PDF: Purdue-Illinois statistics
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Matt Painter figured that if his team executed sufficiently on offense against young-and-small Illinois, Matt Haarms might be set up to thrive.
“He wasn’t just going to have good looks,” Painter said of his pre-game hope. “He was going to have dunks and layups.”
Painter was proven mostly correct.
Haarms also made a three-pointer as he led No. 14 Purdue to a 73-56 victory over the Fighting Illini in this regular season’s lone meeting between the two teams.
Exploiting Illinois’ dearth of height and the foul trouble saddled upon standout freshman big man Giorgi Bezhanishvilli, Haarms recorded a perfect line: 8-of-8 from the floor, 1-of-1 from three, 4-of-4 at the line, to go along with 10 rebounds and five blocked shots. Illinois fouled him eight times and Bezhanishvilli fouled out with just two points and three rebounds.
“We knew how aggressive on defense they would be with all their bigs, with all their players, because their whole team is extremely aggressive,” Haarms said. “We knew we could really exploit that by going up over the top of them, I had a pretty big height advantage on them, so they kind of had to foul me, and with (Bezhanishvilli) out of the game, I don’t think they’re as good as with him in.”
Behind Haarms and a particularly aggressive group of guards, Purdue shot 55 percent from the floor, scored 40 points in the paint and shot 20 free throws, making 14.
Carsen Edwards righted things after a two-game shooting funk, scoring 23 on 8-of-14 shooting against the team he scored 40 against last time they met.
“I was just thinking about last year and how they kind of play the same way, just hoping I could beat my man off the dribble because they don’t have heavy help,” Edwards said. “They actually don’t even look at the ball at times. They get on top of their man and stay locked in on their man. Once you’re able to beat them off the dribble, their help is either late or there is no help.”
And like Haarms, guard Nojel Eastern leveraged his dimensions against Illinois’ slighter guards, scoring 14 points, all penetrating, posting up or otherwise using his size to his maximum advantage.
Purdue moved a step closer to both a Big Ten title — it remains tied for first now with three games to play — and an unbeaten season in Mackey Arena, with just a Senior Day meeting with Ohio State remaining. Purdue’s won every home game but one (Maryland) by double figures this season.
Like the Minnesota and Penn State wins before this one, it didn’t come easily, though, though the final score might suggest otherwise.
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Illinois led by one at halftime and had the game knotted at 48 with 11 minutes to play after the Illini erased the nine-point Purdue lead created in part by a 7-0 Boilermaker run to open the second half.
Purdue controlled the boards early in the second half, then lapsed, allowing six straight points off putbacks.
“As soon as we put a stop to that,” Haarms said, “we had a great opportunity to break it wide-open from there.”
Purdue choked off second chances from there, then did break the game open.
Edwards drove off a shot fake, Eastern drove on Andres Feliz for an and-one, Haarms made two free throws, then Edwards three. Finally, Haarms’ dunk off Eastern’s lob entry, one of Eastern’s half-dozen assists, capped a 12-0 run.
Purdue’s final lead of 17 was it biggest.
It overcame some things again, whether it be a turnover-riddled beginning, a two-point game from second-leading scorer Ryan Cline (though he finished with eight rebounds and seven assists), or bench struggles contributed to by out-of-whack media timeouts in the first half.
“When we haven’t played great,” Painter said of his team’s recent three-game winning streak, “we’ve found a way.”
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