Purdue Learns Lessons From Virginia, Illinois in NCAA Tournament Journey
GLENDALE, Ariz. — Purdue's repeated postseason disappointments have been well-documented. They are the only college basketball team ever to lose to double-digits seeds three years in a row, and last year's loss as a No. 1 seed to No. 16 Fairleigh Dickinson stung the worst.
It was only the second time ever that a No. 1 had lost to a No. 16. Virginia was the first, back in 2018. It was embarrassing, but it all went away the following year when the Cavaliers won the 2019 NCAA title.
From worst to first.
Purdue coach Matt Painter took a lot of heat for the loss — especially since it followed a 2021 first-round loss to No. 13 seed North Texas and a regional semifinal loss to No. 15 Saint Peter's in 2022.
Learning from Virginia's path made sense, though. And Painter took advantage of it. They've won five straight NCAA Tournament games now this year, and are one win away from repeating Virginia's miraculous turnaround if they can beat Connecticut on Monday night in this year's NCAA title game.
"I think it's actually an accurate narrative,'' Painter said Sunday when asked about what he learned from Virginia's journey. "Sometimes people will pick up narratives out of thin air instead of doing their work. This is actually the right narrative. The thing I grab from it more than anything is just the humility of (Virginia coach) Tony Bennett and how he handled it with class. I think anytime you can take it, you've got to be able to take it, right? When you're a little kid, that was always the line, 'you can dish it
out but you can't take it, right? We're all that way as young people. We can say whatever we want, then it hurts when it comes back your way.
"I used that with a positive spin. More than anything, what stood out to me was when we had that loss, we joined that club with Virginia and Tony Bennett. He had just gotten beat by Furman that day. You're at a low when you have tough losses like that, but for him to think of us and to think of me and to reach out to me on that day, that was great. So from just a humanity standpoint, there are some good people out there that are thinking about others even when they're down and out themselves. Once again, it's not who you are, right? It's what you do for a living. (Losing in the first round) means a whole lot, but it's not who you are. Try to keep that in perspective.''
Painter and his players have talked all season about how that first-round loss in 2023 wouldn't define this current team. They just worked harder, and got better, both as a team and individually. They only lost three regular season games all year and won the Big Ten.
But they also knew 2024 would be defined by their postseason success. They simply could not lose early, and they haven't.
"The problem with a really tough loss when it ends your season is you don't have another game,'' Painter said. "Like when you blow a game on Jan.16, you just play on Jan. 21 and you get that taste out of your mouth. But when you have a loss at the end of the season, you have to sit on it, you have to take it.
''Some of that is healthy in a sense, but it's also why I try to keep our players from going into coaching because there's such a level of misery. There's so many good things (about coaching). I'm so glad I did it because of the relationships. You don't choose how you feel. That piece of it, of being able to go through it, feel that, I think helps you get on edge, helps you to be a little sharper. I think you only need to do it once, though. We've done it multiple times.''
Painter said it took a lot of self-reflection to move on from the loss. But it was also about getting better individually, too. Zach Edey was the national Player of the Year in 2023, but he's much improved this year. So are guards Braden Smith and Fletcher Loyer, who made big jumps from their freshman years. Getting Lance Jones in the transfer portal from Southern Illinois has made them quicker and more athletic on the perimeter, and given them another three-point weapon.
They are much improved, but they still had to show it.
"You just try to keep working, try to be honest about your mistakes, try to be honest about just
everything,'' Painter said. "It's an inexact science at times, especially from a recruiting standpoint.
You learn from your tough losses and don't run from them. You face them, and that's what we've tried to do. We've been to that second weekend a lot, but we haven't been able to get through it. We only got to the Elite Eight once before this. You just keep plugging and feel good about what you're doing,
feel good about your convictions. When it gets right down to the game, our tough losses the last four years, if you don't turn the basketball over, don't go 4-for-22 from three, or
whatever those numbers are, you win.
"But I know this. If we don't turn the basketball over and we still go 4-for-22, whatever those numbers exactly are, we're probably going to win those games. Like last night — (a 63-50 win over N.C. State in the national semifinals) — was an outlier game for us. We had high-level turnovers, but we went 10-for-25 from three. We still established Zach Edey. It wasn't an unbelievable game for him, but those numbers are very average for him, and not average for everybody else. We stayed functional in what we were doing.''
Purdue forward Mason Gillis said he's friends with former Virginia star Kyle Guy, who's also an Indiana native, and they've talked about what happened at Virginia. He's tried to make sure all that information carried over.
"We aren't best friends or super close, but we know each other a little bit being from Indiana. He reached out to me after that game and told me about their process was like,'' Gillis said. "He gave me that reassurance that we could do it because they did. Their point was they needed to get better, and they did.
"It's hard to picture doing something that had never been done before, but they did it.Kyle gave me that picture, and we're chasing it. For us this year, our biggest times of growth has been when we've failed, because we could talk with each other and access where we were at. Every time we got knocked down, we get back up.''
Another team they've learned from heading into the title game is fellow Big Ten member illinois, a top-10 team most of the year. Purdue beat them twice, but both games were battles. UConn played Illinois last week and blew open a close game with a stunning 30-0 run.
That was impressive. Purdue guard Fletcher Loyer said many of the Boilers watched that game live, and they've since watched film of the 30-0 run. So they know with certainly how dangerout UConn can be once they get on a roll. They've shown in winning the NCAA title a year ago, and they've won 11 straight NCAA tournament games by double digits.
"You have to respect a team like UConn that can go out and handle their business and beat a good team by 15 or 20 every night,'' Loyer said. "We watched it live and started watching film today, and you can see how hard they can play for 40 minutes and that's impressive. They do a great job, and when you see a team like Illinois that we've done battle with, a 30-0 run is really crazy. We have to make sure we're ready to go for the full 40, and we have to limit their runs.''
Tom Brew is an award-winning journalist who's worked at some America's finest newspapers, including the Tampa Bay (Fla.) Times, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel and the Indianapolis Star. He also owns the book publishing company, Hilltop30 Publishing Group, and he has written four books and published 16 others.