasn't even as close as the score would indicate.

Terrelle Pryor would once again lead the charge for the OSU offense throwing for 159 yards and 3 touchdown passes while also eating up 63 yards and a touchdown on the ground. Brandon Saine would dominate getting the start at tailback running for 113 yards on only 17 carries. The air attack would be a balanced one for the heavily favored Buckeyes as Pryor would hit 8 different receivers on the evening with touchdown throws to three different men

Cleveland's best football team does not have a quarterback controversy. And, of course, I am not talking about the Cleveland Browns. Saint Ignatius senior quarterback Mark Myers has selected to play his college ball at the University of Pittsburgh. The 6' 4'' Myers told Rivals.com:

"I was up there three times this summer and took a campus tour two times, and I love how it's in the city. The facilities are great there and I get the best feel from the coaches. They're really nice people. They run a pro style offense and that's what we run at Ignatius, and they're pretty similar. I think it's a good fit for me. "

Myers had also received offers from Ball State and Toledo, and reportedly had some Big Ten schools inquiring about his services.

If you saw the tail end of the Ohio State-Illinois game on Saturday you saw Buckeye junior safety Kurt Coleman's questionable hit with only seconds remaining. The Big Ten has slapped a 1 game suspension the stand out starter on defense. He will miss Saturday's game when the Buckeyes travel to Indiana.

The conference announced the news on their website writing:

The Big Ten Conference office announced today that Ohio State University football student-athlete Kurt Coleman has been suspended for one game as a result of initiating helmet-to-helmet contact and targeting a defenseless opponent in the fourth quarter of Ohio State’s game against Illinois on Sept. 26, 2009.

If you are a Cleveland sports fan, you are probably still numb on this Monday morning. If you are a Brady Quinn fan you probably are slowly coming to the realization that the former first round draft pick Notre Dame is not the answer at quarterback for the Cleveland Browns. You probably are also a little worried that Derek Anderson has regressed after his 2007 Pro Bowl appearance. Here are some of the other things we learned in Cleveland sports world this week:

• The Cleveland Indians have a promising left hander in David Huff. Huff has been a bit inconsistent in this season with the Tribe but when he is good, he is really good. He displayed fine form finishing off a sweep of Baltimore with 8 scoreless innings pitched. He better watch out if likes the City of Cleveland because winning left handed pitchers seem to disappear from the area a rapid pace.
• There wasn't much to hang your hat on watching the Browns unravel in Baltimore on Sunday but there was one sign of life. Jerome Harrison contributed 85 total yards yesterday catching 5 passes for 33 yards and rushing the ball on the ground for 52. Hardly earth-shattering numbers but it makes you wonder why he doesn't see the playing field very often for the offensive starved franchise. His missed assignments blocking on passes probably aren't helping his cause.