Playing Purdue

[Andrew]

8 minutes ago, BoilerMKT said:

Greetings, Mean Green.  Boilermaker here.  Congrats on winning your conference!  Thought I would stop by and familiarize you with the team you will be facing in the first round.  I hope you will provide the same in return.

Starters:

• Trevion Williams--6'10", 265, junior.  Trevion made first-team all-B1G, averaging about 16 and 9.  He is mostly a back-to-the-basket player with a quick first step and a wide variety of post-moves.  Loves the jump hook over his left shoulder, but also likes to spin and hit the reverse layup.  He is an elite rebounder and an elite passer for a big man.  Very patient with double teams.  He is an average at best defender and occasionally takes dumb fouls.  He is a very below average free throw shooter despite having what looks like good form.  Was backup center on the '19 Elite Eight team.
• Mason Gillis--6'6", 230, redshirt freshman.  Glue guy.  Always seems to be around the ball.  Most of his points come on putbacks or dives to the basket.  Is a capable three-point shooter but not a volume one.  Excellent free-throw shooter and makes them when it counts.
•  Jaden Ivey--6'4", 200, freshman.  Future NBA player.  Elite athlete.  Got off to a slow start this year due to a foot injury but has really come on the last two months.  Averaging 14 over the last dozen games.  Great at attacking the basket and finishing.  Is an improving 3-pt shooter and has been about 85% at the line on high volume over those same twelve games.  Also a very good on-ball defender.  He makes multiple plays per game that we haven't seen at Purdue since probably Glenn Robinson.
•  Sasha Stefanovic--6'5", 200, junior.  Our best 3-point shooter and best post-feeder, which is very important in our offense.  Can be stifled by really good defenders, but the attention he draws opens things up for others.  Is capable of putting on the deck and finishing, but that's usually a last option.  Average one-on-one defender, but is very important in the team defense concept.  Backup 2 on the Elite Eight Team.
•  Eric Hunter, Jr.--6'4", 170, junior.  Our best perimeter defender, having shut down some of the B1G's elite scorers.  Generally a good decision-maker at the point.  Is a very capable but often inconsistent scorer who is most comfortable in the mid-range pull-up game.  Backup point on the Elite Eight Team.

Bench:

•  Zach Edey--7'4", 285, freshman.  An absolute revelation.  The #429 recruit in his class.  Has only been playing basketball for three years after spending his youth playing hockey and baseball in Canada.  Everyone expected him to redshirt, then he went out and scored 36 points in the first two games of the season vs. Liberty and Clemson.  I saw someone refer to him as really slow, but he actually moves very well for his size, and when your wingspan looks like it covers the whole lane you probably don't have to be all that quick.  Great hands and footwork, soft touch (except for when he's tearing down rims).  Flushes alley-oops while barely jumping.  Unlike Trevion, an excellent free throw shooter.  He is not yet an elite shot blocker.  Will generally just wall up to try to avoid fouls.  And if drawn out high in P&R situations, he is pretty easy to get around.  Is foul prone, but draws a ton of them, too.  Finished the regular season with 21 and 20 vs. Wisconsin and Indiana in just 39 minutes.
•  Brandon Newman--6'5", 195, redshirt freshman.  Our next best three-point shooter.  Can score at all three levels, but most shots are from three.  Good rebounder for a guard and pretty good defender.  Started most of the season until the emergence of Ivey and the return of Sasha from COVID.  Foul prone.  Has not totally adjusted to coming off the bench.  Had a 29-point game vs. Minnesota.
•  Aaron Wheeler--6'9", 205, junior.  Message board whipping boy for most of the last two years as his shot wasn't falling like it did during his freshman season, but has found himself again over the last few games, dropping 7 of 11 from distance.  Has always rebounded well and is very athletic. Began the season as a starter, but now splits minutes about 60/40 with Gillis depending on who's having the better night.   Key bench contributor on the Elite 8.
•  Isaiah Thompson--6'1", 160, sophomore.  Backup point.  Provides some quickness and occasionally gets hot from three.  Can be overpowered by more physical guards.

