March 9, 2007

Recap |  Box Score |  Notes

Purdue Boilermakers

COACH MATT PAINTER:  Well, I thought the key for us coming out to play Iowa really had nothing to do with the Big Ten Tournament or trying to get into the NCAA Tournament.  We played Iowa once this year in Iowa City and they embarrassed us.  They just flat man handled us, took us to the woodshed, and that was the one thing we tried to talk about all week was just trying to play good basketball against Iowa and redeem ourselves, similar to what we did against Indiana after they embarrassed us in Bloomington, and I thought our guys responded.  I thought they were aggressive.  They were quicker to the basketball.  We won the battle on the boards, and I'm just proud of our players.  I thought they, in a big time game, played very well but played very hard, and that's what we have to do.  We have to scrap and claw for everything, and our guys just did a phenomenal job today being ready to play and going out there and playing hard.

 Q.  Dave, you picked up a couple of quick fouls and then Kramer came in and just locked down Haluska.  He was one-for-five from the field, and two games against you he was 8 for 28.  Can you just talk a little bit about what you did to him, but also specifically the job Kramer did on him today?
 DAVID TEAGUE:  (Chris) Kramer did a good job.  Kramer has been one of our defensive rocks all season.  We had all the confidence in the world in matching him up with (Adam) Haluska because we knew Kramer was tough and he could do a good job of keeping Haluska out of his rhythm and making it tough on the shot attempts.  When I got in foul trouble, I think Kramer just took it upon his shoulders not to let Haluska get going because he's the type of player that can handle it and bring those guys back in and take over the basketball game, and he just did a phenomenal job.

 Q.  Carl, what was the difference for you this time against Iowa as opposed to the time you played them last time?
 CARL LANDRY:  I just tried to play hard, tried to stay aggressive.  The first game they were double teaming me from the top, from the bottom, from the side.  I was expecting it this game and tried to stay as tough as I could with the ball and tried to find my open teammates and that's what we did tonight and came out with the win.

 Q.  Dave, as Matt just talked about, it seemed like you guys definitely came out with a sense of urgency.  Was the impetus behind that the fact that you guys have been beaten so bad by Iowa before or was it starting the Big Ten Tournament, obviously the NCAA Tournament?  Just what was the crux behind the emotion you guys came out with?
 DAVID TEAGUE:  I think it was, first and foremost, being embarrassed down in Iowa City.  We only had one chance to play those guys in conference play, so we knew this game was big from a revenge standpoint, and then it being the Big Ten Tournament kind of added some fuel to the fire.  We knew this was a big game for us and to avenge that loss we knew we had to come out and be aggressive but be smart on the defensive end and take some things away and just be ready to play, something that we weren't ready to do in Iowa City.  We made drastic changes I think from an effort standpoint, and it showed early in the ballgame.

 Q.  Tarrance, it looked like you were able to get in transition so much.  Obviously I know what you love.  What was going well for you this game that did not go well in Iowa City?  What did you guys see and were able to break down?
 TARRANCE CRUMP:  I just tried a little harder and tried to take it to our advantage.  A couple times I got the ball on the break and I saw things and I just tried to make plays and tried to help because they went down to two fouls.  We had to step up on the defensive end and I just took what they gave me.

 Q.  Carl, looking ahead tomorrow you'll probably get the task of guarding Greg Oden.  Can you tell us what that will be like?
 CARL LANDRY:  He's one of the best players in the country and he's one of the best low post players in the country, a great defender, an all around good player.  It's just going to be tough.  So tomorrow I'm just going to have to be hooked up, try to take away some of his strong things that he does and make him go to his weak points.

 Q.  Tarrance, when this team has been good this year the bench has been good, and today you did some good things defensively, but to provide 24 points on 10 of 13 shooting, could you just talk about the collective trio off the bench, how big it was today?
 TARRANCE CRUMP:  It was very big, especially when Dave  (Teague) went down.  We knew someone had to step up.  We had prepared to play very hard, harder than they played.  They gave us some open looks and we made some plays.

