Purdue Falls in Emerald CC Championship 63-60
Photo Credit: AP
FSU fans only had to travel around 170 miles to get to the nation’s premier early season college basketball event,* but that didn’t help Seminole fans fill the gym.
The tournament was played in a glorified highschool gym, to literally hundreds of fans with a hard plastic-feeling basketball (according to various accounts close to the tourney), and was televised on a network that most of America doesn’t have on their televisions. And while grinding out a win versus a ranked VCU team last night was important and needed, going 2-0 in Destin would have supplied a dollop of salve to the wound of the fresh OT Bucket loss earlier today.
Jel Eastern continued his struggles offensively, as he stayed scoreless in the tournament. As he got into foul trouble, Thompson and Hunter moved into the PG role for the Good Guys. They struggled taking the ball to the teeth of the defense, but made better decisions than the Junior longtime starting PG. Eastern fouled out of the game with around three minutes left…zero points in the tournament.
In the first half, FSU kept Purdue at an arm’s length as they held a 3-5 point lead in yet another rock fight (FSU 27, Purdue 24). But in the second half, Purdue’s shots started getting a bit easier as defense led to Purdue fastbreak points. Wheeler, who struggled in this short tournament, cleaned up a few messes with easy dunks. And before you knew it, Purdue was up consistently by five points and holding FSU at bay. But. as we know, this program doesn’t love success too much, especially in December while near white sands and beaches, and they gave away their lead with around five minutes left.
After Eastern fouled out, Matty Haarms tried to will The Forces of Good to a victory as he kept a few possessions alive but staying on his pogo stick and tapping rebounds out to Purdue’s guards. Much like the VCU game, this one was in doubt in the closing minutes…in fact, with just under a thirty seconds left, the game was tied at 58, and Purdue had the ball at half court. Purdue then ran an awful halfcourt set that led to Hunter having the ball knocked off of his thigh, and gave FSU the ball with a chance to win, ninety feet away from the bucket. Instead, Haarms & Hunter slammed the door shut on FSU’s all-tournament guard, Forrest who drove to look for a midrange jumper…and went into ooooooovertime.
Let’s not forget, Purdue got edged out by FSU in Tallahassee a year ago in the B1G/ACC Challenge…these two are familiar with one another, and were pretty even last season. But FSU holds the series lead (4-0, now)…and like I said above, Purdue really needs as many high quality wins as possible in this pre-con. I just checked with the BS Analytics Desk, and High Quality Losses are indeed, still losses.
Back to the game. In OT, Purdue struggled in familiar fashion- very little offensive rhythm and poor flow as empty possessions followed empty possessions. The good news, Purdue’s defense denied Forrest clean looks and forced him to deal it to teammates who are…mmmmmm…not as good at American Basketball. But as we all learned last year, offense is more fun than defense…and right now, this Purdue team isn’t a ton of fun to watch because of this premise.
Wheeler and Proctor had two relatively good looks from in the paint, and came up empty with time ticking away. With FSU leading by one point, Purdue desperately needed a bucket…but looked befuddled by FSU’s length and pressure. After FSU doinked two more FTs, Thompson drove the ball the length of the floor before missing a contested layup. After FSU nailed two important FTs, Purdue’s desperation wasn’t even close, and the Good Guys dropped another, 63-60, and fell to 4-3 on the young season.
Haarms led all Boilers with 16 points and 8 rebounds…he also earned an all-tourney team nod tonight (if you’re into that sort of detail). Proctor had 12 points, 3 boards and a pair of assists…And Hunter had a well-rounded 10 points, 4 assists, 3 rebounds and 3 steals, but turned the ball over four times…but he wasn’t the only one. For the second straight game, Purdue turned the ball over way too often (24 times).
One really positive piece of info- Purdue got the FT shooting back on track in this game as they went 13-17 from the stripe, and that type of shooting will go a long way if some stuff on offense can start clicking. But offensive sets are pretty painful right now, as Proctor, Hunter, Wheeler and Sasha all seem to be struggling shooting jumpshots. This is kinda unfamiliar territory for Purdue fans, at least in recent years. With Mathias, Thompson, V Edwards, C Edwards and Cline, Purdue had shooters for days…not so much in the early 2019-2020 campaign.
Sasha is struggling to find his stroke and Wheeler only seems consistent finishing around the rim. Even Proctor seems to struggle to get buckets when Purdue really needs points. This team has tons of work just to get respectable, let alone look like an upper-third B1G team…I guess we’ll see if they can gel, once again like the last two seasons in the new year.
Opportunities abound as Purdue welcomes top-ten UVA to Mackey Arena in just five days, in a game that will most-assuredly set college basketball back a decade or so. Man it’d be great to see a lil’ Mackey Magic next week.
*this title was given to the tournament by the tourney’s committee on their FB page; the best source of factual info on the interwebs
