The Purdue Boilermakers, led by future NBA stars, imaginary Player #1 and pretend Player #2, will not only make the Sweet 16, but even creep into the Elite Eight.
Look at these mind-blowing stats: Their top seven players are "led" by an experience laden Junior, Nemanja Calasan, a native of Bosnia-Herzegovina. He is averaging an astonishing 6.5 ppg in his 18.3 mpg in his only season in Division I basketball. Their only senior, Tarrance Crump, is averaging 4 points in 16 minutes. Their high scorer is E'Twaun Moore, a freshman, who lights it up for 12.7 ppg. Their best rebounder is Robbie Hummel, who hits the glass for 6.1 rpg. And their best assist man is Chris Kramer, who dishes out 2.9 apg.
This is an entire team full of roll players! No true superstar. The Boilermakers are all teammates, in the true sense of the word. Hummel, a finalist for the Oscar Robertson Trophy (National Player of the Year), is a very good all-around player (11.6 ppg, 6.1 rpg, 2.6 apg, 50%FG, and 86%FT), but nothing compared to the caliber of players he will see in the coming days or possible weeks.
Yet despite their lack of star power, they beat Wisconsin twice. That's right, the Midwest Region's No. 3 seed was beaten twice by this team. They know how to win against tough opponents in big games. They keep it low scoring, playing solid defense, and limiting their own turnovers, basically doing whatever it takes to end up on the right side of victory.
Free throws win NCAA tournament games. Three of their players average better than 83% from the line, while four of their high-minute men average 71% or better. At that crucial point in the game, up or down by only a basket, Coach Matt Painter knows who to put in to hit the big free throw.
During an 11-game winning streak, spanning January and the beginning of February, eight games were decided by eight points or less. FREE THROWS win the tight games and most NCAA Tournament games are tight. So look for Purdue to be sinking their freebees.
Obviously, coaching is huge in the tournament. Well, Purdue has one of the four finalists for the Naismith Award, the honor given to the best coach of the year. He has brought together this team of ragtag misfits, never allowing them to believe that they are just average simply because they lack the media sensationalism of the other Top 20 schools in the nation.
Yes, Purdue is a Top 20 school. Of course, that's according to the experts in the AP Poll. Purdue finished their season as the twentieth ranked team in the nation after reaching a peak of No. 17 earlier in the season.
I think the biggest advantage, though, is the fact they play in the solid Big Ten. It's not a stellar year for the conference, but at one point they did have four ranked teams, only losing Indiana out of the polls recently following Coach Sampson's most recent scandal.
However, Purdue did only finish one game behind Wisconsin, the eventual Big Ten Tournament champions. Any year you can finish with a 15-3 record in the Big Ten is a good year. And this is a good team. Not great, but good enough to beat the competition and make a run at Cinderella.
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