 Q.  This is for David and Carl.  How confident are you guys now that you're in the NCAA Tournament, and do you belong, maybe lobby for that?
 DAVID TEAGUE:  I feel like we've got a lot of work to do.  Our goal was to come here and win the tournament.  We really can't look past Ohio State right now and look to the NCAA tournament until our business is finished here.
 We still feel like we're in a good position to have a chance at winning this tournament, and then from there we'll be a lock.  If we win the tournament we'll be a guaranteed seed in the NCAA Tournament.  That's our main objective first and foremost.

 Q.  Carl, it seemed like in the first half you were seeing kind of the swarming sort of defense that you saw from them in Iowa City, but then in the second half it seemed like maybe you had a little more room.  Did they change something in the second half because you guys were shooting the three pretty well?
 CARL LANDRY:  Yeah, we started knocking down shots from the perimeter.  David (Teague) did a good job in the beginning, the first half, so did Chris Lutz and the rest of my teammates.  They have to focus on them guys more, and I was able to get some position down low and get some baskets.

 Q.  David, will it feel odd rooting for Illinois tonight because Illinois is another bubble team?
 DAVID TEAGUE:  No, I'm still not rooting for IU (laughter).  It'll be good if they won it and our chances were good, but I still can't root for IU no matter how it shakes out.  We just know we have to do what we have to do to take care of our own business, to take care of business, but I still can't root for the Hoosiers.
 THE MODERATOR:  We'll finish up with questions for Coach Painter now.

 Q.  I asked the players, but obviously David gets those two fouls and that part of the game was maybe the key part of the game.  Haluska, just he couldn't do anything against him.  Talk about how important that segment was and the job that Kramer did on him.
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  (Chris) Kramer started on him even when David was in the game, so it wasn't like David got in foul trouble and we had to switch up.  We had David guarding in Iowa City and he did a good job and everybody else just killed us.  So we thought it was better for Chris to guard him and just to stay with him the whole time and wear him down, similar to what we tried to do with (Michigan State's Drew) Neitzel, just stay with him at times and don't give a lot of help.
 There's some risk to how we defend players like Adam Haluska and Drew Neitzel.  I think Chris (Kramer) just has a strong will and a lot of discipline and knows what's going on and when to go for steals and when not to go for steals.  I thought he did a good job on him.  But I think that the key to our game was just being aggressive and not letting those other guys go wild.
 Tyler Smith is a very good player.  He scored points against us the first time.  But the key was not letting (Tony) Freeman and (Mike) Henderson and (Seth) Gorney and Cyrus Tate combine for 40 points like they did in the first meeting.

 Q.  Talk about the importance of this win in terms of your NCAA tournament resume.  Do you belong in the tournament now do you think?
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  Well, I felt that we belonged in the tournament before.  It doesn't necessarily mean you're going to get in.  There's always a handful of teams that get left out that deserve to be in it.  I felt that we were one of those teams, right there, either a little bit in or a little bit out, and hopefully this helped our chances.
 You can't control that.  The only thing you can control is how you prepare your team and get them ready, and we're just getting ready for Ohio State, and if it's enough, it's enough.  If it's not, then there's not a whole lot you can do about it.

 Q.  Just to clarify then, your game plan, I know in some games you kind of rotate guards on people like Neitzel and stuff, but do you really envision Chris being kind of the guy in this game keeping him on them most of the time?
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  Exactly, yeah.

