Could this be Purdue's seniors' moment?
Purdue isn't really a young team, per se, but has experienced some of the typical symptoms of youth this season, one of them being its difficulties on the road.
Evan Boudreaux and Jahaad Proctor came to Purdue as transfers in large part to play in NCAA Tournaments. For that to happen this season, the Boilermakers have work to do, and much of it will have to be done away from home.
It's the sort of situation where teams would like to be able to fall back on senior leadership, and that's where things aren't typical for Purdue.
Granted, it's sort of college basketball nowadays for recruiting classes to look very different leaving a program than they did when entering a program, but Purdue's seniors are both the non-traditional sort; of them, only Tommy Luce will finish his career where he began it. Boudreaux arrived last season as a two-year graduate transfer from Dartmouth and Proctor followed a year later to play out his final season at his third school, High Point being his prior stop.
For both, their careers at Purdue have been anything but straight lines. Boudreaux's experience has run the gamut, from playing one position, then another, from barely playing at times to starting and carrying max minutes at others, 32 of them just two games ago.
Same for Proctor, a Day 1 starter this season and Purdue's leading scorer for half the season, before a midseason slump sent him to a reserve role, dwindling minutes and a good deal of soul-searching.
For both, however, that line that hasn't been straight is ticking upward just as their NCAA Tournament ambitions hang in the balance.
Purdue has work to do, but indicators lately suggest that Purdue's non-traditional two-man senior class can be part of the solution.
After the Boilermakers' loss in Mackey Arena to Illinois — a damaging loss for a team whose road difficulties suggested a need to make par at home — Boudreaux, by every account, practiced better, and harder, than anyone else who's playing this season. He was rewarded with a start, then dominated Wisconsin, playing the best game of his Purdue career to date.
Now, Boudreaux, Purdue's foremost grinder, figures to loom large from here on out.
"For me moving forward, I think that has to continue to be my role, to make sure we don't fall into those lulls from an energy standpoint," Boudreaux said Friday, before Purdue left for Saturday's game at last-place Northwestern. "When we play with energy and some fire, I think we're a really tough team to beat. That's going to be really important moving forward."
That must be Purdue's foremost emphasis considering that to date, it's been Purdue's foremost flaw. There's no telling what sort of position Purdue would be in if it started games at Nebraska, Illinois, Michigan, Maryland and Rutgers better.
"We need to come out at the start of games, the start of halves and be the more aggressive, tougher team," Boudreaux said. "If I can provide that, I think it'll really help.
"At the end of the day, one guy not bringing energy can really bring everyone down. Not that that's necessarily been the case, but we need to lock in on that aspect, because shots aren't (always) going to fall and we're going to make mistakes, but there's no reason we can't box out every time, make the energy plays, get the loose balls and things like that."
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Purdue didn't win at No. 25 Rutgers Tuesday night. If not for Proctor, though, the Boilermakers likely wouldn't have pushed the Scarlet Knights at any point in the game's final 25 minutes or so. Proctor scored 19 off the bench, matching his point total from the prior seven games following the resumption of Big Ten competition at the end of December. But he also just played well, beyond scoring.
Afterward, he exhibited a hint of wisdom teams usually hope seniors can provide, citing a change of perspective as a contributing factor to his resurgence in Piscataway, whether it's sustainable or not.
It was a few weeks ago that the player who led the Boilermakers In scoring for the first half of the season fell not only out of the starting five but to the back end of the rotation.
"It was a little shocker for me," Proctor said. "Coming to a high-major school, it's a leap already, but I started off starting and playing really well. I wouldn't say it felt the same as my mid-major or low-major schools, because it didn't, but I got comfortable with it and I think a little complacent. When I lost my starting job, I thought this was the first in I don't know how long I wasn't playing 30 minutes, not starting, in like two years."
Proctor says he came to Purdue with team goals front and center in his mind, and that never changed, but as he experienced success — and perhaps listened closely to some of the compliments being paid him, particularly online — he began thinking about his own interests more.
"As time progressed and I saw that I could be really good at this level," Proctor said, "I think I got a little complacent on my (team) goals."
It was rough, getting moved to the bench, Proctor said, unlike anything he'd experienced in years. He was one of the stars at High Point prior to coming to Purdue, and at Purdue, those first few months went as planned, if not better.
"I got humbled very quick," Proctor said, "and it put me back where I needed to be."
And, it seems, back in a position to influence whether that foremost goal — the NCAA Tournament — can be made a reality. Purdue has work to do, without question.
Of course, Proctor and Boudreaux already can see the light at the end of the tunnel, this being it for them at the college level in a few weeks.
"You kind of start to realize you don't have a lot of opportunities left," Boudreaux said. "Once you see there's only 10 games left and you're in a precarious position in terms of being In the NCAA Tournament or not, it definitely creates a heightened sense of urgency. We want the whole team to have that, but we think we do right now. We know we don't have any margin for error moving forward."
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