 

Offensive approach:

Purdue runs a mix of motion offense and sets that have options off of options off of options.  Looks to play through the post most of the time, taking advantage of Williams one-on-one moves and passing ability and Edey's ability to obliterate the sun.  They like to shoot the three, but have not made them at the rate they've grown accustomed to in recent years.  Medium to below average pace.  Have worked in more P&R this year because of Ivey's capabilities.  Shot selection has consistently gotten better as the freshman have matured.  Still a bit more turnover prone than a typical Painter team.  Very good offensive rebounding team.

Defensive approach:

100% man-to-man.  Not a pressing team, but will pick up the primary ball-handler for 94 feet.  Switch almost everything.  General philosophy is to force tough twos.  Can be exposed by elite P & R teams, and the freshmen still make freshmen mistakes on that end.  Also vulnerable to teams that have bigs who can shoot the three.

Miscellaneous:

The team does not quit.  Won a game they trailed by 17 at half at Michigan State, and just went to overtime two days ago vs. Ohio State after trailing by 18 at half.  

Won their last five and eleven of their last fourteen regular season games and finished 4th.  At the beginning of the year, being on the bubble was a reasonable expectation, but the freshmen have played well beyond their years and the juniors have stepped into leadership roles.  Playing with house money at this point.  It's next year that should be really fun.

 

Again, don't know anything about NT.  KenPom makes it look like you are very good defensively, very good at shooting the three and play at a Wisconsin pace, meaning you will force us to defend.  Would love to hear your thoughts and looking forward to the game Friday.

Oh, by the way.  We won't be allowed to play at Mackey Arena of course, but if the game is at Assembly Hall in Bloomington, recognize that is our auxiliary home court  🙂

 

Cheers!

 

 

 

 

Thanks for the info! Love your knowledge of your team and the sport. 👍

[greenminer]

@BoilerMKT appreciate the post.  I'll give my 0.02.  Many on this board can give you the entire dollar.  Hope you stick around.

$0.01 - We are ferocious on defense.  We consistently hold teams 10+ points below their season average
$0.01 - we are efficient on offense.

...we seem to be coming into form at a great time.  Held our four tournament opponents at/below 57 points each game.  Couple that with a offense that's T10 efficient, we believe we are very old school tough.

We also acknowledge this was not the best possible draw for us.  Purdue's length will give us problems.

We believe Coach McCasland is special, but we don't have a ton of depth right now.  Through the first three games of conference tournament, 4 starters accounted for 90% of our points.  Our roster believes in each other.  Will run through brick walls for each other.  Hamlet is our warrior.  Our Iron Man and Thanos all-in-one.  CUSA Tourney MVP.  2019-20 CUSA Athlete of the Year.  Once in a generation leadership, mental strength, and just a believer.  You can't help but get behind him.

Thanks for swinging by.  Hope to see more of y'all.

Edited March 15, 2021 by greenminer

[greenminer]

 

[greenminer]

found some Boilermaker communities:

https://www.hammerandrails.com/mens-basketball

http://www.oldgoldfreepress.com/forums/

https://www.boiledsports.com/

https://purdue.forums.rivals.com/forums/free-board-boilermaker-mens-basketball.30/

[greenminer]

Quote

Bassey from W Kentucky is 6’11” so not comparable to Edey. Bassey did dominate them with his size in the second half. UNT jumped to a 17-0 lead against them. UNT blew the lead and didn’t score a FG until under 10:00 in the second half. Their 3 point shooting was not so good from what I saw. They are just happy to get into the tourney. W Kentucky was the best team in their conference and were upset.

https://purdue.forums.rivals.com/threads/the-opponent.208446/post-2955267
 

[Indynative]

7 minutes ago, greenminer said:

found some Boilermaker communities:

https://www.hammerandrails.com/mens-basketball

http://www.oldgoldfreepress.com/forums/

https://www.boiledsports.com/

https://purdue.forums.rivals.com/forums/free-board-boilermaker-mens-basketball.30/

Please ignore hammer and rails. They are like the brother we don’t talk about. Very embarrassing.

[Coach Andy Mac]

been reading their board and they seem pretty knowledgeable.
 

https://purdue.forums.rivals.com/threads/the-opponent.208446/

Edited March 15, 2021 by Coach Andy Mac

[greenminer]

sure one more

 

[RiseUNT]

6:25pm

[BoilerMKT]

49 minutes ago, greenminer said:

 

Interesting choice and a great reference point.  All the mistakes you see there like bringing the ball down, whacking the defender in the head, trying to dunk from too far away have been pretty much eliminated.  Here's a more recent example against a much higher level of competition.

