The next 9 games for
@BoilerBall
.
- Xavier
- Gonzaga
- Tennessee or Syracuse
- Kansas, Marquette, UCLA or Chaminade
- Texas Southern
- Northwestern
- Iowa
- Alabama
- Arizona
It’s about to get real.
I remember 2 years ago when we reached No. 1 for the 1st time. Was blown away. It was amazing. It was even like that when we were top 3.
Fast forward two years and it's expected now. Rankings come out & you're like "that's cool" and you move on.
That's where we are right now.
Thank you Boiler Nation for everything this year. Best fanbase in America and it’s not particularly close. What you did this week was something we will never forget.
Just completely gutted tonight. There will be better days.
Never take things like conference titles, sellouts and an incredible culture for granted.
I know a lot of people are only looking forward to this month, but man… this has been an incredible season.
Have played all year like it means something. Can’t take that away.
"I'm really trying not to cry... but the tears are coming down. It's just been so long. I just... I cannot believe this has finally happened"
@RobbieHummel
's call following Purdue's win over Tennessee to send
@BoilerBall
to the Final Four 🥺
(via
@westwood1sports
)
Braden Smith needs 7 assists to become the second
@B1GMBBall
sophomore ever with at least 750 points, 400 assists and 300 rebounds in their first two seasons.
The other is
@MagicJohnson
.
And my
@BoilerBall
2023-24 season is finished. From Arkansas to Honolulu to Toronto to Phoenix to LA, it’s been an unreal ride.
Excited for a bit of a break, but man I can’t wait to start working on the postseason stuff.
This program is here to stay.
Final Four Game Day.
Said I wasn’t coming to a Final Four until the team I was with made it. Now that we’re here, we all want more.
Let’s have a great weekend Boilers.
A dunkfest for Trey Kaufman-Renn in the NCAA Tournament. On the Purdue redshirt sophomore and former Silver Creek star, who played a starring role in leading the Boilermakers to Sweet Sixteen.
With Marquette moving up to No. 6 in
@kenpomeroy
, Purdue will now face (4) Arizona, (5) Alabama, (6) Marquette, (7) Tennessee and (8) Gonzaga in a span of 8 games.
Only teams out of the top-8 that Purdue is not scheduled to play is (2) Houston and (3) Connecticut.
Bear with me on this one...
Purdue has won 21 straight non-conference, regular-season and postseason games against power-conference OR nationally-ranked teams.
2nd longest in NCAA history.
22 | UCLA (March 18, 1971 to Jan. 17, 1974)
21 | Purdue (Dec. 19, 2020 to present)
I’m convinced after reading social media this morning that
@BoilerBall
’s game day environment & presentation is the best in America.
Media raved about the hospitality,
@ThePaintCrew
,
@PurdueBands
, marketing efforts, etc…
We are fortunate to play in Mackey.
Braden Smith's 212 assists have resulted in 530 points this season.
Combined with his scoring, he has accounted for 922 of Purdue's 2,532 points.
That's having a hand in 36.4 percent of Purdue's scoring this year.
The Purdue classes of 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2024 have done it.
I know Brad Davison did it at Wisconsin in his 5th year.
Not sure anyone else since Rutgers & Maryland joined the league have done it.
Purdue and Kansas are the only schools to have a top-4 seed in each of the last 7 NCAA Tournaments.
Purdue: 4, 2, 3, 4, 3, 1, 1
Kansas: 1, 1, 4, 3, 1, 1, 4
Zach Edey needs 219 points, 45 rebounds and 26 blocks to become the third player in NCAA history with 2,000 points, 1,000 rebounds and 200 blocks while shooting 60.0 percent from the field.
The others?
✅: David Robinson
✅: Patrick Ewing
Didn't even realize this yesterday...
Zach Edey moved into third place on the
@bigten
's career points list.
2,613 | Calbert Cheaney
2,531 | Shawn Respert
2,459 | Zach Edey
I could spend an entire day tweeting Zach Edey stats… but I probably won’t.
Don’t trivialize what he’s doing. May not see stats / performances like this again…
Discussed this a bunch yesterday.
2008 - 1 game back as Wisky hit half-courter on final day to win league.
2018 - Finished 15-3 / 1 game back.
2022 - 4 buzzer-beaters on road to finish one game back.
Really close to 6 titles in last 8 years.
Watched a lot of ball this year.
That atmosphere today was UNREAL! Best I’ve seen.
Probably the game of the year so far. That was some HIGH-LEVEL hoops by both teams.
Braden Smith is 1-of-7 players since 1947 to reach at least 725 points, 375 assists, 325 rebs for their careers during their SOPH season.
Braden Smith
Ja Morant
D.J. Cooper
Nick Calathes
Jason Kidd
Kenny Anderson
Magic Johnson
H/T
@collegebb_ref
Related.... Trent Frazier of Illinois was standing near our bench and saw a play on the white board and yelled back to the bench.
Shrews said "Trent, our guys don't even know this." They both chuckled.
