With the lone win by the skin of our nuts against a .500 squad. It's not complicated what it will take to win given that when they score under 70 it's a loss. Purdue must find a way to force these games to the 76+ territory.
While the Big Ten reg season is lost and traditionally the BTT isn't our hallowed grounds, for Purdue to have a successful March it simply comes down to scoring more points. Whether it's making a couple more 3s (to the tune of at least 8 per gm), not sucking at the line (so making at least 15 and shooting no worse than 65%), or not throwing away 2 and 3 consecutive possessions where 1 bad TO turns into 2 on top of a quick run out score it created the other way, it is not difficult at all to easily find 7 to 12 more points per game.
People have harped all year on the bad defensive metrics, especially the national types, but if they score 80, will it matter? It has yet to be proven otherwise. On top of 4 unlucky as hell losses (and yes Purdue got one back vs OSU) with the consecutive banks tonight easily the topper of ridiculousness, if they find a way to that additional scoring that's almost wholly been lost via their own decision-making, the number of losses could easily be halved, I argue almost without regard to how the opponent played. Mentally the players would feel confident in the clutch (as well as fans not wanting to find a ledge) as they become one that closes out games, rather than this bad recurring movie. Only at MSU and vs Wisc were close losses in a traditional fashion to go with the depantsing at Mich, so could be as few as 3 Ls and a ranking in the top 3 with the 1 seed in Midwest all but clinched. Unfortunately now reality is Chicago is gone and even worse if IL wins the BTT, I fear Indy pod may be gone too. (Holy shit will I have a lot of tickets to sell across 4 rounds.)
Purdue needs to counter-punch teams that want to win at a plodding pace, play up tempo and try to find a way to score more in transition. It's feels odd typing that about Purdue, but that's what we now have. The fastbreak point game has all but become extinct in the 2nd half of the season. I realize Purdue forces few turnovers, but I think they are other ways to push it, which we witnessed as a nice change of pace from Hunter a couple times when they trimmed the 10 pt deficit to tie it in the final 12 mins. I think that's what @Brian_GoldandBlack.com has meant all year when he says this squad is much more built for March than winning the Big Ten. The easiest way for that to happen is to get hot from deep like we saw in 2018-19 after a 5 or so game funk from Carsen.
Also, is Purdue now 3-6 or so when trailing at halftime? Didn't look up, but that seems about right. So not as damning of a stat, but again, pushes the point to force tempo early rather than letting the game come to them.
At any rate, this is a shitty place to be as a fan as things aren't trending well, but it's all part of the highs and lows of being a sports nut.
Okay, for the first time in a while I thought I'd armchair QB rant it after one of these. Crap it's almost time to go to work, time for sleep.
While the Big Ten reg season is lost and traditionally the BTT isn't our hallowed grounds, for Purdue to have a successful March it simply comes down to scoring more points. Whether it's making a couple more 3s (to the tune of at least 8 per gm), not sucking at the line (so making at least 15 and shooting no worse than 65%), or not throwing away 2 and 3 consecutive possessions where 1 bad TO turns into 2 on top of a quick run out score it created the other way, it is not difficult at all to easily find 7 to 12 more points per game.
People have harped all year on the bad defensive metrics, especially the national types, but if they score 80, will it matter? It has yet to be proven otherwise. On top of 4 unlucky as hell losses (and yes Purdue got one back vs OSU) with the consecutive banks tonight easily the topper of ridiculousness, if they find a way to that additional scoring that's almost wholly been lost via their own decision-making, the number of losses could easily be halved, I argue almost without regard to how the opponent played. Mentally the players would feel confident in the clutch (as well as fans not wanting to find a ledge) as they become one that closes out games, rather than this bad recurring movie. Only at MSU and vs Wisc were close losses in a traditional fashion to go with the depantsing at Mich, so could be as few as 3 Ls and a ranking in the top 3 with the 1 seed in Midwest all but clinched. Unfortunately now reality is Chicago is gone and even worse if IL wins the BTT, I fear Indy pod may be gone too. (Holy shit will I have a lot of tickets to sell across 4 rounds.)
Purdue needs to counter-punch teams that want to win at a plodding pace, play up tempo and try to find a way to score more in transition. It's feels odd typing that about Purdue, but that's what we now have. The fastbreak point game has all but become extinct in the 2nd half of the season. I realize Purdue forces few turnovers, but I think they are other ways to push it, which we witnessed as a nice change of pace from Hunter a couple times when they trimmed the 10 pt deficit to tie it in the final 12 mins. I think that's what @Brian_GoldandBlack.com has meant all year when he says this squad is much more built for March than winning the Big Ten. The easiest way for that to happen is to get hot from deep like we saw in 2018-19 after a 5 or so game funk from Carsen.
Also, is Purdue now 3-6 or so when trailing at halftime? Didn't look up, but that seems about right. So not as damning of a stat, but again, pushes the point to force tempo early rather than letting the game come to them.
At any rate, this is a shitty place to be as a fan as things aren't trending well, but it's all part of the highs and lows of being a sports nut.
Okay, for the first time in a while I thought I'd armchair QB rant it after one of these. Crap it's almost time to go to work, time for sleep.
