What to Expect: Purdue at Indiana
Indiana wraps up a two-game homestand on Tuesday against rival Purdue. The Boilermakers are 15-2 and are coming off an easy 95-78 win against Penn State at Mackey Arena.
Tuesday’s game will tip off at 7 p.m. ET on Peacock:
Note: For information on how to watch Indiana basketball on Peacock, click here.
Three of Indiana’s signature wins under Mike Woodson have come against Purdue. Woodson is 3-1 against the Boilermakers in his two-plus seasons in Bloomington, including a sweep last season. The Hoosiers were underdogs in each of the three wins.
Indiana will enter Tuesday’s matchup as an underdog, which speaks to the current gap between the two programs despite the on-court results the last two seasons.
Purdue was a No. 1 seed in last season’s NCAA tournament and looks to be on a similar trajectory this winter.
The Hoosiers, meanwhile, were an NCAA tournament team the past two seasons but aren’t currently in the conversation for a spot in March Madness. A win on Tuesday would be a step towards changing that.
MEET THE BOILERMAKERS
As the second longest-tenured coach in the Big Ten, Matt Painter has built a winner in West Lafayette. The Boilermakers consistently win 20 games, make the NCAA tournament and are in the mix for the Big Ten title most seasons.
Purdue is again led by reining national player of the year Zach Edey, who is in his fourth season as a Boilermaker. Edey averages a double-double with 22.3 points and 10.9 rebounds per game. He also averages 2.9 blocks per game. The 7-foot-4 center draws nine fouls per game in conference play and ranks first in offensive rebounding percentage. There’s no tougher one-on-one matchup in the country.
What would make this year’s Purdue team different is an improved backcourt, which features the trio of sophomores Braden Smith and Fletcher Loyer, along with Southern Illinois grad transfer Lance Jones.
The 6-foot Smith struggled against Indiana last season but is playing at an All-Big Ten level. He averages a team-high 31.6 minutes and leads the Big Ten in assist rate (38.9 percent). Smith averages 12.4 points, 6.9 assists, and 5.3 rebounds and shoots 48.2 percent on 3s.
The 6-foot-4 Loyer is fourth on the team in scoring at 11 points per game and connects at a 40.8 percent clip from distance.
Jones has solidified Purdue’s three-guard lineup with his stellar defense and scoring ability. While less efficient than Smith or Loyer from 3, Jones has knocked down 31 shots from deep this season. His 11.3 points per game are third on the team and he has 21 steals, second on the team behind Smith.
Redshirt sophomore Trey Kaufman-Renn rounds out the starting lineup at the four. The Silver Creek product averages a solid 7.4 points and 4.2 rebounds in 16.6 minutes while shooting 53 percent from the floor.
The Boilermakers can legitimately go ten deep in most games with Myles Colvin, Camden Heide and Ethan Morton as the guard/wing backups and Mason Gillis and Caleb Furst providing depth up front.
Heide and Colvin are capable shooters, with Heide currently 11-for-20 from deep and Colvin 15-for-39. Morton isn’t a scorer, but he is a capable defender and distributor.
Gillis is another floor spacer off the bench, shooting a sizzling 23-for-45 (51.1 percent) from a distance. The 6-foot-10 Furst has started frequently in his career but is now in a limited role. Furst averages just 12.2 minutes and scores 3.1 points per game, along with 3.5 rebounds.
TEMPO-FREE PREVIEW
All stats are via KenPom.com and are updated through Sunday’s games.
Purdue is the second-best offensive team in the country through 17 games. The Boilermakers are shooting 39.8 percent on 3s, which ranks ninth in the country. They’re also making 55.1 percent of their 2s, the 30th-best mark in the nation.
Nearly 65 percent of Purdue’s field goals are assisted. That ranks fifth in the country. When the ball isn’t in the post with Edey, the Boilermakers are either getting fouled or spreading it around the perimeter for open looks.
The teams who have beaten Purdue – Northwestern and Nebraska – have either held them down from the perimeter and turned them over or had a big shooting night themselves from the perimeter.
In a 92-88 loss at Northwestern in early December, the Boilermakers shot 5-for-19 on 3s and turned it over 17 times. More recently in a loss at Nebraska, the Cornhuskers shot a ridiculous 14-for-23 (60.9 percent) from deep. Purdue turned it over 14 times in that loss, leading to 18 points.
It’ll also be challenging for Indiana to keep Purdue off the glass as the Boilermakers rank 19th in the country in offensive rebounding percentage.
WHAT IT COMES DOWN TO
The KenPom projection is Purdue by 11 with just a 17 percent chance of an IU victory.
Indiana has already proven it can take an elite team to the wire at Assembly Hall as it led Kansas for 35 minutes before late missteps allowed the Jayhawks to escape with a 4-point win.
Tuesday’s atmosphere will be electric and Purdue has proven it can be beat away from Mackey Arena. This is a pivotal game for both teams as Indiana desperately needs a resume win and the Boilermakers can’t afford to fall three games behind Wisconsin in the Big Ten standings.
Indiana will need to make more 3s than usual, keep its bigs out of foul trouble and limit second-chance opportunities to have a chance to pull off an upset at home over Purdue for a third straight season.
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