For Joe Tiller's first 10 seasons as Purdue's football coach, the Boilermakers' practices were open to the media. Reporters would sit on a hill overlooking the practice field, where Tiller and his staff and players went about their business.

Then one of Tiller's assistants began noticing detailed practice reports showing up on the Internet.

"We come off the practice field," Tiller said, "and there's stuff already posted."

Tiller considers himself media-friendly, but he also felt the need to draw a line in the sand in order to protect his program's best interests. So in the spring of 2007, Purdue moved its practices to a more secure site on campus and Tiller discontinued his policy of allowing reporters to watch.

The veteran coach, who is entering his 12th and final season at Purdue, certainly isn't the first coach to ban reporters from practice. And he wasn't the last, as evidenced by University of Wisconsin coach Bret Bielema's decision to keep reporters out of practice for most of the Badgers' 2008 preseason training camp, which began Monday.

Not all coaches in the Big Ten have closed the doors on the media. But programs like Illinois and Indiana, which open their entire practice to the media, are becoming a rarity -- not only in the league, but among BCS programs.

It's clear coaches are growing increasingly frustrated -- and paranoid -- about what information leaks out on the Internet. On the other side of the issue are reporters, who are growing annoyed because they feel they're unable to provide their readers with comprehensive reports.

"It's a sad thing," said Ron Higgins, president of the Football Writers Association of America. "I understand some coaches have the NFL policy, where you can watch the first 20 minutes and the last 20 minutes, and that's kind of becoming the norm. But to completely shut it down to where you can't see anything, that's sad."

Doors closing

Tiller says half-jokingly that he's getting out of the coaching profession at just the right time. He preferred the days when there were no such things as blogs or Internet message boards. Back then, he didn't have to worry about reporters using the Web to break down the number of carries each running back had in practice and to analyze why one player had moved ahead of another on the depth chart.

"We had three different (reporters) that actually sat on the hill with their computer in front of them and they're reporting on the practice as it goes," Tiller said. "And it's not good for your team.

"Kids are young people. They get on the Internet. And the next thing you know I've got kids coming into my office during our damn two-a-days saying, 'What's my status on the team?' "

It wasn't unusual for family members to pass along information they had read on the Internet that fueled those self-doubts or other concerns, Tiller said.

"I'm thinking, 'What is going on here? This is absolutely insane. I'm just trying to have a two-a-day practice. I'm trying to get our football team ready to go,'" he said.

Bielema said he was sick of putting out fires regarding injuries. After a player was injured during Bielema's first preseason training camp as a head coach in 2006, he got a call from the player's mother, who had read about the injury on the Internet before trainers had the opportunity to notify her by phone.