Breakdown: #4 Purdue's win over Michigan
Nothing's easy in the Big Ten, as they say, and this certainly wasn't, No. 4 Purdue's 82-76 win over Michigan, who the Boilermakers will meet again Thursday night in Ann Arbor.
Our breakdown.
PDF: Purdue-Michigan statistics
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WHAT HAPPENED
Roughed up by Michigan's trapping, with little help from the referees' whistles, and needing answers for Wolverine big man Hunter Dickinson's deluge of jumpers, fourth-ranked Purdue saw a 12-point second half lead narrowed to just four with two minutes remaining.
To close out a game in which Purdue couldn't rely on the three-pointer as much as usual, the Boilermakers needed key stops, and got just that, holding out to beat the Wolverines by a half dozen after Michigan scored a meaningless lay-in at the buzzer.
The biggest stops of the game came from Trevion Williams against Dickinson.
First, with Dickinson operating on the baseline, Williams reached in to break up his ball transfer to his right hand, knocking the ball out of bounds off the Michigan center, who to that point had ripped Purdue for 28 points. Next time down, DeVante' Jones got in the lane against Purdue, but Williams kept his hands high to challenge the dump-off pass to Dickinson. The pass went to the big man's feet and was turned over.
"He was in a stance and he was alert," Coach Matt Painter said of Williams, who finished with four steals to go along with his 19 points and eight rebounds. "He played great."
Those two turnovers positioned Purdue to salt the game away at the foul line, making 6-of-8 in the final 1:20.
This was another example of Purdue flexing its muscles on offense against a myriad of defensive looks from the Wolverines. The Boilermakers shot 52 percent for the game and again topped 80 points.
But their 5-of-18 three-point shooting was off brand, but overcome with Jaden Ivey's dominance off the bounce. His 23 points and seven assists came mostly from him slicing up Michigan in transition or in halfcourt offense against the Wolverines' matchup zone.
"They tried to take us out of our rhythm with the press that they ran and then the zone," Ivey said. "It was really just all about patience. When I come off those ball screens, I'm just being patient and if I don't have anything going to the goal, I have my teammates on the outside. We did hit a lot of shots, but those were great looks and I know they're going to fall in the future."
Had Purdue been able to make a few more threes, this game might have unfolded very differently in the first half.
"Whenever he can play off two feet after going a million miles an hour, the defense has to pick their poison, really," said forward Mason Gillis, who made two threes off Ivey assists. "He's either going to kick it out to the three-point line or he's going to score it, if he's playing off two feet. Or he'll dump it down to our bigs. It's just a tough matchup."
While Dickinson got 28, Williams and Zach Edey combined for 32.
At both ends of the floor, Williams was especially impactful in the senior class' first-ever win over Michigan.
HOW IT HAPPENED
There were moments in both halves where this game seemed bound for a one-sided Boilermaker win, but Dickinson's first-half shooting kept the game close in the first half, and Michigan's full-court pressure disrupted Purdue enough in the second half to keep the door open.
Purdue turned the ball over at least twice against Michigan's trap, similar to what Iowa did in December. Painter attributed some of the roughness around the edges against the pressure to Purdue's arduous schedule lately.
"They don't do it all the time," Painter said of Michigan. "They do it every game, but they don't do it a lot. I just have to give it more time in practice. We went through it, we worked on it, but you play Thursday night, then you get back and spend the night in Indianapolis and you're having 40-minute practices, 50-minute practices. We haven't had a day off in two-and-a-half weeks. We just keep playing games, so sometimes with that prep, I want to get them off their feet.
"I want to keep doing certain things, but I don't want the practice to be that long. You really get in a tough spot there."
In-game, Purdue adjusted by having Sasha Stefanovic set screens in the backcourt to open space for the ball-handler.
"I thought once we adjusted what we were doing," Painter said, "our guys did a good job."
| Key Sequence | Player of the Game | Stat of the Game |
|---|---|---|
|
It was the two turnovers forced by Trevion Williams that really put this game away, but Purdue's cushion was built in the second half with a run of seven straight made shots and points on nine of 10 trips. |
As great as Trevion Williams was, Jaden Ivey was the difference between these two teams. His all-out assaults on the lane and the rim killed Michigan's defense from the inside and his emerging poise really showed up. |
Purdue shot 63 percent on two-point field goals, with 44 points in the paint. That's a credit to Jaden Ivey's penetration and the combined play of Trevion Williams and Zach Edey, who totaled 32 points on 22-of-30 shooting. |
WHAT IT MEANS
Purdue could have done a better job putting this game away, as has been a theme this season, but that they never trailed during a 5-of-18 three-point shooting game, that's a positive thing.
The Boilermakers have real momentum now heading into the game of the year to this point Tuesday night against Illinois.
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