This was supposed to the be the year Purdue made the leap into the elite of college basketball. They still can, after all, there is still some college football to be played. It's way early to be counting teams out. The Purdue Boilermakers, however, have some things that need to be ironed out if they want more than a nice little Sweet 16 squad. In their past two games, Purdue has played top-flight competition.
In their past two games, Purdue has been exposed for their two major flaws.
Now, before all the Purdue fans start flipping out and calling me out for being an IU grad -- which I am, so it's not news to me -- please realize the relative terms I'm using here. Purdue is a very solid basketball team. They handled a quality opponent in Boston College without much headache.
I'm merely pointing out that if Purdue wants to jump into the echelon with college basketball's elite that they need to do something about two aspects of their game.
They are getting outrebounded -- sometimes badly -- and they settle on the jump shot far too often.
It's easy to pinpoint from where this stems, even if you don't watch the games, because the overwhelming majority of Purdue's minutes to go perimeter players. The only rotation guys who aren't guards are Robbie Hummell (plays like a swing-guard), Nemanja Calasan (hangs out by the three-line occasionally), and JaJuan Johnson.
Also, they are a very good outside shooting team. More often than not, they'll survive with this playing style because of their superior talent. They'll walk through much of the Big Ten, for example.
Against elite competition like Duke, though, you can't get outrebounded by 20. I know it's easy for Purdue fans to complain about officiating when Oklahoma shoots 41 more free throws, but that's also a byproduct of settling on jumpers all day instead of slashing to the hoop.
There was a stretch mid-way through the second half against Duke where Purdue just couldn't score, settling for outside jumpers left and right. You can credit Duke's defense for stifling ETwaun Moore (for most of the game) and Keaton Grant, sure, but the Boilers are going to deal with defense of this caliber if they move deep into March.
The good news is that it's only December 3, and they really should have won that Oklahoma game. There's still lots of time and only a small improvement needed. They aren't going to shoot 15.4 percent from three too often -- as they did last night -- if ever again.
You never know, these past two games could be a blessing in disguise. The team is still really young, and getting hopes too high, too early, could have hurt things in the long run.
