Last season, Zach Edey became the first back-to-back Wooden Award winner since Virginia star Ralph Sampson in 1982 and 1983. The imposing 7-foot-4 center dominated college basketball and carried the Purdue Boilermakers to their first Final Four since 1980. So, it’s no surprise that after Edey became the No. 9 overall draft pick of the Memphis Grizzlies last summer Matt Painter’s team took a step back. The surprise, however, is where the loss of a 25-point per-game scorer has been felt the most.
Purdue stormed out to first place in the Big Ten before a three-game stretch against Michigan, Wisconsin, and Michigan State hit like a speed bump on the highway with a Chipotle bowl in your lap. Needless to say, it’s a mess – carnitas everywhere.
The Boilermakers dropped all three games, falling to fourth place in the conference at 11-5. They no longer look like a team capable of winning the Big Ten title, let alone the national one.
The maturity of Braden Smith, the now junior point guard who began his career as the scapegoat for Purdue’s first-round March Madness loss to 16-seed Farleigh Dickinson in 2023, has kept Painter’s ever-efficient offense afloat. Smith is the clear third in a two-man race for the Wooden behind Auburn’s Johni Broome and Duke’s Cooper Flagg. When he’s not creating his own efficient offense, he’s setting up his teammates and averaging 8.8 assists per game (second most in the country), with most going to leading scorer Trey Kaufman-Renn who has done his best Edey impression in the low-post this year.
Offensively, the Boilers are eighth in Kenpom offensive rating at 124.9, a dropoff so slight from last season’s 125.2, that it’s hardly discernable to the naked eye. Simply put, Edey or not, Purdue can score, which was not the expectation.
A year ago, Edey’s ON/OFF splits were staggering, with Purdue’s offensive rating falling from 127.7 with its superstar center to 101.5 when he was on the bench, and its true shooting percentage dipping 8.6% from a 99th percentile 61.5% to 52.9%. He was the most impactful offensive player in the sport, yet on that end of the floor, he’s hardly been missed. However, defensively, even 27 games into the year, Painter still hasn’t found a proper replacement.
Maybe that player would have been Daniel Jacobsen, but the 7-foot-4 freshman center suffered a fractured tibia in the second game of the season and hasn’t seen the floor since. That injury left 6-foot-9 Kaufman-Renn and 6-foot-10 Caleb Furst as the last line of defense at the rim and revealed the remarkable defensive value of an athletic 7-foot-4 impediment in the paint that was hidden in plain sight a season ago.
Matt Painter doesn’t compete for championships with a roster full of five-stars or by plucking disgruntled stars from the transfer portal each year. No, Painter does it the old-fashioned way, developing three-star talent, often from the state of Indiana, and he keeps his team together to remain near the top of the Big Ten year after year. Purdue hasn’t missed the tournament since 2014 and his most recent five-star commit was Caleb Swanigan in 2015.
While that may be the most sustainable way to build and maintain a program, it can leave you vulnerable when you run into those top-tier athletes. It took until the national championship game for that weakness to be exposed a season ago because Edey covered up for every athletic inadequacy on the defensive end. He was an eraser, altering shots around the rim and making opposing guards think twice once they penetrated into the paint. Without him – or Jacobsen in his place – opponents are getting to the paint with ease and when they do… well, here’s an example from Tuesday night’s 75-66 loss to the Spartans in East Lansing.
COEN CARR WITH THE CHERRY ON TOP ‼️ @MSU_Basketball #B1GMBBall on Peacock 💻 pic.twitter.com/U0L6ifVRCQ
— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) February 19, 2025
“Oh boy” is right Robbie Hummel. And yes, Coen Carr is a supernatural athlete, but the exact conflict Kaufman-Renn was caught in, forced to decide between defending the ball handler or the lob threat, is where Edey, with his long arms and impossibly obtrusive frame, thrived. Purdue’s defense has struggled this season, and, lately, the best teams in the Big Ten have identified its vulnerability at the rim and have pounded away until they draw blood.
Michigan State shot 88.9% at the rim; Wisconsin 86.7% and Michigan 72.7%. Purdue is 349th in blocks per game at 1.9. Smith might be my favorite player in the country this season. His command of the entire offensive end of the floor is mesmerizing to watch and even at 6-foot-nothing, he’s turned himself into a future pro. However, without any true rim protection, the Boilermakers will be an easy out in the NCAA Tournament.
According to CBBanalytics.com
Purdue | 2023-24 (percentile) | 2024-25 (percentile) | Last 10 games (percentile) |
|---|---|---|---|
Defensive Rating | 102.4 (85th) | 106.8 (58th) | 110.1 (39th) |
Def Reb% | 75.7% (96th | 70.5% (52nd) | 72.9% (85th) |
Block% | 9.3% (53rd) | 5.8% (6th) | 4.3% (1st) |
Opp. FG% (at rim) | 64.3% (29th) | 69.2% (7th) | 75.8% (0) |
Opp. FG% (paint) | 37.9% (80th) | 44.0% (25th) | 50.7% (2nd) |
Zach Edey changed the geometry of a basketball court, and if you didn’t realize it at the time, it’s clear now that his gravitational effect was just as impactful on the defensive end of the floor.
When a 7-foot-4 freshman showed up on Purdue’s roster this season to follow Edey, after Edey followed Matt Haarms and Matt Haarms followed Isaac Haas, it was obvious that like Leonardo DiCaprio with his revolving door of 22-year-old supermodels, Matt Painter has a type. Then when Jacobsen went down and the Boilermakers were forced to make do without a 7-footer in the middle, much like DiCaprio’s affinity for supermodels, it became easy to understand why.