The Weekly Word is GoldandBlack.com's weekly, obviously, column covering Purdue football, basketball and recruiting, as well as college sports issues, the true meaning of life, or whatever other topics might come to mind in a given week.
'WE HAVE TO BE BETTER THAN THIS'
Matt Painter's head tells him that offense wins in college basketball nowadays, and so he now runs a program that's been defined lately by offense (and massive human beings). But deep down, in his heart, he is a defensive coach, and that's the foundation he rebuilt his Boilermaker program upon.
That foundation is missing, as are Painter's exact words. Defense is supposed to live in Mackey Arena, but like the fans, it's too often unseen. Purdue's defensive difficulties now exceed the turnover issue as the greatest existential threat to Boilermaker success this season, not that the two are mutually exclusive from one another.
How did it get here, to this place where Purdue gave up 81 to a Rutgers team last night that was missing a guy who averages 24? To a point where the Boilermakers simply had too few answers for some of the most basic offense in the game? Rutgers just ran high ball screens all game and Purdue couldn't stop it, same as it couldn't stop it last year in Mackey at the end of regulation and in OT.
It was Purdue's second game In as many outings in which it gave up too many threes and struggled against the dribble, a bad combination to say the least.
You may ask again: How did it get here?
