We sportswriters, we like to cut corners.
Dirty little secret: Sometimes we write stories at halftime.
And sometimes we're made the fools because of it.
Tonight, I deleted my third halftime game story in four days, and man, I'm telling you, that was some good stuff, some real Grade A material, that died on the vine, I'm sorry to say.
Thanks, Purdue.
Thanks for the inconsistency. No, this isn't inconsistency. This is something clinical, some sort of bipolar basketball disorder.
The Boilermakers probably played their best game-and-a-half of the season down here in Florida. And their worst game-and-a-half.
And when Purdue was bad, it was really, really bad.
You know this. You've seen the games.
The bottom line is that for all the talk about maturity, Purdue still lacks it. One would think consistency might be a product of that attribute, I don't know.
Purdue won a basketball game Sunday night it may as well have lost, so I would hope no one's doing cartwheels over beating a low-major program to avoid a last-place finish in this event and doing it in the fashion it was done.
If Siena doesn't blow up in the second half against Purdue the way Purdue blew up in the second half against Washington State, the Saints have tied this series at one apiece and Purdue's sulking back home on a three-game losing streak. Siena lost this game almost as much as the Boilermakers won it, and that shouldn't have to be the case for Purdue to be winning games like this.
But right now, this is Purdue's reality, a team that has not come along as was hoped, a team with a bunch of guys who can score and too many who want to, clouding their judgment on offense and muffling their fire on defense. That's this one person's assessment anyway. I might be wrong.
It's got to change, man.
No one was going to write off a season after eight games had Purdue lost to Siena. To do so would have been totally short-sighted and silly. But when looking at a season in segments, this portion of it obviously would have been severely compromised, undoubtedly to Purdue's detriment later on if such things turn out matter. Right now, Purdue is a long way from the NCAA Tournament team it should be at beginning to resemble.
But sometimes teams have to settle in, you know, like the ingredients of an oil-based salad dressing.
That's all you can hope for, I guess, that Ronnie Johnson plays the rest of the season the way he played tonight, when I thought he was as good as a player can be when they're 1-of-6. Seemed live like he did a nice job "leading," especially in the second half.
Amazing what happened in the second half tonight, when the same guards weren't jacking the ball left and right, dribbling into trouble and trying to throw blind runners over Space Mountain.
If A.J. Hammons could just hold on to the damn ball and Jay Simpson could make every one-foot bunny he gets, those two would have been a dominant combo tonight, maybe a sign Purdue's sleeping giant is stirring.
But it's Siena.
No one's giving out little red ribbons for playing well and beating Siena.
But as disappointing as this trip to the happiest place on earth was for Purdue, it's the best the Boilermakers could do.
Purdue looked bad in Florida, but has some capacity to get better. At you hope so.
The first step is being the same team from one half to the next.
Is it lineups? We'll find out as Painter keeps tinkering. Is it guys' heads not being right to start games? Looked OK to start the Washington State game.
Don't know.
Better figure it out, though.
Have to cut it short tonight, folks. Have a plane to catch.
Dirty little secret: Sometimes we write stories at halftime.
And sometimes we're made the fools because of it.
Tonight, I deleted my third halftime game story in four days, and man, I'm telling you, that was some good stuff, some real Grade A material, that died on the vine, I'm sorry to say.
Thanks, Purdue.
Thanks for the inconsistency. No, this isn't inconsistency. This is something clinical, some sort of bipolar basketball disorder.
The Boilermakers probably played their best game-and-a-half of the season down here in Florida. And their worst game-and-a-half.
And when Purdue was bad, it was really, really bad.
You know this. You've seen the games.
The bottom line is that for all the talk about maturity, Purdue still lacks it. One would think consistency might be a product of that attribute, I don't know.
Purdue won a basketball game Sunday night it may as well have lost, so I would hope no one's doing cartwheels over beating a low-major program to avoid a last-place finish in this event and doing it in the fashion it was done.
If Siena doesn't blow up in the second half against Purdue the way Purdue blew up in the second half against Washington State, the Saints have tied this series at one apiece and Purdue's sulking back home on a three-game losing streak. Siena lost this game almost as much as the Boilermakers won it, and that shouldn't have to be the case for Purdue to be winning games like this.
But right now, this is Purdue's reality, a team that has not come along as was hoped, a team with a bunch of guys who can score and too many who want to, clouding their judgment on offense and muffling their fire on defense. That's this one person's assessment anyway. I might be wrong.
It's got to change, man.
No one was going to write off a season after eight games had Purdue lost to Siena. To do so would have been totally short-sighted and silly. But when looking at a season in segments, this portion of it obviously would have been severely compromised, undoubtedly to Purdue's detriment later on if such things turn out matter. Right now, Purdue is a long way from the NCAA Tournament team it should be at beginning to resemble.
But sometimes teams have to settle in, you know, like the ingredients of an oil-based salad dressing.
That's all you can hope for, I guess, that Ronnie Johnson plays the rest of the season the way he played tonight, when I thought he was as good as a player can be when they're 1-of-6. Seemed live like he did a nice job "leading," especially in the second half.
Amazing what happened in the second half tonight, when the same guards weren't jacking the ball left and right, dribbling into trouble and trying to throw blind runners over Space Mountain.
If A.J. Hammons could just hold on to the damn ball and Jay Simpson could make every one-foot bunny he gets, those two would have been a dominant combo tonight, maybe a sign Purdue's sleeping giant is stirring.
But it's Siena.
No one's giving out little red ribbons for playing well and beating Siena.
But as disappointing as this trip to the happiest place on earth was for Purdue, it's the best the Boilermakers could do.
Purdue looked bad in Florida, but has some capacity to get better. At you hope so.
The first step is being the same team from one half to the next.
Is it lineups? We'll find out as Painter keeps tinkering. Is it guys' heads not being right to start games? Looked OK to start the Washington State game.
Don't know.
Better figure it out, though.
Have to cut it short tonight, folks. Have a plane to catch.
