Breakdown: Purdue's loss to No. 21 Illinois
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This is normally what Purdue does to opponents in Mackey Arena.
Instead, it was No. 21 Illinois turning the tables and dominating the second half against the Boilermakers on Keady Court, stunning the home crowd en route to a convincing 79-62 victory and perhaps laying claim to favorite status in a Big Ten where such road conquests have been difficult to come by.
Our breakdown of Purdue's first Big Ten loss at home since early February of 2018.
WHAT HAPPENED
Despite getting hammered on the glass in the opening 20 minutes, Purdue led by a point at halftime thanks to Eric Hunter's three-pointer with 13 seconds left.
That was the highlight.
Illinois tore through what's been a good Purdue team defensively in the second half, making 11 of their first 12 shots, raining threes and raiding the lane off the bounce.
"We struggled to keep them out of the paint," center Matt Haarms said. "That was an emphasis before the game and that's where most of their points came during that stretch."
Purdue couldn't handle monolithic Illinois center Kofi Cockburn, who went for 22 points and 15 rebounds, or pro-in-waiting guard Ayo Dosunmo, who totaled 18 and 11 assists and played like the "elite closer" his coach described him as by making a pair of jumpers after Purdue had drawn within nine with 4:40 left to play.
Oh, and Trent Frazier made five threes, helping to render irrelevant the first-half ejection of key contributor Alan Griffin, who got the boot for purposefully stepping on Purdue's Sasha Stefanovic after the Boilermaker had scored.
Illinois could do no wrong. When Purdue backed off over-sized 4 man Giorgi Bezhanishvilli to try to crowd Cockburn down low, the big man who was 2-of-13 from three-point range in Big Ten play coming in, drained two triples.
Meanwhile, an Illinois team that stands as a formidable matchup for Purdue due to its power inside, its athleticism outside and the toughness that amplifies both held the Boilermaker offense down.
Purdue shot 41 percent and committed only six turnovers — par for the course this season — but after shooting 40-plus percent from three-point range its past two home games, the Boilermakers attempted only eight vs. Illinois. Not by choice, but because their guards found little room to operate. One of Purdue's three threes came from Haarms and another from forward Aaron Wheeler.
"We just couldn't get anything going in the low post," Coach Matt Painter said.
Between the two of them, Purdue bigs Haarms and Trevion Williams matched Cockburn's 22 points, but did so on 7-of-17 shooting. Haarms was 1-of-6 from two-point range.
WHY IT HAPPENED
A lot of reasons, but if Illinois is not the best team in the Big Ten, it may be the toughest, and it has the road wins to back it up, having won now in two of the league's foremost snakepits, the Kohl Center and Mackey Arena.
"They just out-toughed us," Purdue co-captain Nojel Eastern said.
The tone was set on the glass, where Illinois outrebounded what has been a strong rebounding team 20-8 in the first half.
"We just got out-toughed," Haarms echoed. "We have to hit a guy on a rebound and we failed to do that. They have (Cockburn). He's going to get those rebounds."
Cockburn's physical presence has loomed large in both Illinois' wins over Purdue this season and has afforded Illinois' aggressive perimeter defense a safety net of sorts. Purdue's counterpunch to high-pressure defense on the perimeter has to be to get the ball inside and score one-on-one in the paint. That's what Purdue's been unable to do against the Illini, because of the stone-wall presence Illinois' freshman has given it.
"They just took us out of what we wanted to do," Stefanovic said.
Eastern led Purdue with 14 points, as three of his four highest-scoring games of the season have now come in the past four.
WHO MADE IT HAPPEN
For as much as Cockburn influenced this game, Illinois' guards may have won it.
Frazier's five threes on seven tries — he scored 21 points — may have been the singular difference in the game if any one player was the difference amidst a one-sided second half. He made two in the first two minutes to get Illinois off to a solid start, and during Illinois' game-turning 22-9 run to start the second half, when Illinois finally did miss a shot, it rebounded it and Frazier turned the screws on Purdue with another three.
But Dosunmo, too.
He was brilliant, with 18 points and 11 assists against just two turnovers, against a team that's been very good against high-end opposing guards this season.
With less than five minutes to go, Isaiah Thompson scored for Purdue to make the score 61-50, a modest 6-0 run.
Dosunmo then came off a ball screen to stick a jumper, then followed it up with another jumper and Illinois went on to nearly double that margin again.
It was the sophomore who drained the biggest shot — a cold-blooded late three — against Wisconsin In Madison a while back.
"He's becoming an elite closer," Illini coach Brad Underwood said.
WHAT IT MEANS
It means Purdue starts off a crucial stretch of games on the wrong foot. This was the first of seven contests the next few weeks that may determine the Boilermakers' NCAA Tournament fate. It means the Boilermakers are not unbeatable at home, and that they must not allow the confidence Mackey Arena provides to wane moving forward.
But this goes beyond Purdue.
After halftime on Tuesday night, Illinois planted its flag in some of the most treacherous soil the Big Ten has, and in so doing, proved itself as a legitimate contender to win a league many outsiders all but conceded to Michigan State months ago.