I remember back when Shrewsbrury was the assistant for Purdue and he would put up their play on the white board and it would say some shit like “swivel down stagger twist” and I would yell that back out confidently like we knew the play and he just looked at me and said “cmon Geo
Not many teams can say this in the grand scheme of Big 10 basketball.
And will be the last group to do it for a while with the Big Ten going to 18 teams next year.
Consecutive weeks ranked in AP Top 5.
17 | Purdue
6 | Kansas
1 | Duke
1 | Michigan State
1 | Marquette
Highest preseason ranking since 1987-88 season (2).
Hearing the pressers today, it’s incredible the amount of respect shown today by both teams toward the other team.
Think both teams understand it’s a massive night for college basketball tomorrow night.
Two best teams going at it. The way it should be.
Over the last 25 games, Fletcher Loyer has the third-best 3-point percentage in the country (min. 40 3PM).
.511 | John Buggs (North Texas)
.500 | Reed Sheppard (Kentucky)
.494 | Fletcher Loyer (Purdue)
Coincidentally, Mason Gillis is 9th during that same span (.468).
Hard to keep finding firsts for Zach Edey, but we found one.
For the first time in his career, he has four straight 20-10 games.
28-11 vs. Xavier
25-14 vs. Gonzaga
23-10 vs. Tennessee
28-15 vs. Marquette
Zach Edey is the only player in
@B1GMBBall
history with a season of at least 700 points and 350 rebounds.
He has two of them.
Stat via
@collegebb_ref
.
Got myself down a research rabbit hole this afternoon....
- Braden Smith and Magic Johnson (1979) are the only players to have at least 50 points, 50 assists and 35 rebounds in a single NCAA Tournament.
Most men's basketball games on Peacock this year.
Purdue - 6
Michigan State - 5
Ohio State - 5
Wisconsin - 5
Indiana - 5
Michigan - 5
Minnesota - 5
Mostly teams that are expected to have big years that will have a big following this year.
Entering tonight's games... The most wins against the KenPom Top-50 since the 2016-17 season.
102 | Kansas
79 | Purdue
75 | Baylor
73 | Michigan
71 | Michigan State
70 | Duke
Saturday’s exhibition game at Arkansas is now sold out.
That’s AWESOME for a charity game, with proceeds going to United Way Arkansas.
Glad
@BoilerBall
can play a small part in helping the residents of Arkansas who are still recovering from devastating tornadoes last Spring.
Bottom line… no player in this
@NBADraft
has the ability to dominate like Zach Edey. His domination “ceiling” is so much higher than anyone else in the Draft.
Happening right now. Three busses just loaded up with illegal invaders at Detroit Metro. Anyone have any idea where they’re headed with their police escort?
@petehoekstra
Purdue has 9 straight wins over teams ranked in the AP Top 15.
Longest active win streaks over teams in AP Top 15.
9 | Purdue
3 | Florida Atlantic
2 | Eight Teams
H/T to
@MLBRandomStats
@joe_zobel_
@collegebb_ref
Latest KenPom nugget.
In non-con play, Purdue COULD play five of the eight other teams ranked in the top nine.
1️⃣ - Purdue
2️⃣ - Houston
3️⃣ - Kansas ✅
4️⃣ - Connecticut
5️⃣ - Alabama ✅
6️⃣ - Arizona ✅
7️⃣ - Gonzaga ✅
8️⃣ - Tennessee ✅
9️⃣ - Marquette ✅
I am going to have to scrub the media guide again, but...
This appears to be the first time in 119 years of being in the Big Ten Conference that
@BoilerBall
has won four straight league games by at least 14 points.
Total wins among Big Ten teams since the start of the 2021-22 season.
80 | Purdue
61 | Wisconsin
60 | Illinois
59 | Iowa
59 | Michigan State
58 | Indiana
There have been 8 games this year between top-11 opponents (including Saturday's Purdue vs. Arizona game).
Purdue has been involved in four of them.
No. 11 Gonzaga
No. 7 Tennessee
No. 4 Marquette
No. 1 Arizona
Illinois is ranked No. 7 in the latest NCAA NET rankings this morning.
Purdue will have now faced:
No. 4 (Arizona)
No. 5 (Alabama)
No. 6 (Tennessee)
No. 7 (Illinois)
No. 11 (Marquette)
"I think proving people wrong is kind of my life story."
Braden Smith has quieted more than his share of doubters this season.
@BTNJourney
profiles No. 2
@BoilerBall
PG's sophomore jump. ⤵️
Purdue has won 7 straight MTE games entering today vs.
#4
Marquette.
-
#18
North Carolina
-
#5
Villanova
- West Virginia
-
#6
Gonzaga
-
#8
Duke
-
#11
Gonzaga
-
#7
Tennessee
Every time we add to it, it is still a mind-blowing stat to me.
Purdue has won 116 straight games when scoring 90 or more points. The last loss came on Nov. 24, 1987.
That's 13,178 days ago.