Breakdown: Purdue's win over Villanova
UNCASVILLE, Conn. — Our Breakdown of No. 6 Purdue's 80-74 win over No. 5 Villanova for the championship of the Hall of Fame Tip-Off.
Maybe this was the Boilermakers' jump from good to great.
Purdue met two bluebloods here in Connecticut, and against both, the Boilermakers found themselves in difficult positions, only to overcome them emphatically.
It didn't get much more difficult than the 11-point deficit Purdue faced against a championship-level program and sharply disciplined Wildcat team, playing in front of thousands of its fans, with just nine minutes to play.
The result that followed: Purdue doubled Villanova up, 34-17, the final nine-plus minutes, and the margin was only that close because an irrelevant bucket at the buzzer was wrongly counted.
The Boilermakers roared past the Wildcats.
"We showed everyone and we showed ourselves that we're really legit," center Zach Edey said. "That's a really good Villanova team and it felt like they never missed a three ball that entire game. We kind of proved to ourselves that we're not that No. 23 team anymore, not that team that went out in the first round anymore. We're a whole new ball club, and we proved that to everyone else, too."
Purdue showed itself worthy of its preseason acclaim, specifically the single-digit ranking that might very well be cut in half come Monday. It showed the magnitude of its matchup advantages, the precision of its shooting, the emerging brilliance of its star guard, Jaden Ivey, and the depth of its, well, depth.
As much as anything, however, the Boilermakers proved their mettle.
"We're resilient," Ivey said, for the second time in less than 24 hours. "... We just played our game 'til the buzzer sounded and (showed) we're not going to back down from anybody."
WHAT HAPPENED
After Purdue led by as many as eight in the first half, Villanova took control starting late In the first and carried momentum into the second half.
Caleb Daniels' three-pointer with a little more than nine minutes to play put the Wildcats up 57-46. At that moment, Purdue looked spent, middling on offense for the first time this season, really.
Then, suddenly, it wasn't.
The Boilermakers made their final 11 field goal attempts.
Isaiah Thompson made three three-pointers from that point on, and emergent freshman Caleb Furst made critical plays as the beneficiary of Ivey's erupting play-making presence. In 80 minutes of basketball at the Mohegan Sun, Ivey totaled 13 assists against just two turnovers.
They were enormous assists, first to Thompson for his three that cut an 11-point deficit to six, then Furst for a transition dunk that brought it to one with 5:17 left, then to Furst a minute-and-10 later, and finally to Furst again for the biggest shot of the game.
It was Ivey driving off Edey's ball screen right in front of his team's bench, splitting the help, drawing the last man between him and the rim, and kicking the ball out to Furst wide open in the far corner, his Plastic Man athleticism making a difficult pass routine.
The freshman's triple put Purdue up 69-62 with two-and-a-half minutes left.
"If I remember it correctly, it was kind of a broken play, but (Ivey) was able to get a stop on the guy," Furst said. "He got me a good look."
Thompson got one himself soon after.
With 'Nova within four, Purdue ran a play to set Edey up for a lob. Villanova parked in the lane, and actually seemed to shove Thompson to the top of the arc, wide open.
His three iced the win, before Edey's remarkable and-one pirouette dunk 30 seconds later put an exclamation point on it.
HOW IT HAPPENED
Edey led all scorers with 21 points on 9-of-12 shooting. A day after Trevion Williams closed out the win over North Carolina, Edey took his turn against Villanova.
The combination of the two contributed to the Boilermakers' second battle-of-attrition sort of win of the weekend. Both games, Purdue finished with a surge, while North Carolina fouled out, and then Villanova finished the game missing the shots they'd spent the whole afternoon making, and committed all three of their turnovers in the final 13 minutes.
"Any time you have to deal with monsters like Zach and Trevion, it wears you down, and I think it wore them down tonight," Thompson said. "And toward the end I think (Collin) Gillespie got a little tired. He wasn't as aggressive as he was earlier. We were just trying to jam him (full-court), be solid and wear him down.
"It wore them down and I think we just capitalized on it."
Chasing Ivey around probably wasn't all that easy, either.
Purdue's best scorer finished with a modest 10 points, but he again was the game's most influential ball-handler and full-court weapon. His seven assists, again, came at opportune times and the expense of minimal turnovers.
He earned the right this weekend to be considered one of the best guards in the country.
It's a reflection of the Boilermakers' stacked roster, though, that It was Thompson — a backup a year ago — and Furst — a freshman on a team full of veterans — that took the Boilermakers to the finish line.
They both scored 12 each, but 16 of their 24 came in the final 8:09.
"It's not an exaggeration when we say we have eight starters," Edey said.
| Key Sequence | Player of the Game | Stat of the Game |
|---|---|---|
|
At 5:49, Purdue had already slashed Nova's lead, but Sasha Stefanovic's pick-six steal seemed like a key moment. Furst followed It with a transition bucket to cut it to one and Purdue was off to the races. |
Zach Edey deserves mention, as does the combination of Furst and Thompson, weird as that may sound, but it's Ivey for the second day in row. He dominated the pace of play and made great decisions. Seven assists to one turnover. |
Purdue finished with 17 fast-break points to Villanova's two. This is Purdue, the team that everyone only knows because it has giants on its team. Ivey's impact has been beyond profound. Transformational. |
WHAT IT MEANS
It's a long season, but Purdue sure looked the part of an elite team. This was the premier non-conference event nationally, and the Boilermakers won the thing, and looked really good doing it. They looked mature, relentless, consistent, complete and suffocatingly deep.
The Boilermakers did have to prove themselves to open this season, and they could not have done it any better.
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