 Q.  There was a time you got off to a good start and there was a time in the first half where you lose David, and they were into the line a lot, which as you know Iowa usually strokes it and they missed a bunch of free throws.  Were you thinking maybe then, maybe we dodged a bullet a little bit and the game is kind of going our way?
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  We were fortunate they missed some free throws in that stretch.  Our pressure was a little counterproductive at times because they were getting some free points by us putting our hands on them.  But with us, when we've done that before and people went to the free throw line and we'd back up, it's not been good.
 We lose our aggressive style and how we play and how we get after it and pursuing the basketball and making that next play, and so we just tried to stay with it and just kind of regroup a little bit and talk about playing more with our feet and still putting pressure on the ball, and then at times give it a little bit more help off non shooters and talking to each other out there.
 But I thought that was the reason why we got our lead, but it was also the reason why they were cutting it, chipping away at the lead at the one time.  We just tried to stay with it and play a little bit smarter than we had before.

 Q.  Marcus Green has obviously been spotty for you guys this year, but he played pretty well.
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  Spotty is a good word.

 Q.  He played pretty well tonight, and then obviously Tarrance, and Chris gave you some things when he was on the court.  Can you just talk about that package?
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  Well, I thought Marcus Green gave us a boost and was able to score the ball for us, and that's what we need him to do.  He has struggled with that.  It's tough.  It's like a pinch hitter in baseball and trying to get some consistency.  It's just a tough role to play when you're a shooter because you never really get that rhythm because you don't play a lot of minutes.  But tonight he was great for us and I thought he did a pretty good job defensively.
 Obviously when Tarrance (Crump) is able to break down the defense it gives us another look, and he did that tonight and made some plays, especially in the first half, and then (Chris) Lutz got into foul trouble but he hit a big three, and then he gets three assists, no turnovers, which is very important.

 Q.  It seemed like in the first half he got that kind of swarming, trapping defense that he got in Iowa City, then maybe it looked like there was a little bit more room for him in the second half.  Is that a product of these guys knocking down some shots or you spreading the floor a little bit more?  Did you change anything strategically?
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  No, I was just trying to tell them to pass the basketball and not shoot it so quickly.  David (Teague) hit two right away, Carl (Landry) hit one right away.  There's half of them in the first five minutes.
 Keaton Grant hit one in the first half, Marcus Green hit one in the second half.  We had one three we hit in the second half.  It didn't really have anything to do with our ability to make perimeter shots.  I thought if we were patient and moved the ball and hit spacing on the defensive end we could do things.  If we rushed things or forced things or tried to pass it into him after two or three passes they are going to be able to swarm him.
 I thought at times in the second half we didn't play really smart.  I thought if we could put them on defense we were in a great position, and when we did that, we either got to the free throw line or we got a good look.

 Q.  When last you saw Ohio State in Columbus, you kind of got them into a grind it out game, was pretty low scoring.  Is that kind of what your hope is for tomorrow, or are you feeling pretty good about where you guys are with your up tempo where maybe pace is not a big deal?
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  I don't know if pace is a big deal with us.  I think at times we have to steal points, whether that's in transition or on the glass.  We have to be able to steal points and we have to be efficient from the free throw line.  I think that's more important to us than the pace of the game.  I don't know if we have enough guys where we can dictate that, either, for how they play.
 They are similar to how the fab five were when I played in the Big Ten.  A lot of people didn't realize how good they were in the half court.  When you think of the Fab Five and you think of up and down, running all the time, and I think Ohio State, they have a lot of weapons, a lot of talent, but if they don't get in the open court and they bait and they let the big fellow come down or (Othello) Hunter come down, they're pretty good and they spread you.
 Whether it gets up tempo or it stays in the half court, I think Ohio State has proven they have a lot of success no matter how the game gets played out.

 Q.  That's kind of what I was going to ask you.  Is Ohio State as good as advertised, and what would it take for you to be successful against them?
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  I think they're very good, and I think some of the close losses they've had at home, whether that was to us or Penn State, to Michigan State, especially the fashion how Michigan State unfolded with them being up 20 at the half and Maurice Joseph having a three to win it, I think it strengthens a young team because they get in those close games where they've had big leads, or they beat us by 18 points and they turn around ten days later and play us again and now with five minutes to go it's a possession game.  So I think that strengthens Ohio State.
 They're very good.  They're very talented.  For me to gauge them against the other teams in the top ten that we haven't played, that's hard to do.
 I just think Greg Oden is very good.  He's a game changer.  Regardless if he makes a shot or not.  He's a game changer.  He makes you adjust what you're trying to do at all times, and then when you bring in Hunter as a backup, I think if he played probably for anybody else and got touches, he'd be an all conference type guy.  I think he probably will be next year.
 They bring Daequan Cook off the bench and that says it all for me because I think the world of him.  He's very talented, and we'll see in the next few years how talented he'll be.