 

[BoilerMKT]

This is Purdue's Option 1

 

[CMJ]

BoilerMKT, thanks for adding to our knowledge.  I watched Purdue one or twice, so I can't say I knew too much about this year's squad.  But I know how Painter's teams play from past years and how gritty they are.

 

I know you had a couple of years of early exits in the NCAA's, but generally Purdue isn't upset, which I also  don't like as far as matchups.  😉  I do think this is a better chance for us than Kansas State was in 2010, so at least that's something!

[TAP]

4 hours ago, EAGLE83 said:

In the past they would not let teams play on their home court

No different this year. Purdue can't play at home. Game is at Lucas Oil Stadium where the Colts play.

[TAP]

Someone above mentioned that the 7'4" player starts which is incorrect. Edey comes off the bench to replace Trevion Williams. They typically split the 40 minutes 25-15 or so depending on foul trouble. Painter did play them together a bit near the end of the Ohio State game Friday. They are quite different players but we will feed the post time and time again. Edey struggles to pass it back out though and forces some shots. Williams is a tremendous passer out of the double team. A very good combination of bigs.

[RiseUNT]

20 minutes ago, TAP said:

Someone above mentioned that the 7'4" player starts which is incorrect. Edey comes off the bench to replace Trevion Williams. They typically split the 40 minutes 25-15 or so depending on foul trouble. Painter did play them together a bit near the end of the Ohio State game Friday. They are quite different players but we will feed the post time and time again. Edey struggles to pass it back out though and forces some shots. Williams is a tremendous passer out of the double team. A very good combination of bigs.

 

[Andrew]

1 hour ago, BoilerMKT said:

This is Purdue's Option 1

 

Only shoots 50% from the line. Did anybody try the late game fouls on him before he got set and went to work? 

[BoilerMKT]

1 hour ago, CMJ said:

BoilerMKT, thanks for adding to our knowledge.  I watched Purdue one or twice, so I can't say I knew too much about this year's squad.  But I know how Painter's teams play from past years and how gritty they are.

 

I know you had a couple of years of early exits in the NCAA's, but generally Purdue isn't upset, which I also  don't like as far as matchups.  😉  I do think this is a better chance for us than Kansas State was in 2010, so at least that's something!

Correct.  First-round exits in '15 and '16, both brutal with blown late leads.  But since, Sweet 16 in '17 and '18 and Elite 8 in '19 and a Virginia miracle away from the Final 4.  Prior to those '15 and '16 losses, we had won 14 straight first-rounders spanning the Keady and Painter eras.

[BoilerMKT]

8 minutes ago, Andrew said:

Only shoots 50% from the line. Did anybody try the late game fouls on him before he got set and went to work? 

He hit 11-14 in that game 🙂

 

[RiseUNT]

6 hours ago, CMJ said:

Virginia just based on how we match up against them.  Not saying they're the worst 4 seed...on paper Purdue might be.  But the matchup itself with Purdue poses more problems (to me).

Even IF Virginia plays they will not have practiced in a week. 
 

[ADLER]

Tipoff time of 7:25 pm on the North Court Friday night at Lucas Oil Stadium:

 

[RiseUNT]

Avery Johnson? Our good luck charm? 

[greenminer]

https://www.indystar.com/story/sports/college/purdue/2021/03/14/march-madness-5-things-know-purdue-ncaa-tournament-opponent-north-texas-mean-green-basketball/4695162001/

[Coach Andy Mac]

14 hours ago, wardly said:

There are about 6 or 8 sites in the Indianapolis area such as Butler, which have no tickets available. On the other hand Lucas Oil Stadium where Colts play have tickets for 1st three rounds because of seating capacity .

But which one do we get?  

[greenminer]

Purdue's young team is the polar opposite of the Green Wave, which starts four seniors and a junior.

...wave?

https://www.si.com/college/purdue/basketball/ncaa-purdue-gets-fourth-seed-in-south-will-play-north-texas

[southsideguy]

If we play small ball please don't put Murray on the court.  It breaks down to four on five.  Watching the game against WKU he is just not on the same level as the other starters.  Man PU is a big team.