Pudue dethaws against Illinois

First appeared on January 5th,
in The Lebanon Reporter

Pardon the cliché but while it was cold outside, inside Mackey Arena Wednesday night was red hot. So loyal Boilermaker fans by the hundreds trudged in on their snowshoes cloaked in bulky Arctic parkas lined with fur from the durable, and yet always fashionable, Musk Ox. They’d come most likely to see Illinois play, having given up on their beloved Boilers sometime after the Bucknell loss (three games into the season).

Illinois had been good. Scary good. After winning the Maui Invitational in a championship game in which they beat Butler by 17 points, first year head coach Jim Groce’s team had won six of seven coming in.

Seeing DJ Byrd play an integral role in winning a basketball game is nothing new to folks in this part of the state, but the number 11 ranked Illinois Fighting Illini were blindsided by the 6’5 Senior Wednesday night. The Purdue Boilermakers (7-6) did what nobody on Earth, including all 9,874 people inside Mackey, believed they could; they beat Groce’s upstart Illinois team 68-61.

Purdue came in with absolutely nothing to hang their hats on following a lackluster preseason. And clearly there was little for Purdue fans to look forward to coming in to the season what with all the attention their arch rivals downstate had garnered before anyone had even had a chance to embarrass a directional school.

So the near zero degree temperatures outside must have seemed balmy to Matt Painter as he took the court with his team, considering the fervor Purdue fans once had for the coach’s program was quickly freezing over.

The Boilers don’t boast the top recruiting class in the nation or a preseason All American, but what they do have is a coach who instills a faith in hard-nosed defense and hustle. The product is of course oftentimes a brand of basketball so ugly even Sports Illustrated doesn’t have enough airbrush artists on staff to make the average basketball fan interested in watching it. But more often than not, when players are on board, it produces wins; of course nothing helps a group buy in faster than winning a game nobody has given you a chance in.

The heat wave came after Purdue outrebounded the Illini 45-34. And in doing so Purdue not only helped themselves compensate for a lack of shot making but may have revealed a glaring weakness in this Illini team at the same time. Illinois is a flashy and athletic team that can shoot the basketball, but what we saw Wednesday was a much less talented and far less athletic team punch them square in the face.

This physical, Gene Keady style “football on the hardwood” was enough to put Painter’s team in a position to win, but as they came down the stretch Purdue began to tighten up. You could see their arms get shorter and feel their throats drying up.

Knowing you’re a terrible foul shooting team late in a game you have no business leading must be a lot like diving with sharks wearing a wetsuit lined with chum. But in the end the Boilers were able toss Byrd into the microwave long enough for him to reach just the right temperature and, after proving to have the perfect amount of seasoning, the senior was able to make all the plays necessary at the end to help his team win.

There’s nothing like a nice win to warm ones soul on a cold winter night. And while it may come as a welcome distraction to the Arctic conditions in which we currently exist, Purdue fans should temper their blue lips, for nobody wants January 2nd to be the high water mark of their season.

© 2013 Eric Walker Williams

Hoosier odds are long, but are they Buster Douglas long?

First appeared on February 3rd, 2010
in The Lebanon Reporter

February 11th will mark the 20th anniversary of the night James “Buster” Douglas knocked Mike Tyson out to win the Heavyweight Championship of the World. Coming in a 42-1 underdog, Douglas left Tokyo having shocked the sports world and secured a place in boxing eternity.
Some believe the Indiana Hoosiers will face similar odds when the Purdue Boilermakers come to Assembly Hall Thursday night. The Boilers sprinted out to a 14-0 start and, after some part-time hack of a sports columnist cursed them by spotlighting their dominance in his writing, they proceeded to lose three straight. Now, after beating Wisconsin and drumming Penn State, it would seem they have righted the ship. Surely Boiler fans want nothing more (outside of a National Championship) than to hear the drumbeat continue Thursday night in Bloomington.
One could say with some certainty the Hoosier’s season to this point has been quite different. After letting a winnable game at home against Iowa get away, the Hoosiers controlled the second half Saturday at Illinois and played well enough to win, only to be beaten at the buzzer. So they’ve lost their top scorer, dropped an ugly game to Iowa and lost at the buzzer to Illinois. What could be worse? Oh yeah, here comes nationally ranked Purdue. The question in the B-town coffee shops now is how much life can be left in the Hoosiers after they’ve lost so much?
The fervor of this rivalry is well documented (see one side chanting “BOILER UP!” and the other answering in unison, “BANNER UP!” for proof), so truth is this series is so much about emotion that it really doesn’t matter where these two find themselves now.
It’s a time when the proverbial records are actually given the proverbial toss out the proverbial window. A rivalry so volatile we’re used to seeing coaches so heated they resort to throwing things; Knight and his chair. Keady and his jacket. Samson and, well take your pick between his future away or the program under a bus.
In a new era Tom Crean and Matt Painter fit the mold. Both are fiery in a “fire in the belly for winning” kind of way. Certainly not the “lose temporary touch with reality” way we saw after Mike Davis stormed the court in Lexington only to dance around like somebody had tossed a voodoo doll of him into a hot skillet.
So what will happen Thursday? The only certainty in all of this is, at one time, an unknown like Buster Douglas could never have ever beaten Mike Tyson. Tyson was the closest thing to Superman the sports world had ever seen. He had never even been knocked down in a fight before. Of course twenty years later we’ve all heard how that story turned out (well Evander Holifield has heard bits and pieces of it anyway).
Crean said recently his kids need to be tougher. The Hoosiers will have to be physical to survive Purdue’s football on hardwood style, even if Tijan Jobe goes 4/5 from downtown. This game will merely be a progress report for Crean’s crash course on toughness however and not a final exam.
What we see Thursday night could be interesting…or it could be ugly. If it’s analysis you seek, the Hoosiers will be smart to stay aggressive and attack Purdue even when logic says protect the ball in the face of their smothering pressure. Crean’s mantra should be “Take them 10 rounds”; absorb their best shot and outlast them. Thursday night the Indiana Hoosiers could do worse than aspiring to be Buster Douglas for a day.