The Purdue Boilermakers will face the Rutgers Scarlett Knights at home on Tuesday night. Can they secure their third Big Ten win to start the 2017-18 season?
TV Schedule: Tuesday, Jan. 3, 7:00 p.m. ET, Big Ten Network
Arena: Mackey Arena, West Lafayette, Indiana
The Purdue Boilermakers enter their third game of Big Ten play off of a great win over the Lipscomb Bison.
Lipscomb is probably not a team many outside of the A-Sun (or Middle Tennessee like me) have heard of, but the Bison are a really good squad that should compete with Florida Gulf Coast to earn the AQ-bid for the NCAA Tournament. Purdue’s dismantling of this team is just further proof that the Boilermakers are potentially a dark horse to win it all down the road.
That being said, they have to avoid overlooking perceived weaker Big Ten teams on their schedule like their next opponents, the Rutgers Scarlett Knights.
Rutgers has looked far better than many expected them to be coming into the season, especially on defense. Their win over Seton Hall sent shockwaves throughout the Big Ten, but back-to-back losses to Stony Brook and Hartford by just two have killed their momentum. Unfortunately, I think this is where the Scarlett Knights’ season falls apart, as they lose their next five or six games and come back down to Earth.
Purdue wins big and begins to creep up on the top 10 – a place that it is beginning to look like the Boilermakers are destined to be sooner rather than later.
Prediction: Purdue 78, Rutgers 55