When junior guard Braden Smith is in attack mode, No. 20 Purdue can beat anyone.
In the Boilermakers’ three-game winning streak, the Big Ten Conference’s preseason Player of the Year has averaged 25.3 points and 9.7 assists. He had 22 points, seven assists and six rebounds Sunday in an easy 79-61 win over Northwestern.
Smith and Purdue (11-4, 3-1) will try to keep the roll going Thursday night when they journey to Piscataway, N.J., for a Big Ten matchup with Rutgers (8-7, 1-3).
Averaging 15.4 points, 8.6 assists and 4.8 rebounds a game this season, Smith is in the running to win the award league pundits predicted he would in October.
“It all starts with him being hungry and shooting,” said Boilermakers coach Matt Painter. “We encourage that … when he’s making the right reads, we’ve been successful. His ability to shoot the basketball and pass the basketball is very unique.”
Smith’s all-around brilliance is why Purdue has designs on defending the regular-season conference title it won last season with 7-foot-4 center Zach Edey serving as the anchor.
While Edey has moved on to the NBA’s Memphis Grizzlies, the winning continues at his former program.
The Boilermakers aren’t as dominant inside as they were with Edey patrolling the paint, but they have hit 39.6 percent of their 3-pointers, 14th in Division I. And with Smith controlling the ball, they boast one of the top assist-turnover ratios in the country at 1.5.
Many of Smith’s assists go to Trey Kaufman-Renn, the team’s leading scorer at 17.8 points per game, and fellow guard Fletcher Loyer (14.0 ppg).
While Purdue enters Thursday’s game in fine form, the Scarlet Knights are searching for a winning as they enter one of their toughest stretches of the season. They’re coming off a 75-63 home loss Monday to Wisconsin, their third defeat in four games, and they will play three Top 25 teams over the next 17 days.
It was billed as coach Steve Pikiell’s most talented team in his nine seasons on the job after he recruited prized freshmen Dylan Harper and Ace Bailey. But the Scarlet Knights haven’t come together the way many thought they would.
Harper was sidelined by the flu in last week’s 84-74 loss at Indiana and was still less than 100 percent on Monday vs. Wisconsin, not scoring in 15 minutes. And Bailey hit just 3 of 16 shots from the field in a frustrating nine-point effort that ended with him fouling out on two technicals with 1:46 remaining.
But Pikiell still has high hopes.
“I’ve got a ton of confidence (in this team),” he said. “We’ve got to get Dylan Harper back, obviously — last I checked, he’s a pretty good player — and we will. In a league like this, there’s ups and downs, but that’s what you get in the Big Ten.”
Harper is averaging team highs of 21.1 points and 4.5 assists a game, while Bailey chips in 19.1 ppg and 7.6 rebounds. But no one else on the roster averages more than 7.7 ppg.
–Field Level Media
