Purdue 80, Memphis 71: Winning Ugly is Still Winning

The first half tonight was probably the worst Purdue has looked so far on this young season. Braden Smith and Fletcher Loyer were a combined 2 of 13, with one of the two makes an off-balance banked-in three just before the buzzer. Trey Kaufman-Renn was saddled with three fouls, severely limiting his ability for the final 20 minutes. Memphis’ athleticism was causing all kinds of problems. It was a sloppy, physical game to that point, and it would only get more physical in the second half.

Through all that, Purdue still led by one.

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Sometimes you have to win games ugly. This game had the feeling of an 8:30 tipoff on a chilly January night at the Bryce Jordan Mausoleum against a 9-16 Penn State game with 4,000 people in attendance and the upper deck blocked off. Those are the games where the Nittany Lions’ home court advantage of lulling an opponent to sleep in a dead arena works best. This game had a pro-Purdue crowd, but it was still a basketball game being played in a hotel ballroom on a court that was apparently wiped down with Crisco. Purdue had to grit through an awful shooting night from Braden, numerous uncalled fouls both ways, a floor that had players slipping and sliding at key moments, and officials that had a questionable hold on the proceedings.

If anything, that just goes to show how good Purdue can be this year. Memphis had superior length and athleticism. It caused problems all night. With seven minutes left Purdue was down three and facing the most adversity it has faced so far. It then closed the game on a 19-7 run to seal the deal. When you can win a game with a C level of execution against an athletic team that is the sign of being a good program.

Some thoughts from this one:

My player of the game is CJ Cox. He had an extremely efficient 18 points and connected on some big threes when Purdue needed them most. Those are big contributions after being relatively quiet the last few games, especially when Braden having an off night scoring.

Speaking…

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Publish date : 2025-11-21 03:07:00

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