How Purdue, Zach Edey beat 3 top teams in 3 days to win Maui Invitational title
HONOLULU — Matt Painter has a system that is uniquely Purdue , built around finding a giant with some touch and figuring out ways to get that man the ball.
Painter found and developed the most unguardable player in college basketball in Zach Edey , but the truth is that it’s not easy to play against him and sometimes it’s hard to play with him. What everyone remembers about the loss to No. 16 seed Fairleigh Dickinson is that Purdue went 5-of-26 from 3 and had 16 turnovers, but sometimes that’ll happen when the goal of every possession is to get one man the ball. Here at the Maui Invitational, Kansas had an All-America candidate in Kevin McCullar Jr. turn the ball over 18 times in three games, most of those the result of trying to force-feed big man Hunter Dickinson .
Fairleigh Dickinson was the smallest team in college basketball, so it made sense to try to jam the ball into the 7-foot-4 guy, but that’s not the easiest thing when he’s constantly surrounded by bodies.
Purdue will be judged this season by what happens in March and April, so every moment until then is seen through the lens of whether this team could be different or the inevitable is bound to happen again.
The Boilermakers made their first big statement this week by beating three top 11 teams on their way to the Maui Invitational title, finishing it off with Wednesday’s 78-75 win over No. 4 Marquette. Purdue will be No. 1 when the polls are released on Monday, but that’s no different than a year ago when it looked like the best team in America after winning the Phil Knight Legacy. Watch closely though, and you can see differences.
Marquette had a bold strategy against Edey and sophomore point guard Braden Smith . The Golden Eagles decided to switch ball screens, willing to put big man Oso Ighodaro on Smith or Lance Jones and then live with a guard on Edey, often bringing a second defender over to bracket him from behind and discourage post entries.
On the catch, Marquette brought double teams and forced Edey into five first-half turnovers.
It worked early, but Purdue has grown in its ability to adapt. Purdue scored 11 points by finding the off-ball double-teamer’s man, something that was a struggle in that FDU game.
“You gotta be patient there,” Painter said. “Gotta be patient and move the ball and move your bodies. A lot of times our guys will stand. And you just don’t want to be four around one.”
What Painter needed this year was more pitches in his arsenal. One huge plus during the Maui run was Jones, Purdue’s lone transfer addition, attacking in transition. Painter needed another ballhandler and someone with speed, and Jones has delivered. Freshmen Camden Heide and Myles Colvin have also brought an element of athleticism off the bench.
The other truth is that as long as Purdue can hang in games against elite teams early, the game is going to change once Edey inevitably gets the other team in foul trouble. Edey is drawing 10.4 fouls per 40 minutes this season — up from 7.0 per 40 last year — and the biggest play of the game on Wednesday was when Ighodaro committed his second foul five minutes and 23 seconds in.
Marquette outscored Purdue by one in Ighodaro’s eight first-half minutes, but Purdue led by 12 at half.
It wasn’t just Ighodaro’s minutes; it was how Marquette’s bigs played once in foul trouble. When Edey was guarded on post-ups by a Marquette big with less than two fouls, he was 0-of-2 from the field, had a turnover on a travel and drew one foul. The Golden Eagles guards also succeeded in forcing him to catch further from the basket, and he missed both his field-goal attempts shooting over the much smaller defenders. But when posting up Marquette’s three bigs after each one had at least two fouls, Edey scored 14 points of his game-high 28 points and missed just two shots.
“A lot of times when guys have foul trouble,” Edey said, “they’re not going to fight you as hard for those catches. They’re not going to fight you as hard for that position. So it makes my life easier.”
Watch the fight — or lack of — when Ighodaro played with two fouls in the first half and tried to avoid his third.
“There’s no question it was the difference,” Painter said of Marquette’s foul trouble.
Edey struggled to guard Ighodaro, who finished with 16 points on 8-of-10 shooting. Marquette was a plus-10 with him in the game, but he only played 26 minutes. That’s the power of Edey. This entire tournament, opposing bigs seemed to be battling just to stay on the floor.
The other advantage working in Purdue’s favor this season is time. Painter’s core returned and is older. Time allows a team to learn each other, and players just improve.
And no longer is there just one star on the roster. No longer is everything built around Edey.
Smith proved himself to be one of the best point guards in the country this week, outplaying Gonzaga star point guard Ryan Nembhard in the opening round and basically playing Marquette preseason All-American Tyler Kolek to a wash in the final.
A couple of years ago Painter was trying his best to run offense without ball screens because he didn’t want to be like everyone else.
Now?
“Think about all of our pick-and-roll stuff,” Painter said with excitement as he discussed his team and its style on his way out of the arena on Wednesday. “Gets our two best players involved.”
Painter spent the spring trying to convince Smith to be more aggressive out of ball screens because it would change how teams had to guard the Boilers. He’s delivered so far, burning drop coverage with pull-up jumpers and getting to the rim anytime there’s indecision and he sees a lane.
Defenses get so preoccupied with what to do with Edey when he comes out of the screen that sometimes Smith has a runway to the basket.
And Smith knows how to bend a defense to create a passing lane to feed the big fella.
Painter was reminded of the time when he held a disdain for the ball screen. “Didn’t have him,” he said of Smith, and smiled. “It’s your personnel, right?”
All that really worked effectively for Marquette was forcing turnovers — Purdue had 15. Purdue shot it well — 10-of-21 from 3 — and when it finally missed, Edey dominated the offensive glass. His ability to get to the front of the rim and clean up any miss is sometimes Purdue’s best offense, which is why Painter is encouraged that he has more guys who can get into the paint and force help.
“People don’t like to get disconnected from Zach,” Painter said, “so the more you have penetrating dribbles and get in there, they worry about it.”
The Boilermakers had 20 second-chance points, including the biggest bucket of the game. Marquette played a near-perfect defensive possession in the final minute, only to see Edey tip in Smith’s missed jumper that he got off just before the shot-clock buzzer.
“They can’t make shots and Edey get going and then also have offensive rebounds,” Marquette coach Shaka Smart said. “Easier said than done.”
There are still reasons to worry for the Boilers, especially when March comes and they eventually face a team like Marquette. The Golden Eagles were a bad matchup when Purdue was on the defensive end because of the ability to get Edey defending in space. Marquette had success getting what it wanted, and the game could have swung had a few more 3s fallen — the Golden Eagles were 5-of-17 from deep — or if Jones hadn’t hit a 70-footer at the first-half buzzer or if Ighodaro hadn’t picked up his second so early. Adding to the frustration: That second foul wasn’t even against Edey. Ighodaro got it up hedging a ball screen far from the basket.
Marquette is one of the handful of teams that looks good enough to win a national title this year — the Golden Eagles, remember, hammered No. 1 Kansas in the semis — but this is the predicament for any team trying to beat Purdue: It’s nearly impossible to avoid foul trouble against Edey.
It’s those advantages that had Painter excitedly talking about all the ways this team can score and how it can get better playing around Edey. Sure, everything feels like a precursor to March for the Boilermakers, but they should take pride in what they accomplished this week. Winning the tournament in Honolulu with that field, one could argue, was harder than getting to a Final Four.
Most will not believe Purdue can get there until it does. But it’s going to be hard to come up with new, innovative ways to defend Edey. He has more help now. Just like when Virginia went from losing to UMBC to winning a national title in 2019, we’re witnessing progress.
(Photo: Darryl Omui / )