 Q.  Your message to your team tonight, will it be in part, guys, this was a great opportunity, you're on national television, playing the No. 1 team in the country, used to play in these games, haven't played in one in a long time and this is a great opportunity not just to polish up your resume but it's a great opportunity for the program.  Will you mention any of that to them?
 COACH MATT PAINTER:  I'll just mention the same thing that I mentioned about playing Iowa.  Iowa embarrassed you.  Now we have to kind of get back and get that respect back and prove to Iowa and their program that we're pretty good.  I think that's first and foremost for us.  We've been down and out a little bit, and we've had some tough times.  We've had some tough years, and now I think we're going in the right direction, but we still haven't beaten Ohio State.
 I just ask them to work hard and be efficient and play smart and play harder than them and put themselves in the same position they did in Columbus and then don't play like your hair is on fire the last five minutes of the game.  For us that has a lot to do with Ohio State.  I thought they stepped it up, but we put ourselves in a great position there and we weren't able to convert.  You only get those opportunities so often to play a team of that caliber, and now we have that opportunity again, but we have to put ourselves in that position first before we can talk about it.

Iowa Hawkeyes

COACH STEVE ALFORD: We obviously didn't play very well, and I think Purdue had a lot to do with that.  So my congratulations to Purdue.  They were the better defensive team today.  It's almost a reversal of the last time we played them.  I thought we did a much better job the first time against their bench, and this time it was 25-to-8, their bench dominated us.  I thought our defense, our guys did a better job in game one defending, and this game Purdue was the better defensive team.  We couldn't make a free throw, couldn't make a three, and I think that ended up making for a pretty lopsided outing.

 Q.  Adam, you've had two tough games now against Purdue.  Any difference?
 ADAM HALUSKA:  No, I just thought they defended well as a team.  I thought for the most part they got after all of us, and it's just one of those things where the ball wasn't going down.  But it started on our defensive end.  I thought we did a poor job, and it definitely wasn't a good performance overall for our team.

 Q.  Tyler, do you think you guys were nervous?  Was there any reason why Purdue was kind of the aggressor today?
  TYLER SMITH:  I don't think so.  It's just their defense.  They get up into you, and we had no pressure for them today.

 Q.  Adam, just talk if you could about kind of your thoughts walking off the court, your last Big Ten game.
 ADAM HALUSKA:  It's disappointing.  I think we had high hopes of coming in here and doing some damage.  I was definitely looking forward to playing tomorrow and going on and playing on Sunday, as well.  But with an effort like that it just wasn't very fun out there to give that kind of effort.  We definitely played bad, and it's just not one of our best efforts.

 Q.  Talk a little bit about how are you guys going to rebound now and kind of regroup for an NIT.
 ADAM HALUSKA:  I think first of all, we've just got to come in and have the right mindset.  It's the next step that's going to be our next game, and our next opportunity to win a championship.  I think this team is highly capable of going in there and trying to win that thing.  It wouldn't be bad to go in there and end the season on a win, I'll tell you that.  There's only two teams in the entire nation that's going to end with a win.  I wouldn't mind doing that, especially my last year.

 Q.  Adam, what's been the difference with this team between home and road?  You know, last week looking so good against Illinois.  It just seems like on the road this season it's been consistent and it's been a struggle at times?
 ADAM HALUSKA:  I think that's a mystery we've got to figure out ourselves.  Coach alluded to it in the locker room.  We play so well at home, and it seems like when we go on the road or even at a neutral site, the energy is not there.  I think especially our defense.  Forget the shooting; if you can't guard you're not going to win games.

