NCAA Basketball: Dwayne Cohill, Kris Murray among Players of the Week

Power conference Player of the Week – Zach Edey

This was another close race this week between Edey, Javan Johnson, and Kris Murray. Purdue played two games which gave Edey the nod over Murrary from Iowa. Johnson earned the National Player of the Week but honestly, I think Edey was overlooked for that award given the monster games he had this week. Purdue has some huge wins this year already and the large man has been at the center of all of those. As mentioned, Edey is likely going to have a permanent spot in these rankings especially if he continues to play like the Naismith Player of the Year. This will not be his last Busting Brackets Player of the Week award.

Where does head coach Matt Painter find some of these players?  He always gets players well over 7’0” tall to come play for him and all of them are extremely skilled guys who destroy the Big Ten. Edey is so hard to guard because of his size and his athletic ability. The big man bucks the conventional wisdom of fouling the big dude and put him on the line. Edey shoots almost 77% from the line and it would be a fool’s errand to put a player like that on the line especially if he is going to make most of them. The Boilermakers have had an embarrassment of riches at the big man over the last handful of years.

The game against Minnesota was one of the most dominant performances I have ever seen from a big man. The Gophers tried to double him, tried to make him put the ball on the floor, tried to get a body into him, but the reality is Edey was a man amongst boys out there that game and Minnesota, or just insert random Big Ten team, did not have an answer on how to stop him. Coach Painter is a mad scientist when it comes to big guys and when to get them to take over the game. Congrats to the big man on a great week and congrats to Purdue for their top 5 ranking.