Without Zach Edey, top-ranked Purdue basketball handles New Orleans

WEST LAFAYETTE – Playing without big man Zach Edey, top-ranked Purdue cruised past New Orleans 74-53 on Wednesday night at Mackey Arena.

Edey, the top candidate for national player of the year, sat out due to an illness.

The production from Caleb Furst, Mason Gillis and Trey Kaufman-Renn carried the Boilermakers to their 12th straight victory to start the season. Kaufman-Renn scored 17 of his season-high 24 points in the second half.

Purdue closed the first half on a 24-2 run, capped by a steal and dunk by Brandon Newman.

For the first time in program history, the Boilermakers played a home game as the nation’s No. 1 team. When Purdue was ranked No. 1 last season, it lost at Rutgers and beat North Carolina State in overtime in Brooklyn before falling from the top spot.

“From a program standpoint, it’s pretty cool,” coach Matt Painter said. “For me, from a selfish standpoint, the place I like it is recruiting because people now see back-to-back years you’ve been No. 1 in the country, first time in the Big Ten since 1976 with Indiana’s great run. That’s an amazing stat.”

PDF: Purdue-New Orleans statistics

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LIFE WITHOUT EDEY

What did the Boilermakers learn without the centerpiece of their offense on the floor for the first time this season?

Granted, the opponent was New Orleans, which had lost seven of its first 10 games before Wednesday and didn’t have a true big man to even match up with Furst, Kaufman-Renn and Gillis.

Still, the Boilermakers should gain valuable experience that can be used later in the season when Edey likely deals with foul trouble once Big Ten play resumes. That’s something Purdue hasn’t dealt with this season.

“You have natural times where your center gets into foul trouble and you’re to find your way through the game and you’ve got to have segments of the game where he’s not in,” Painter said. “This was a great game and a great experience.”

Without Edey, the Boilermakers didn’t have a natural rim protector and the team’s leading rebounder. Purdue still won the board battle, 24-18, and limited the Privateers to five offensive rebounds.

“We preach next man up all the time,” Gillis said. “If anybody gets injured, sick, COVID from a couple of years ago, we’ve learned its next man up.  You’ve got to be able to do your job and understand what the team needs from you to help.”

GILLIS IS BACK

No pun intended, but the New Castle native missed three games with a back injury and returned to action last week against Davidson in the Indy Classic. Gillis, though, returned to the starting lineup due to Edey’s absence.

While it was clear in the first half Gillis has recovered from his setback when he dove on the floor for a loose ball, the real sign came during Tuesday’s practice when he dunked over Furst during a drill.

“It’s happened a couple of times in the past year and not just on Caleb,” Gillis said, drawing laughter.

Although it was just three games, it’s been a long road back dealing with the ups and down of a back injury. But Gillis played like he was 100%, closing out on shooters and moving well on the offensive end.

He finished with 11 points, three rebounds, three assists and two steals in 31 minutes.

“If anybody has back problems, you understand it’s not fun to deal with, especially when there’s complications with it and things are great one day and two days later, I can barely walk,” Gillis said. “Dealing with that and working with our trainers, prehab and rehab and taking care of myself as much as I can. It gets exhausting but I have to do it to be able to play.”

EXTENDED MINUTES

Kaufman-Renn played 25 minutes, which isn’t his normal workload. But the redshirt freshman took full advantage of his time on the floor, scoring a season-high 24 points, hitting 8 of 10 from the field. Overall, Purdue made 20 of 26 field goals from 2-point range.

Kaufman-Renn’s footwork is superb. He came to Purdue already excelling in that area and continues to fine tune his moves around the basket.

“It’s natural,” he said. “Just getting the opportunity to work on it in practice whereas last year I didn’t get that as much. I get to play in games and see what works.”

It worked Wednesday.

And so did his free throw shooting. Kaufman-Renn made 8 of 10 from the line after converting just 6 of 14 in limited action during the first 11 games.

“He gets fouled eight times and you’re going to get into a flow,” Painter said. “He had a couple of games where he plays 8-10 minutes and you’re not going to get into a flow that way. Zach is a big piece of that.

“You see when he gets the ball and we run stuff for him, how dangerous he is. It was great to see. It was a great for his confidence.”