 Q.  Tyler, how tough was Carl Landry today?  Seemed like he really did a good job of setting the tone down there in the paint.
 TYLER SMITH:  Yeah, we did a great job on him at home.  We knew he was going to come back today and try to give us his best effort to our big man.  We just wasn't helping him out a lot.

 Q.  Did you have any sense in practice this week that this was going to happen?
 COACH STEVE ALFORD:  No. I think Purdue really played well.  Sometimes you've got to congratulate who you play.  I think they played    they came out, they made shots.  You're on a neutral site, a place you haven't been in, and they make shots early and we don't, and they got a ten point lead early and then really it never went    we got it to nine or ten, they got it to 13 a couple times.
 It got to the position it was real late in the game when we were fouling.  But it was really the first five, six, seven minutes.  Once they got their lead, it really stayed there throughout.  One team had a good start to things and the other team kind of got on their heels.
 You've got to give credit to Purdue.  Their defense was very solid, they were aggressive.  But I think the first half    we're down 13 at half and we really should be down about six or seven.
 But our foul shooting was atrocious today.  That's something that has been really good.  We were 10 for 19 the first half with two front ends that were missed, so that's really 10 for 21.  That's really bad foul shooting, and that's something that's been really good for us all year.  If you shoot 19 free throws in the half, it's hard for me to be upset with our offense because we got to the free throw line, we just didn't make foul shots.  We had guys miss two in a row.  I think that lets the air out of your offense a little bit.
 And then their two big guns had big nights.  I think, what did they combine, 35 and 19 out of their two big guns.  (Tarrance) Crump was better tonight for them, their bench outplayed our bench.  So there's a lot of reasons but nothing that we saw in practice.  We practiced well, we're healthy.  I think it was a situation where one team got off to a better start and then we just couldn't catch them.

 Q.  It seemed like you sensed the team was not in the right mindset early in the game.  You called a time out and gave it to them pretty good.  What could you tell about how come they didn't respond to that?
 COACH STEVE ALFORD:  Well, I never called a timeout.  My first timeout was with 25 seconds to go in the first half.  I didn't call time.  Maybe I should have (laughing).  But I just thought that we were on our heels and then we talked about that all week, that we don't    you can't come into a one and done setting and be on your heels.
 You've got to give Purdue credit.  They were the more aggressive team today, and because of their aggressiveness they got a win.
 I think our inexperience, you look at some of the guys playing in their first Big Ten Tournament, and it was pretty telling.  Other than maybe Kurt (Looby) and Tyler (Smith), the other guys kind of struggled with things.  Mike (Henderson) never got in the flow being a senior, and playing in his fourth tournament.  I don't think he got in the flow very much.
 I liked what Tony (Freeman) did.  I thought Tony did some good things.  I thought Kurt really battled.  I thought Kurt did some good things for us.

