Tag: Purdue Basketball

Michigan State face-plant at Purdue sends message to Badgers

More on the Big Ten race

We said this earlier in January: There is no elite team in the Big Ten. We noted that Michigan State, though unbeaten in conference play, had played almost all of its conference games at home. Michigan State’s one road game in the league entering Sunday at Purdue was a game at Northwestern, one of the two terrible teams in the conference alongside Nebraska.

Michigan State, in other words, had not yet been challenged on the road in Big Ten play, due to its home-game-heavy schedule to start the conference season.

Guess what happened when the Spartans and Tom Izzo had to play a decent — but not even especially good — opponent on Sunday in West Lafayette? Michigan State was DEMOLISHED by Purdue, not merely beaten. The Boilermakers were 9-7 entering the game, but like the 9-7 Tennessee Titans, they looked like world-beaters against the first-place team in their conference. (Sports are funny that way.)

The Michigan State-Purdue result confirms our thesis at Badgers Wire: There is indeed no elite team in the Big Ten. Michigan State is not a Goliath looking down on everyone else. The Spartans are not a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament. They look a lot more like a 3 or 4 seed than a 1 or a 2 seed.

Guess what, then, Wisconsin fans? The Badgers can win the Big Ten. No, I wouldn’t BET on that, but I would certainly say that UW can make a run at the conference championship.

Yes, the loss to Illinois could really hurt the Badgers in two months, when we look at the final Big Ten standings, but Illinois is currently holding a second-place position in the Big Ten. Do you think the Illini will hold that position? If Illinois can be second now, Wisconsin can be second at a later point in time… and if Wisconsin can be second, it can make its way to first place.

Remember: The Badgers have won two Big Ten road games, and not against Nebraska or Northwestern. Wisconsin has beaten the kinds of teams Michigan State has not yet shown it can beat in the Big Ten away from East Lansing. If Wisconsin keeps winning some rock fights on the road in the conference, and Michigan State gains the same “Jekyll and Hyde” identity so many other Big Ten teams have in road games compared to home games, the Badgers will be in the thick of the hunt at the very end, in early March.

The Big Ten is wide open. Wisconsin can be part of the party. Don’t let anyone tell you this league is unwinnable for the Badgers.

10 for 20: Purdue basketball

Purdue basketball in the 2020s

One of the bigger stories in college basketball and the Big Ten in the 21st century, not just the 2010s, is the lack of high-end basketball success in the state of Indiana. The Indiana Hoosiers were a fixture in the NCAA Tournament — often its later rounds — through the early 1990s under Bob Knight. Imagine sitting on your couch in 1993 and having someone tell you that Indiana would make one Final Four in the next 26 years. You would have told that person s/he was absolutely crazy and needed to see a shrink.

Alongside Indiana’s lack of significant basketball success is another improbable story of frustration: Purdue, a program in a basketball-mad state with a rich heritage and tradition (a guy named John Wooden played there in the early 1930s), has been very consistently good but very rarely great. The Boilermakers have somehow managed to go 39 years without a Final Four and do not appear to have the kind of team which is ready to snap that streak before it reaches 40 years this upcoming April.

This past March in Louisville, Virginia’s Kihei Clark (the pass) and Mamadi Diakite (the shot) denied Purdue its first Final Four since 1980. Virginia swiped that Final Four ticket from Matt Painter’s grasp. The Cavaliers’ late play — in one of the best regional finals ever seen, right up there with 1992 Duke-Kentucky — denied Purdue’s Carsen Edwards a deserved victory lap as the hero of heroes in the history of Purdue basketball. Edwards delivered one of the all-time-great performances in NCAA Tournament history, but it didn’t lead to a Final Four.

As one considers the challenge facing Purdue in the 2020s, the surface answer is obvious: Get to the damn Final Four. The more precise detail, though, is this: Have a Plan B. What I mean by that: Purdue’s best team over the past 39 years was the 1994 team with Glenn “Big Dog” Robinson, a college basketball legend. The 2019 team relied so much on Edwards for its production and overall success. Purdue needs a “Plan B” player, a second guy who can team with a superstar to give the Boilermakers the extra measure of dynamism they need to succeed at the highest level. We will see what the 2020s bring for a program which is yearning to snap a decades-long Final Four drought.

Marquette comeback against Purdue gets Wisconsin’s attention

Looking at the Marquette Golden Eagles’ win over the Purdue Boilermakers before Marquette faces the Wisconsin Badgers on Sunday.

The shiny object found in the Marquette Golden Eagles’ 65-55 win over the Purdue Boilermakers on Wednesday night was the 40-point second half the Golden Eagles slapped on Matt Painter’s crew. If Marquette has established an identity in recent years, it is that it can explode on offense at any time. Markus Howard can break free. Seton Hall might have Myles Powell, but Howard makes sure that Marquette always has as much firepower as the opposition, if not more. A 40-point second half is on brand for MU and Steve Wojciechowski.

Yet, while looking at the shiny object — 40 points after halftime in a relatively low-scoring game — one shouldn’t ignore the more substantive aspect of a game in which Marquette came back from a 13-point halftime deficit (38-25). The Golden Eagles held Purdue to just 17 points after the intermission.

If Marquette — which got run off the floor by Ja Morant and Murray State in the first round of the 2019 NCAA Tournament — is to improve as a program and become more of a national force in the Big East Conference, it will come at the defensive end of the floor. Being good enough and tough enough to hold Purdue to 17 points in a half sends a very positive message before Marquette faces the Wisconsin Badgers on Sunday. Such a feat is… well… very Wisconsin-like.

As we size up the Golden Eagles before they visit the Kohl Center on Sunday afternoon, we are brought in touch with a fundamental question: As good as Marquette was in that second half, was the 40-17 drubbing the Golden Eagles handed to the Boilermakers a primary product of MU’s ability to adjust, or was it more a result of Purdue not finding an answer to the departure of Carsen Edwards?

From the Marquette side of the equation, the Golden Eagles have to feel confident they can defend at a high level. They can’t control Purdue’s limitations; they got punched in the mouth in the first half and could have wobbled. Instead, they roared back against a team which came within an eyelash of making the Final Four last spring. Marquette did what was within its power to do. To that extent, the Golden Eagles deserve ample credit.

It is the Purdue dimension of this question which is more encouraging to Wisconsin. Purdue, for those not getting up to speed on college basketball as football enters its crucial home stretch, lacked answers at crunch time versus Texas — in Mackey Arena — a few days earlier. If Purdue had solved Texas but then stumbled against Marquette, the Golden Eagles could be viewed in a more favorable light. Because Purdue couldn’t use home-court advantage well against a previous opponent, however, this loss to Marquette seems like a trend more than a plot twist or an aberration.

Wisconsin can therefore look at Purdue and arrive at the conclusion that Marquette pounced on an especially vulnerable opponent. Wisconsin can look at the statistics and see that Marquette shot just 7 of 25 from 3-point range and won by 10… because Purdue was just 6 of 24 from long distance and a shocking 9 of 21 from the free throw line. If Purdue can’t stand on its own this season without Carsen Edwards, Wisconsin — lacking Micah Potter for no legitimately good reason — can stand on the strength of its balance and its defense.

Wisconsin doesn’t just have a chance to beat Marquette this Sunday. The Badgers can send a message to Purdue and the rest of the Big Ten about their resourcefulness, their balance, and their quality. Just imagine what a win without Potter could do for a team which is still settling into this season. A win over Marquette would settle some scores and enable Wisconsin to feel a lot more settled and calm about its long-term prospects.