A few final musings — yes, musings — from Purdue's 104-68 win over No. 17 Iowa that no matter how many times I type it, still looks like a typo.
• Luka Garza was going to get his, and to his credit, he took it by being aggressive, but attacking before Purdue could send a second defender. No one's handling him one-on-one, not this year.
But Purdue took it all back, by attacking, by attacking him.
Purdue attacked the front of the rim with lobs over the top of Iowa's defense, and when it had Garza out on the perimeter it attacked him off the dribble. He's a great player, but he's slow-footed defensively, and Purdue did a nice job turning an Iowa strength into a weakness. Matt Haarms made a three after Garza had been sucked into the paint by Sasha Stefanovic's dribble and Trevion Williams faced him and drove on him.
And Evan Boudreaux was the face of Purdue going after Garza on offense. He dominated that late first half sequence when he played the 5.
• Look, I cover Purdue, but I care deeply about all teams, and I'm just going to say this to Iowa: You need to be better. You need to guard someone, anyone. I mean, you can't go on like this, Iowa. You have a good team and you just gave up 104 points to Purdue. You have a potential top-10 team nationally in the preseason next year, and if you don't start playing something resembling defense, you will not win the Big Ten, you will not win as many games as you want to win in the NCAA Tournament, none of it.
Please, play defense.
In all seriousness, this was damn flawless offense tonight from a flawed offensive team, which is a credit to Purdue, but also an indictment of the Hawkeyes, who only seem interested in scoring, have for years now.
• Here's part of what sets Nojel Eastern apart as a defensive player. He may be the best on-ball defender in college basketball, but I do say that with limited knowledge of the landscape. But he's great, elite. But defending on the ball and defending away from the ball are two very different things, and what he did tonight was elite defense away from the ball, as it was last year against Romeo Langford.
I'm telling you: Joe Weiskamp is a stud, a first-team All-Big Ten caliber player who has no chance to be first-team All-Big Ten because of a loaded field, but a guy who's good enough to be. He was a non-factor offensively and that was Eastern's doing.
• A quick reminder of how good Trevion Williams is: He made an unbelievable catch for a big man on a particularly ambitious pass by Nojel Eastern and finished the shot like a ballerina, he stripped a guard on a hedge and took it up the floor for an and-one, he dominated the game as a passer and he contributed largely to keeping the Big Ten's second-leading rebounder, Luka Garza, to just one rebound.
• Again, this game was Virginia, Michigan State and Wisconsin all over again, and the totality of those four games scream that Purdue is good enough to be an NCAA Tournament team. That doesn't mean it will have an NCAA Tournament résumé. It would be now if it had any measure of consistency between home and road this season, and that's why this game serves as both a reminder of what Purdue's capable of but also a cautionary tell toward getting one's hopes up that this time will be different.
Purdue's played like this at home a bunch of times this season, then still been down 10 at the first media timeout in the road that followed, and even though Purdue just won a road game, that doesn't mean it played well.
That's what I've got, everybody.
Thanks for reading.
• Luka Garza was going to get his, and to his credit, he took it by being aggressive, but attacking before Purdue could send a second defender. No one's handling him one-on-one, not this year.
But Purdue took it all back, by attacking, by attacking him.
Purdue attacked the front of the rim with lobs over the top of Iowa's defense, and when it had Garza out on the perimeter it attacked him off the dribble. He's a great player, but he's slow-footed defensively, and Purdue did a nice job turning an Iowa strength into a weakness. Matt Haarms made a three after Garza had been sucked into the paint by Sasha Stefanovic's dribble and Trevion Williams faced him and drove on him.
And Evan Boudreaux was the face of Purdue going after Garza on offense. He dominated that late first half sequence when he played the 5.
• Look, I cover Purdue, but I care deeply about all teams, and I'm just going to say this to Iowa: You need to be better. You need to guard someone, anyone. I mean, you can't go on like this, Iowa. You have a good team and you just gave up 104 points to Purdue. You have a potential top-10 team nationally in the preseason next year, and if you don't start playing something resembling defense, you will not win the Big Ten, you will not win as many games as you want to win in the NCAA Tournament, none of it.
Please, play defense.
In all seriousness, this was damn flawless offense tonight from a flawed offensive team, which is a credit to Purdue, but also an indictment of the Hawkeyes, who only seem interested in scoring, have for years now.
• Here's part of what sets Nojel Eastern apart as a defensive player. He may be the best on-ball defender in college basketball, but I do say that with limited knowledge of the landscape. But he's great, elite. But defending on the ball and defending away from the ball are two very different things, and what he did tonight was elite defense away from the ball, as it was last year against Romeo Langford.
I'm telling you: Joe Weiskamp is a stud, a first-team All-Big Ten caliber player who has no chance to be first-team All-Big Ten because of a loaded field, but a guy who's good enough to be. He was a non-factor offensively and that was Eastern's doing.
• A quick reminder of how good Trevion Williams is: He made an unbelievable catch for a big man on a particularly ambitious pass by Nojel Eastern and finished the shot like a ballerina, he stripped a guard on a hedge and took it up the floor for an and-one, he dominated the game as a passer and he contributed largely to keeping the Big Ten's second-leading rebounder, Luka Garza, to just one rebound.
• Again, this game was Virginia, Michigan State and Wisconsin all over again, and the totality of those four games scream that Purdue is good enough to be an NCAA Tournament team. That doesn't mean it will have an NCAA Tournament résumé. It would be now if it had any measure of consistency between home and road this season, and that's why this game serves as both a reminder of what Purdue's capable of but also a cautionary tell toward getting one's hopes up that this time will be different.
Purdue's played like this at home a bunch of times this season, then still been down 10 at the first media timeout in the road that followed, and even though Purdue just won a road game, that doesn't mean it played well.
That's what I've got, everybody.
Thanks for reading.
