We are watching a revolution.

A week ago, Braden Smith's looming decision hung in the air like a threat. Purdue and Matt Painter looked like victims to its own success. Braden Smith had developed into an All-American, the best point guard in the country, in a free market college basketball landscape that was biting at the bit to throw three, four, maybe even five million dollars towards the Westfield native.

To put it another way, if you had an NCAA college basketball draft where every school and every player was available, Braden Smith would be the #1 pick. There's not another college player as proven or trusted, who makes his teammates better, more than Braden Smith.

That's not the kind of player that a program like Purdue is supposed to keep.

After all, despite all its success, despite finally getting to the title game, despite all the conference success, Purdue is not a blue blood.

It's also not a green blood. A school so flush with money that its school colors don't matter nearly as much as what it can pull out of its pockets.

But Purdue hasn't just kept college basketball's biggest star. It's provided him everything he needs to build not just a contender, but a juggernaut, in a college world that's built like the wild west, and a protector of college basketball ideals in Matt Painter has learned to thrive in the face of cowboys and outlaws.

College basketball is changed, is changing, has changed, and somehow through this storm, Painter has become both the voice of calm and the master of metamorphosis.

It happened quickly. There's a guard. He's been playing professionally since Braden Smith was an over achieving under classmen. He's probably, almost definitely, going to end up in the NBA, sooner than later.

He's coming to Purdue.

Omer Mayer doesn't come to Purdue a decade ago. He doesn't come to Purdue three years ago.

Part of it is the obvious. NIL now makes professional players from the international pool no longer considered illegible because they've been paid to play before.

But a decade ago, Purdue and Matt Painter hadn't proven itself. I don't really mean on the court or in March. I mean as an idea, as a place where players come to get better, not just now, but in the future. Carsen Edwards turned a March run into a guaranteed NBA contract. Jaden Ivey was turned into a top-five pick. Zach Edey, a big man in the wrong decade, became a top-ten pick.

Purdue has been a throwback school for a while. It seemed like a detriment at times a few years ago. An offense lost to the dinosaurs, but Micah Shrewsberry, PJ Thompson, Ivey, Edwards, and now Braden Smith have helped define Purdue as a place where guards can thrive with and without the ball in a system built to get the most out of even those under seven feet tall.

Omer Mayer is not a normal addition. Mayer will be an NBA guard, seems to touch the same vein of basketball savant as Smith, and the addition makes Purdue, frankly, an uncomfortably great team on paper.

This is the next age of Purdue basketball. One that was never promised, or predicted, but is here, for now.

Quietly, Purdue added another player. A stretch four by the name of Liam Murphy who went to North Florida. It happened a few hours after the Mayer news vaulted Purdue up from title favorites to the best odds to win the title next season.

It caused Boiler in the Stands to convene for an emergency podcast. It was one of the first thing Field of 68 talked about at the start of its pod yesterday after discussing Smith's return.

Murphy will not start for Painter. Instead, he's another example of how well Painter feels and sees basketball. Murphy is a perfect complement for Purdue, a stretch four who really stretches the floor.

Murphy scored 1.33 points per possession last season for the Ospreys of North Florida. 40% of his shots came in that exact situation. That puts him in the 94th percentile of spot up shooters in the country and unlike Purdue's stretch four last season, there is no hesitation to pull it. Just three times like year, despite coming off the bench, did Murphy attempt less than four three-pointers in a game.

Painter has added an elite shooter, with a fast trigger, who has none of the acclaim of some of the other names connected with Purdue.

Instead, Painter has gotten someone with exact game that fits a Purdue offense that's going to create a lot of open threes.

That's the old Purdue way, and it hasn't left. Instead, Purdue has blended into both worlds, and has come out the better for it.

Purdue isn't just one of college basketball's best stories anymore. It's the headline.

Welcome to the new era of Purdue basketball.