Big week ahead for #2 Purdue
By ZACH VOGT
ISL Contributor
The No. 1 ranked Purdue Boilermakers are off and running with a 2-0 start to the 2025-26 season with wins over Evansville and Oakland at Mackey Arena. This season was widely viewed as possibly the most anticipated season in the history of Purdue basketball – and for good reason.
Purdue came into the season ranked No. 1 in the preseason poll for the first time in program history. The Boilers returned a plethora of very important pieces from their Sweet 16 team a year ago, including National Player of the Year favorite Braden Smith and preseason All-American Trey Kaufman-Renn. Returners also include Fletcher Loyer, CJ Cox, Gicarri Harris, and Daniel Jacobsen. Head coach Matt Painter also had a very strong transfer portal class bringing in double-double machine Oscar Cluff, sharpshooter Liam Murphy, as well as bringing in highly touted overseas recruit Omer Mayer.
All of these exciting new additions and returning experience earned the Boilermakers the No. 1 spot in the preseason AP Top 25. Purdue is now two years removed from their first Final Four appearance in 44 years, when they fell to UConn in the 2024 National Championship Game. If you ask anybody within the Purdue program, there is one goal and one goal only when it comes to this season: to get back to the National Championship and see the confetti fall in black and gold this time around.
In keeping with what has become the new norm for Matt Painter and Purdue, the non-conference schedule is loaded. They will play Alabama, likely Texas Tech in the Bahamas, Auburn, Iowa State, Memphis and Marquette – all before the new year. Matt Painter adopted this approach in recent years after struggles in the NCAA Tournament, recognizing the need to face different styles of play early in the year against elite competition. The goal: to be better prepared for what they’ll encounter in March once Big Ten play is behind them. So far, it’s worked – Purdue has found more tournament success in recent years, much of it stemming from that early exposure to varied opponents.
Before entering the gauntlet of their non-conference schedule, Purdue opened up their campaign with two wins over Evansville and Oakland during the opening week of the season. They steamrolled the Aces with an 82-51 victory. Fletcher Loyer led the way Tuesday night with a career high in both points and three-pointers. He was 7/10 from deep in what was a truly special shooting display – the kind of performance Loyer is capable of doing every time he takes the floor.
Friday night told a bit of a different story when Oakland visited Mackey Arena. The Golden Grizzlies were coming off a 121-78 loss at Michigan in their opening game of the season, giving them some extra motivation to put together a more determined effort — and it showed. It was a struggle on the offensive side of the ball for Purdue in the first half as they generated many open looks but failed to convert many of them. Oakland hung around through tough shot-making and outworking the Boilers on the offensive glass and would have gone into halftime with a three-point lead if it wasn’t for a Liam Murphy three-pointer in the final seconds to tie it up at 35 at the break.
Purdue had a strong start to the second half behind the aggression of Braden Smith, who seemed determined not to let the Boilers suffer an excruciating early season upset. Smith finished the game with a near triple-double as he tallied 20 points, 9 assists, and 7 rebounds. His performance fueled a 52-point second half for the Boilers as they pulled away for an 87-77 win.
It was certainly a team performance that left a lot to be desired – but it’s always better to learn from an ugly win rather than an ugly loss. The win saw Purdue take a big hit in the latest KenPom rankings. When the Boilers woke up Friday morning they held the No. 1 spot; by night’s end, they had dropped all the way to seventh following the win over Oakland.
What’s next for Purdue?
Purdue fell to the second spot in the week 2 AP Poll.
A trip to Tuscaloosa awaits the second-ranked Boilers on Thursday. The match-up is the second leg of a home-and-home series with Alabama that began last year when the Crimson Tide visited Mackey Arena for an early-season showdown in which Purdue won 87-78. This year’s rematch is shaping up to be one of the most anticipated non-conference games of the season — not just for these two programs, but for all of college basketball.
Purdue will wrap up the week back at home Sunday night against Akron.
A lot of good in the opening week of the season for Purdue, and some bad. At the end of the day they are 2-0 with room to grow. The expectation is that they’ll continue to get better each week as the new pieces settle in.
A big week ahead.
