Purdue Passes IU on NCAA All-Time Victory List

Last week’s 81-76 victory against Indiana inside Mackey Arena was historical for the Purdue men’s basketball program.

Already the winningest school in Big Ten Conference games only (1,047-712), the seventh-ranked Boilermakers moved past the Hoosiers into 10^th place on the NCAA’s all-time wins list with 1,946. Victory No. 1,947 came Tuesday night, a 90-81 triumph at Iowa that put Purdue atop the conference standings.

Even the most casual fan could probably name the schools in the top five, maybe not in order though. Kansas (2,433) has a healthy lead on No. 2 Kentucky (2,413). The chasm is wider between bitter rivals North Carolina (2,385) and Duke (2,319) for third place. UCLA, which started playing basketball 22 years after Kansas’ first game in 1898, is fifth with 2,018 victories.

The second five is not as easy to guess. Temple has taken advantage of a below average season by Syracuse to move past the Orange (2,003) into sixth place with 2,007 victories.

It may come as a surprise to Purdue and Indiana fans but neither program is the state’s winningest. Notre Dame holds that distinction with 1,973 victories.

St. John’s has a comfortable margin over Purdue and Indiana for ninth place with 1,961 victories.

The Boilermakers have climbed the NCAA victory list thanks in part to their record against ranked teams since the start of the 2021-22 season. Nobody in the nation has been better than Purdue, which has gone 23-9 against the Top 25.

Coach Matt Painter is now 22-12 all-time against Indiana, aided by winning 16 of the last 20 matchups with the Hoosiers. Purdue is 9-1 against Indiana in the last 10 meetings at West Lafayette.

While it is still early to be looking at mock NCAA tournament seedings, Purdue’s 11 Quad 1-2 victories this season only trails Auburn and Alabama, which have 13 each. One nationally known bracketologist had the Boilermakers as the highest No. 2 seed in his latest projections.

Maybe one of these days, Purdue will shed its national reputation as a “plodding offense.” Painter’s shift from a defensive emphasis inherited from his mentor, Gene Keady, to a faster paced offense coincides with some of the Boilermakers’ greatest success in recent years.

When scoring at least 80 points, Purdue is 104-3 since the start of the 2017-18 season. Carsen Edwards sparked the scoring surge with season averages of 18.5 and 24.3 points as a sophomore and junior. Then came Jaden Ivey’s 17.3 sophomore season in 2021-22, which enabled him to become an NBA Draft lottery pick. Zach Edey posted scoring averages of 22.3 and a nation’s-best 25.2 points per game on his way to back-to-back National Player of the Year awards.

This season, it’s been the three-headed attack of Trey Kaufman-Renn (18.7 ppg.), Braden Smith (16.4) and Fletcher Loyer (13.8). Smith lit up Iowa on Tuesday night with 31 points, while Kaufman-Renn put up 25 in his continuing bid to join Smith as a first-team All-Big Ten performer.

Kaufman-Renn and Smith were announced this week as semifinalists for the Oscar Robertson Trophy, presented to the nation’s best player by the United States Basketball Writers Association.

To no one’s surprise, Smith also is one of 10 semifinalists for the Bob Cousy Award given to the nation’s top point guard. As of now, odds are that Smith will join Carsen Edwards (Jerry West for best shooting guard) and Edey (two-time Kareem Abdul-Jabbar top center) as major award winners in April.

Smith is on pace to become the first player since California’s Jason Kidd in 1993-94 to average at least 15 points, 8 assists, 4.5 rebounds and 2.5 steals per game.

Smith’s defensive effort against Michigan and Indiana helped Purdue record its first back-to-back 20 turnover games in Big Ten play since 2008 against Indiana and Minnesota.

Forty and counting

New Purdue football coach Barry Odom is no stranger to rebuilding projects.

The largest Boilermaker recruiting class in recent memory is going to have to be the foundation of any effort to recover from last season’s 1-11 disaster.

“The 40 young men we’ve signed … since things have changed in recruiting with transfers and portal and high school recruiting, what is the right number?” Odom said Wednesday on National Signing Day. “I think anyone who has studied what roster management looks like, the recruiting trends, I think those numbers are going to remain consistent as we go forward, 40 and 40-plus.

“Over the last two cycles that I was a part of before this (at UNLV), we signed 50 and before that 55. The ability to adapt, the ability to roster manage is so vitally important to the health of a program.”

Odom emphasized that Purdue will continue to recruit and develop high school players. But he added that recruiting isn’t completed for the 2025 season.

“We’ll be really aggressive in the next portal window,” said Odom of the 10-day period in April. “We still have a number of spots of need.”

With just one returning starter on each side of the ball (running back Devin Mockobee and linebacker Hudson Miller) thanks to transfers, one could argue that every position is one of need.

The most important one, quarterback, will be one to watch when spring practice begins in March. It is hoped that either sophomore Malachi Singleton (Arkansas), redshirt freshman EJ Colson (UCF), redshirt freshman Evans Chuba (Washington State) or true freshman Garyt Odom, the coach’s son, will establish himself as the unquestioned starter.

Seven of the 29 transfers to sign with Purdue followed Odom from Las Vegas. One is possibly the largest tight end in school history, 6-8, 290-pound Christian Earls. Another former UNLV heavyweight is offensive lineman Jalen St. John, who casts a giant shadow at 6-5, 330.

Fifteen of the transfers are seniors, three are juniors, five are sophomores and six are redshirt freshmen.

Purdue football legend turns 80

Bob Griese celebrated his 80^th birthday on Feb. 3, and Sports Collectors Daily honored the former Purdue All-American’s milestone by listing eight of his most collected appearances on football cards.

My card collection includes just four of these Griese cards: his first Topps issue in 1968, a 1970 Kellogg’s 3D card, a 1971 Topps “game card,” and his 1972 Topps All-Pro card.

I’ve never seen his 1967 Royal Castle card, featuring a posed Griese inside Ross-Ade Stadium. Royal Castle was a South Florida hamburger chain that at one time had 185 restaurants in the Miami region.

The other Griese cards on the Sports Collectors Daily list were a 1975 Wonder Bread issue, his 1977 Topps card and a 1978 card manufactured by Topps but placed into bags of Holsum Bread.

Kenny Thompson is the former sports editor for the Lafayette Journal & Courier and an award-winning journalist. He has covered Purdue athletics for many years.