 Q.  Talk about the NIT a little bit looking ahead.  Talk about the differences in the tournament now.  In the old days you guys had probably known you would host a game there, with the seating and the way things could go now, you guys could end up with quick turnaround travel.  Talk about the differences in the NIT.
 COACH STEVE ALFORD:  Well, it's a lot better now than what it's been five, six, seven years ago.  I think having a 32 team field and having it bracketed, the way they do things now it's a lot better than you play a game and then you try to figure out where you're playing again and who you're playing.  It's much more organized by a group that I think has been in college basketball and I think understood college basketball.  So I think that's all helped this tournament.
 This is going to be a good tournament for our guys, it really is.  They're down right now, we're down.  We were a bubble team coming in, and that pops our bubble, so that's never fun.
 With that said, this team has done a lot of good things.  I look at what they've done in the league this year.  To finish fourth in the league, to get a fourth seed in the tournament.  Nobody ever likes to play one game in this tournament, but we lose in the quarterfinals.  We played ourselves into a quarterfinal match up.  It was our non lead that got us.  Play 14 games, you go 8-and-6, Mike was never in the flow because of an injury, that really affects, and we're so young.
 We had some losses that hurt us.  Obviously the loss at Drake hurts, the loss at Arizona State hurts, the home loss to Northern Iowa.  Those were losses that they end up    if you get those back, now you're sitting here at 20 and 11, a little bit different scenario after finishing fourth in the Big Ten.
 We understand that, but all in all, I'm very pleased with what this group of guys were able to do.  They've been great to coach and a lot of fun to see how they've advanced during the course of the year.  Hopefully we'll be upset for a while, but we're not going to find anything out until Sunday evening.  So we'll probably take tomorrow off, practice Sunday, and then late Sunday afternoon into the evening we'll find out who we're playing.
 That's part of college basketball, you've got to move on.  We get beat at Penn State, we've got to turn around and beat a very good Illinois team.  We did that.  We beat a good Illinois team.  Got to turn around and play a good Purdue team, we lose.  We have to get up off the floor and try to get another win.

 Q.  This team looked like it grew up a lot between the middle of December and middle of February.  What was that?  Was it simply Tyler or are the young guys all in unison because you knew what you had in Adam?
 COACH STEVE ALFORD:  I give a lot of credit to Adam (Haluska).  There were a lot of question marks at the beginning of the year of just his leadership because he's such a great guy, and sometimes when you're in a leadership role there's times you've got to be a bad guy.
 That's what I'm most appreciative of.  I think the key was Adam's leadership.  You lose Jeff [Horner] and Bru [Greg Brunner] and Erek [Hansen] and Doug [Thomas] and Justin [Wieck], those were all guys that not only were getting to play, Justin wasn't getting to play a lot, but he's on our staff now, and he's just a kid that everybody respected, and that group was really respected.  Adam was that one guy coming back.
  (Henderson) was going to help but Mike's injury kind of slowed things.  So I think a big key was Adam.
 And then the Michigan game.  I don't know if they    they had nothing to build on because a lot of these guys weren't here last year.  They had nothing to build on for success away from Carver.  Now, I will give them credit, doing what they did at Carver against the competition we did it against was very impressive.  On the road they've struggled, but I think the Michigan game kind of turned them around and we were able to get them a win at Minnesota, play well at Wisconsin, play well on the road, so I think that was probably the turning point of the season, but I think Adam's ability to lead was a big key for us.

 Q.  I know you have the NIT, but talk a little bit about the future of this program in terms of Tyler.  You mentioned Justin a little bit.  Talk about going forward now.
 COACH STEVE ALFORD:  Well, I think our young guys are getting better.  Obviously there's some of them that didn't perform well tonight, but all in all, we got our entire front line back.  And all of our front line, really including Seth, was going through their first tournament experience here.  This was their first tournament experience.
 (Carl) Landry is a fifth year senior.  I mean, he understands what it's about and he understood about trying to get to the NCAA Tournament and having a chance to do that.  But I think having that whole front line, having a spring and summer and fall to work and continue to get better.
 You have David Palmer who's practiced with us all year, and he really gives us an inside presence that can score because he's got a great scoring mentality.  You have Jared Cole and Josh Crawford, who continue to develop.  So all of a sudden we go from being kind of an inexperienced front line to not only having experience but being big.  It'll be a big team.
 And we have to try to fill the void of Adam Haluska.  That's never easy, but I think you see Tony starting to emerge as a scorer.  I think Justin will score more, Tyler will be asked to score more, and then obviously we have some of these new guards coming in.  We're still out there I think trying to get another point guard.
 So I think all in all, we're pretty excited about that.  I'm probably most excited about the experience they've gotten so far this year and seeing how they're growing and maturing.  Now the trick is to try and get some postseason play out of them.  The more games we can play, the better, and that's something we've got to work on here once we find that out on Sunday.
 
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