One thing was clear in Dakota Mathias' play this weekend in Fort Wayne: he is exactly what Purdue needs right now.
Mathias is an excellent shooter. We hesitate to say he is Kendall Stephens' peer, but he's not far off, if at all.
But what sets Mathias apart from your prototypical "shooter" is that he's no one-trick pony, as so many others are. He handles the ball. He drives. He's an excellent passer and a capable playmaker for others. He won't be a point guard in college, but he has point guard skills enough to do it for his high school and AAU teams and win a lot of games doing it.
To be really effective at the college level, you want to see shooters who can play off closeouts as defenders sprint to cover them, put the ball on the floor and either drive to the basket or collapse the defense, then make the right pass. Mathias looks ideally suited to do those things.
But shooting is his thing and not just three-point shooting. Mathias, based on his showing at Spiece this weekend, makes all kinds of shots. This weekend, he made catch-and-shoot threes, threes off the dribble, mid-range jumpers off pump fakes, turnarounds and jumpers out of post-ups.
He is just well rounded as an offensive player and quite frankly a much better player than we anticipated seeing this weekend. Purdue got out in front of everyone on this, did all it could early and got it done. Had this gotten to July, the fray would have been busy.
Mathias looks like an ideal Purdue fit. He's No. 1 in his class academically, his AAU coach said. He's tough and competitive, a winner, as was pretty clear this weekend as he led a Northwest Ohio team to the final four of the 17s bracket at Spiece. Mathias has some good players on his team, but it's more than fair to say he carried his team to the semis of one of the most competitive tournaments out there.
Team Thad probably should have rolled Northwest Ohio, based on heights and weights and quicks and wing spans and rankings. But Mathias kept making plays, plays that kept his team afloat.
When Thad had a healthy lead late and Mathias was called for an iffy travel bumping into a defender to create space, he got mad and stole the ball from Thad's point guard on the ensuing possession and went the other way for an and-one opportunity.
Northwest Ohio wound up losing, but Mathias' 28 points sure made it interesting.
Leaving Fort Wayne today, the sense was Purdue couldn't get Mathias wrapped up soon enough, after national writers took a great interest in him.
What was funny - or telling about Mathias - was that it seemed like the more he blew up, the more it pushed him toward Purdue.
Maybe I was imagining things, but it seemed like with every day that passed, with interviews being done every day, his comments about committing soon and Purdue leading grew stronger and more certain.
And so Purdue gets a player it wanted badly, maybe some momentum considering the pub Mathias will get off his play this weekend and the satisfaction of knowing it beat everyone to the punch on a player and slammed the door on everyone else's fingers.
Mathias is an excellent shooter. We hesitate to say he is Kendall Stephens' peer, but he's not far off, if at all.
But what sets Mathias apart from your prototypical "shooter" is that he's no one-trick pony, as so many others are. He handles the ball. He drives. He's an excellent passer and a capable playmaker for others. He won't be a point guard in college, but he has point guard skills enough to do it for his high school and AAU teams and win a lot of games doing it.
To be really effective at the college level, you want to see shooters who can play off closeouts as defenders sprint to cover them, put the ball on the floor and either drive to the basket or collapse the defense, then make the right pass. Mathias looks ideally suited to do those things.
But shooting is his thing and not just three-point shooting. Mathias, based on his showing at Spiece this weekend, makes all kinds of shots. This weekend, he made catch-and-shoot threes, threes off the dribble, mid-range jumpers off pump fakes, turnarounds and jumpers out of post-ups.
He is just well rounded as an offensive player and quite frankly a much better player than we anticipated seeing this weekend. Purdue got out in front of everyone on this, did all it could early and got it done. Had this gotten to July, the fray would have been busy.
Mathias looks like an ideal Purdue fit. He's No. 1 in his class academically, his AAU coach said. He's tough and competitive, a winner, as was pretty clear this weekend as he led a Northwest Ohio team to the final four of the 17s bracket at Spiece. Mathias has some good players on his team, but it's more than fair to say he carried his team to the semis of one of the most competitive tournaments out there.
Team Thad probably should have rolled Northwest Ohio, based on heights and weights and quicks and wing spans and rankings. But Mathias kept making plays, plays that kept his team afloat.
When Thad had a healthy lead late and Mathias was called for an iffy travel bumping into a defender to create space, he got mad and stole the ball from Thad's point guard on the ensuing possession and went the other way for an and-one opportunity.
Northwest Ohio wound up losing, but Mathias' 28 points sure made it interesting.
Leaving Fort Wayne today, the sense was Purdue couldn't get Mathias wrapped up soon enough, after national writers took a great interest in him.
What was funny - or telling about Mathias - was that it seemed like the more he blew up, the more it pushed him toward Purdue.
Maybe I was imagining things, but it seemed like with every day that passed, with interviews being done every day, his comments about committing soon and Purdue leading grew stronger and more certain.
And so Purdue gets a player it wanted badly, maybe some momentum considering the pub Mathias will get off his play this weekend and the satisfaction of knowing it beat everyone to the punch on a player and slammed the door on everyone else's fingers.
