Staff Roundtable: What’s Going on With Purdue Basketball?

There’s clearly something going on with Purdue men’s basketball. We can’t be sure what it is, but I reached out to the staff to see what they think the issue is.

Ledman:

I can’t give you a 100% definitive issue, but I can give you my opinion. I think it was Jalen Rose who talked about this Purdue team a month or more back where he said this is a team who has been everywhere and done everything and so the regular season just feels less important to them. I think they know that people will judge them on March results no matter what. That means they just aren’t putting in 100% each and every game (even if subconsciously). Is that a bit of a cop out? Possibly. Maybe someone else on staff will have a better answer?

Travis:

I think there are two:

First, when Purdue has lost, it has not been the more physical team. I saw it in person Sunday in Columbus. I don’t know if Ohio State is better, but they were definitely more physical defensively, and the foul trouble for Purdue’s bigs made that advantage even larger. Oscar Cluff was basically not allowed to participate in the proceedings. We have seen time and again how important it is for he and Trey Kaufman-Renn to dominate the glass. If they don’t, Purdue is in trouble. The key sequence on Sunday came with just over 12 minutes left. Purdue was trailing 52-45, but had some momentum after it had gotten down 14. Ohio State had a possession where Purdue absolutely needed a stop, and it got not one, but two offensive rebounds, allowing Bruce Thronton to hit a backbreaker three. Obviosuly there is no guarantee Purdue goes on to win if it gets a board there, but a stop and a basket at the other end makes the rest of the game look different. 

Second, and I cannot believe I am saying this, Purdue has been a better team away from Mackey Arena. Let’s be honest: Purdue was bad at home this year. It lost all four marquee games on the schedule, two by double digits. The senior trio was 44-4 at home before this season. To lose four in Mackey seems unthinkable. Not only that, it struggled far too much against bottom feeders Oregon, Penn State, and Washington. Away from home Purdue has been better. They are 10-3 with the best wins (Texas Tech, Alabama, Nebraska, Iowa, Auburn, and Wisconsin) all coming away from home. If you had told me that Purdue would be 10-3 away from home with two games left before the season started I would have already bought Big Ten championship merch. 

I think part of that comes from the role players playing better away from home, specifically CJ Cox and Gicarri Harris. Cox was huge Sunday with three early threes, but once he was contained things went sour. Harris has been a night and day better shooter away from home. When those two are hitting (plus Jack Benter and Omer MAyer), it opens up so much more for Purdue. It opens up the post for Cluff andTKR. It opens up that midrange drive for Cox, Braden Smith, and Fletcher Loyer.

If Purdue is getting out-toughed and its role players are not contributing it suddenly looks very ordinary. It relies too much on the three-ball. The Boilers were able to make somewhat of a comeback with TKR becoming a scorer late on Sunday, but the damage was done by that point.

Strangely enough, I remain confident this team can mae a tourney run. First off, it still has a very good chance at getting a 3 seed, meaning it will avoid one of the big four (Michigan, Arizona, Duke, and UConn) for as long as possible. That road work early pays dividends here. 

Second, I think this team is built for non-Big Ten basketball. We have seen the Boilers absolutely thirve outside the Big Ten the last five years. It is only overshadowed by the enormous outliers of St. Peter’s and FDU. Those look all the more baffling when you see the list of teams Purdue has beaten outside the conference in that time. 

Third, and again, this is so odd to say, but Purdue won’t play the tournament in Mackey. There is not a true “bad” loss on the schedule as the Boilers are 8-7 in Tier 1 NET games. only Arizona (13-2), and Florida (10-5) have been better and have played as many such teams. I truly believe that the combo of neutral venues plus non-Big Ten bully ball teams will help this squad. 

We know this team can be better than this. We have seen it this year. The team that absolutely destroyed a very good Texas Tech team (who, by the way, beat Arizona and Iowa State on the road each) is there. In the seven losses Purdue has lost two toss-ups (UCLA and Michigan State where it missed a three for the win at the end), lost three times because it played an absolutely terrible game (at Indiana, at Ohio State, and home against Iowa State), it lost to the best team in the country (Michigan) and it lost a home game because Keaton Wegler had a ginormous outlier of a performance for Illinois. It’s been a combination of bad luck, a breakdown in toughness, and poor shooting at home. 

