IU men’s basketball head coach Archie Miller said that his team’s game against in-state rival Purdue was going to come down to hitting open shots during a press conference Wednesday. He was right.
The Hoosiers couldn’t hit shots, especially the most wide-open ones — free throws. IU men’s basketball suffered its eighth consecutive loss to Purdue on Thursday, falling 81-69.
This means the Hoosiers didn’t beat the Boilermakers during the entirety of Donald Trump’s presidency. In fact, Miller has yet to beat Purdue as IU’s head coach.
“I give Purdue credit,” Miller said. “I thought they played with edge, with a lot of confidence, and shot the ball extremely well. We did not have an answer offensively and we played poor on defense.”
Related: [IU men’s basketball faces familiar problems against Purdue]
Sophomore forward Trayce Jackson-Davis said Wednesday that losing to Purdue was a tradition he didn’t want to continue. He didn’t want the freshmen to feel what it was like to lose to Purdue.
“It is not a fun thing, losing to a team that many times in a row,” sophomore guard Armaan Franklin said. “It gets kind of old. We want to be the team to change the culture about it, rewrite the story. We wanted to do that tonight, but unfortunately, we did not make enough plays.”
Miller said the key to this game was making sure his team controlled what they could, and making shots was a huge part of that.
In a game full of fouls — 51 total — IU didn’t capitalize on its free throw opportunities. The team made just 16 of 29 free throws, shooting a mere 55.2% on those uncontested shots.
When it came to contested looks, IU still struggled. The Hoosiers attempted 57 shots from the field, but only 25 of them went in.
Miller said offense is hard to control when shots don’t fall, so they needed to stay in the game on the defensive end of the floor.
But they couldn’t do that either. Purdue came out hot to start the game, especially from 3-point range. The Boilermakers made seven of nine 3-point attempts in the first half alone.
“At the end of the day we could just not get stops,” Miller said. “They made shots. They made a lot of them.”
While closing out on the perimeter was an issue, the Hoosiers also found themselves in a lot of mismatch situations in the paint. IU’s guards ended up having to defend Purdue forwards Trevion Williams and Zach Edey, and most of the time, they shot right over them.
Miller said because of Purdue’s solid start, they got comfortable and played with confidence the rest of the game. IU led for just more than a minute the whole game at the start of the first half, and the team was never able to regain the lead.
“We had no real answer defensively,” Miller said. “They could pretty much do what they wanted to do. We had no answer.”
And just when it felt like the Hoosiers were back in the game, they couldn’t get a stop on defense to give themselves a chance to take the lead.
Although Miller talked about not having the same kind of crowd due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Hoosiers still fed off the energy from family members and their bench.
The energy, however, wasn’t enough to stop Purdue’s runs. The Boilermakers shot incredibly well, shooting nearly 65% from 3-point range.
IU cut the deficit to just 1 point at the 13:12 mark in the second half when Franklin hit a jumper in his first game back after rolling his ankle.
After that point though, Purdue outscored IU 31-20 in the final 13 minutes. Miller wanted his team to push the tempo and play spontaneously, but the rushed pace just ended possessions in turnovers or bad looks at the basket. Purdue scored 9 points off of IU turnovers.
“We had no real answer defensively,” Miller said. “They could pretty much do what they wanted to do. We had no answer.”
IU will have a week off now after its game against Michigan State was postponed due to COVID-19 cases within the Spartans’ program. Miller said this break comes at a good time so his team will have a few extra days to get ready for No. 5 Iowa.
“Every team right now is going through it,” Miller said. “It is a mental grind with very few times off. The testing, the practices, the games, we had three games in seven days last week.”
