Former Bishop Luers cornerback TyVel Jemison, who signed a national letter of intent to play for Purdue, will instead head to Grand Valley State in Michigan.FORT WAYNE – Purdue quarterback Robert Marve is out “at least a couple of weeks” as he recovers from his left knee injury suffered in Saturday’s game at Notre Dame, according to coach Danny Hope.
Starting quarterback Caleb TerBush will be backed up by Rob Henry, who missed all last year with a knee injury.
“We’re still in good shape, obviously, from an experience standpoint with Caleb TerBush still healthy and at the No. 1 spot, and then obviously Rob Henry is a heck of a player,” Hope said during his weekly teleconference Tuesday.
“He didn’t play (against Notre Dame). That’s probably good in some ways. He had a few more days to rest and recover.
“He had struggled some throughout the course of camp, kind of like Robert did last year coming off of an ACL surgery, but he’s much further along health-wise than what Robert was at this point last year. Certainly Rob Henry becomes very, very important to us and our team right now.”
Marve had an MRI on his knee, and “there is some ACL tear to some extent,” Hope said. “It’s significant enough to hold him out for a while,” Hope said.
Henry started seven games after Marve suffered a knee injury in 2010. Henry entered the 2011 fall camp as the starting quarterback but suffered a knee injury at practice and missed the entire year.
He returned for the opener against Eastern Kentucky and completed 7 of 9 passes for 77 yards. He had one touchdown, one interception and fumbled once.
“Rob Henry brings a whole different dimension as a quarterback, as an athlete, to the playing field,” Hope said. “Rob Henry already has game experience, and he’s been our starting quarterback, so if he performs well in practice this week and he looks like he’s healthy and ready to go, then he can certainly play an important role in the game this weekend (against Eastern Michigan).”
Hope doesn’t anticipate playing a third quarterback “unless there was some reason to.”
He mentioned redshirt freshman Austin Parker, a walk-on from Fort Wayne, as an option for the No. 3 quarterback.
“He’s a make-it-happen guy,” Hope said of Parker. “He manages the offense pretty good for a guy that doesn’t get any more reps than what he does. In the last several months he has come in on his own and studied a lot of film and he has done well in the scrimmage reps that he’s had.”