Ryan:

Well the main issue for Purdue at the moment is defense. There are stretches across the season that the defense just seems optional for Purdue. Below are the largest runs Purdue opponents have gone on since the start of February (and in losses). It’s pretty simple: in games Purdue allowed greater than a 8-0 run, they lost 7 of 8 games thanks in part because they barely escaped Lincoln with an overtime victory after blowing a giant lead. Now, obviously, these runs are problematic on both sides of the court, but it just feels much more egregious on defense because Purdue more often than not will get a good look on offense but sometimes the outside shots just aren’t falling for 3-4 possessions in a row. The problem becomes when you compound those possessions with (insert opponent here) making 4+ shots in a row, often because Purdue is not rotating well or just cannot compete in the low post. It’s becoming more and more clear that Purdue is going to need to outshoot their opponents in March if they want to go on a deep run. The defense hasn’t been stellar for the majority of the season and when the opponents became really good, Purdue has not looked anything close to elite. Opponents will not be getting easier come tournament time, either, so it’s put up or shut up time for the Boilermakers. 

Ohio St – 18-5 run then 14-3 run (lost by 8)

Michigan St – 10-0 run (lost by 2)

Indiana (Home) – 5-0 run (won by 29)

Michigan – 16-0 run (lost by 11)

Iowa – 7-0 run (won by 21)

Nebraska – 18-2 run then 10-0 run (won by 3)

Oregon – 8-0 run (won by 4)
Maryland – 7-0 run (won by 30)

Indiana (Road) – 13-0 run (lost by 5)

Illinois – 13-0 run (lost by 6)

UCLA – 11-0 run then 8-0 run to end game (lost by 2)

Iowa St – 11-0 run then 13-2 run (lost by 23)

Drew:

Vibes brother, the vibes are rancid. The Ohio State game was a clown show, and not even a good clown show; it was a depressing clown show.

I don’t know if these guys don’t like each other, or if familiarity has bred contempt at this point, but it was weird not seeing anybody step up and have a quick word with the Ohio State center after Loyer got ear-holed. That seemed like a warranted reaction from a more dialed in team. Nothing extreme, just a reminder to keep your shoulder to yourself.

Omer threw Braden a bad pass and it certainly looked like Braden didn’t everything he could to get back on defense, which has become a bit of an issue recently.

I feel like Trey is almost over compensating for the general malaise Purdue has been in recently by playing on the wrong side of reckless on occasion. I appreciate the hustle, but I also appreciate him not picking up dumb fouls while diving for balls he has no reasonable chance of getting to.

Look, the regular season is over, and goals were not met, but the cool thing is these guys still have a chance to change the narrative with a solid tournament run, as unlikely as that seems right now.

I don’t see that happening if this team doesn’t get together and realize a bunch of guys are about to play their last games of competitive basketball that actually mean something and start playing that way. This team, despite the disappointing results, is still more than capable in terms of talent.

Jed:

There isn’t a lack of skill or talent because this team has show it can beat really good teams. I think this team simply has an issue with complacency because of the amount of success they have experienced. It is kind of silly to think about considering this group has lost to a 16 seed as a 1 seed along with getting court-stormed constantly, but it’s the only answer I have.

This team has, for many games, simply looked like it didn’t like itself…let along each other. It is as if they went through their struggles in early January and then lost the three straight, they knew they likely weren’t winning the B1G. After that, it simple seemed like there just wasn’t any juice left. It was a problem I noticed in their game against Oakland where they just seemed content holding a lead instead of showing any kind of killer instinct. That has seemingly continued to follow them most of the season.

 A group of players who has played this long together, won individual awards, made a national championship, and won league titles just seems like they have no interest in how the games they have left end up. They will make the B1G Tourney and the NCAA Tourney and to them it Kiel doesn’t matter where they get seeded. They simply want to get to those games.

That’s a recipe for disaster when it comes to building to a couple single-elimination tourneys that the program has a less than stellar reputation in over the last decade.