Purdue men’s basketball team looking ahead to MI

Only three teams have scored at least 80 points on the Wolverines this year – Xavier, SMU and now Purdue – and each had a big man who changed the game.

“Anytime you struggle like we did against Iowa, you want to get that bad taste out of your mouth”, Painter said.

“He reminds me of the UConn teams, where you can run some cute stuff and get right to the rim, but somebody’s sending it back”, Beilein said. It’s really important. “Sometimes you learn some hard lessons and will be better because of it. It’s tough to swallow to lose like that, but you go and fix it”.

When A.J. Hammons was introduced as a starter for Purdue’s game against MI, the Mackey Arena crowd roared its approval. What could really hurt the Wolverines’ chances to pick up a marquee win tonight is possibly not having Caris LeVert.

“We practiced it with a lot of pads and things like that, so we were prepared for the length”. The Ken Pomeroy Ratings have Purdue ranked as the seventh best team in Division I basketball.

“Those guys, they can make them in practice”, Beilein said.

Case in point – Purdue was working for the last shot of the first half when Thompson got lured into driving and taking a shot with five seconds left. Using a combination of floating layups, a strong dribble drive and even a couple 3-pointers, the Wolverines’ offense ran through Abdur-Rahkman and the sophomore kept the game to within six with six minutes to go. MI made it tough for much of the second half, getting within as few as five, but the Boilermakers pulled away late. With Davis leading the way, the Boilers did.

Purdue hopes for good things from incoming freshman, guard Carsen Edwards, a three-star point guard prospect out of Texas. All in all, the Boilermakers averaged 1.68 points per possession in the second due to converting 16-of-21 field goals (76.2 pct.) and 7-of-10 threes after the intermission. “We’ll see how we respond”. “You have to move on to the next game, because if you dwell on one game, you’re going to come out the next game and get beat again”. I think they Wolverines have to have at least one of those and if they get two that’s fantastic. LeVert missed Michigan’s last game (a win over Penn State) with an ankle injury and, although he was planning to return to practice yesterday, it’s still not clear whether or not he’ll be able to play against the Boilermakers.

Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman had a career-high 25 points for MI (12-4, 2-1).

MI shot just 37.7 percent for the game, 32.3 percent in the first half.

Consider Levert leads the Wolverines in scoring (17.6), rebounding (5.6) and assists (5.4). However, he believed the Boilermakers could compensate mentally with good decision making and the court vision of players like Caleb Swanigan, Vince Edwards and Dakota Mathias.