For fans of all things black and gold, one thing is certain: Now that the Purdue football season has ended, all eyes and attention become squarely centered on the school’s basketball team.
And now that the bulk of their highly successful non-conference slate is over, the Purdue basketball team now sets their sights on the next phase, the Big 10 conference schedule, which begins Thursday, December 5, against Penn State in University Park, PA.
Game time is set for 6:30 ET and will be televised on FS1.
State Of The Boilermakers After Their Tournament Victory
Aside from the clunker produced in Milwaukee against Marquette on November 19, the Purdue basketball squad navigated their non-conference schedule like a nationally-ranked team should. They won seven of their first eight games, highlighted by capturing the title of the Rady Children’s Invitational over Thanksgiving weekend. In the tournament, the Boilers beat NC State and Ole Miss, both of which belong to Power 4 conferences, to bring home the hardware.
Head coach Matt Painter was pleased to see his team overcome some adversity in San Diego, specifically with rebounding and committing turnovers, two areas that were lacking previously, but he was far from satisfied about where his team stands heading into their conference opener.
Said Painter in his post-game presser after the win over Mississippi: “I thought our guys were quicker to the basketball today. I thought we did some good things. We took care of the basketball, we rebounded the basketball, gave a good effort.”
He went on to stress the need for solid and opportunistic defensive play, which he felt attributed to their Thanksgiving success.
“We’re not a team that’s going to force a lot of turnovers, but when we do, we’ve got to capitalize.”
Painter was very impressed with the way Trey Kaufman-Renn and Camden Heide stepped up versus Ole Miss and how Purdue’s offense worked much better with those two performing pivotal roles.
Regarding Kaufman-Renn’s hot stretch in the second half against the Rebels, Painter said the plan was to “just getting him the ball in the low post, but also I thought Braden (Smith) did an excellent job of getting him the ball in that sweet spot on those pocket passes.”
As for Heide, Painter recognized that Kaufman-Renn’s effectiveness helped Heide’s offensive prowess as well as Braden Smith’s ability to maneuver the defense to his liking. “They (Ole Miss) switched and did some different things where, sometimes, that’s not going to work. They either tried to keep a two-on-two game in ball-screen or they switched out of it, so you’re not going to be able to play behind some of those things. But we knew if we could put him (Heide) away from the action and get Trey that basketball, now Trey is in that two-on-one situation for a brief moment, now you’re able to get some of those shots.
“(Cam) is definitely a weapon in us going smaller. Now it gives us spacing. If you go small, you’ve got to have everybody being able to shoot the basketball and he really helps us in that regard. Sometimes he doesn’t get looks, but he’s allowing Braden to manipulate the defense because of his spacing.”
What Does All This Mean For Purdue’s Identity Moving Forward?
The tinkering Painter has done with his starting lineups and rotations thus far has given him enough data to judge just what his team is made of after the season’s first month, especially in the initial stages of not only figuring out how to live without two-time All-American Zach Edey, but understanding that no current Boilermaker can smoothly replace him, either.
“Right now, for us, we’ve played bigger with this group, and now we’ve went to a smaller lineup and I think, with that adjustment, we’ve got to be scrappy like we were today. If you take that away from us, I don’t know if we win the game. Adjusting from (Zach Edey), probably the (biggest thing), obviously the ball went to him a lot, but the difference is we could miss block-out responsibilities and still get rebounds because he would clean things up. He didn’t get credit for how dominant of a defensive player he was. His last couple of years, he was a really good defensive player. He didn’t foul, he stayed big, he changed shots, he blocked shots, he rebounded the basketball. His piece defensively is missed just like offensively.
“That’s been our adjustment, trying to adjust to that. But also, getting those guys to feel like they don’t have to be him, because they can’t be him. He’s a once-in-a-generation player. We just have to play to Trey Kaufman-Renn’s strengths and Cam Heide’s strengths and anybody else who fills those gaps on our frontcourt.”
Previewing Penn State
The Penn State Nittany Lions sprinted out of the non-conference blocks successfully as well, also going 7-1 and off to their best start in 25 years.
However, Purdue has historically owned Penn State, winning 38 games against the Nittany Lions while losing only nine. The Boilermakers are on an eight-game winning streak in the series, and have not lost to Penn State since February 11, 2020, an 88-76 decision at Mackey Arena. In fact, Purdue has emerged victorious in 17 of the last 18 meetings dating back to 2014.
The Nittany Lions boast five players averaging double-figure point totals after eight games, and leading the way is guard Ace Baldwin, Jr., who pours in 14.9 points per contest. Following closely behind are forward Yanic Konan Niederhauser who scores 14.3 points per game and forward Zach Hicks at 13.4. Penn State as a team fills the hoop at a clip of 91.3 points per game while giving up just 67.5.
