Boilermakers Roll; Hope Speaks At Halftime

Purdue won its second and final preseason tuneup tonight, 74-52, and, frustratingly, nothing is available online about it. Fortunately, though, regular reader Paul (Irish Cowboy) has been deputized to provide you with better than a lazy media recap. Paul was there and he'll make you feel like you were, too. Take it away, Paul....

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Well, let's just say our shooting suffered from a case of the Mondays. Granted, I can see why Kentucky Wesleyan has won a couple of DII titles, because they certainly played hard, played well, and played some pretty good defense. But in the end, we have better, bigger players. Here's my thoughts, numbered for some reason:

1. Patrick Bade looked much more comfortable, to the tune of 12 points comfortable. He didn't really force anything (except one attempted dunk near the end of the game) and played ok defense.


2. My roommate, for whom this was the first look at the new Boilers, thought that DJ Byrd was a sophomore. 'Nuff said.


3. John Hart came in and tried to rush and force things for a while, but then settled down a little bit and hit a three. He also had a dominating block on a fast break.


4. You heard it here first, Wohlford might be the new 'bobby buckets'. He plays very hard, plays great defense, and though I can't recall him taking a shot in a game, when he's shooting around before the game/at the half I can't recall him missing a three either.


5. Chin-up Kelsey Barlow, you're the future. He looked like he knew this was his last shot for a while and tried to play very hard, but ended up fouling out. I still love his size and athleticism.


6. JJ rebounded pretty well, but he still tried that silly shot with one foot behind the three-point line. He did drain his two 15-footers though. Overall I think the team rebounded better.


7. Chris Kramer scoring alert! A friend in the know says Kramer shot 500 three's a day over the summer. Took one attempt from three tonight and nailed it.


8. Speaking of scoring, somebody was praying that Ryne Smith would shoot his way out of this slump... ask and ye shall receive. He had 2 or 3 three's and another bucket to go with some pretty good defense.


9. KG and Kramer had a 4 minute span where they hustled and hounded and were basically migranes for the opposition as far as perimeter defense goes. It was very impressive.


10. We started off slow shooting-wise, but let's please not make that a trend like it was last year.


11. Oh yeah, that Rob Hummel dude, he can play some ball.
    

Once again, KWU certainly were no slouches so not hanging tons of points isn't necessarily too worrying, but I just hope Friday we come out hot and ready to start the season on a roll!

A football note: Coach Hope came out at halftime and talked to the audience (Video here -Ed.) and told them that he's got 21 seniors on a football team that has played very hard and that we should all be very proud of who are playing their last game in Ross-Ade Stadium this Saturday. He wants you all to be there. He says that the win on senior day this Saturday puts us in position to win again and make into contention for a bowl game. He thanked the students for their support more than once. Coach Hope is awesome, etc etc.

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Thanks, Paul! We really appreciate the assistance and thorough reporting. I also love the idea of Chris Kramer taking 500 threes a day over the summer.....and then hoisting up one, hitting it, and going, "Yep, that's enough. Don't want to go too wild."

Everything begins for real Friday night.

Choo-choo, muthas!

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UPDATE

Reader Nate checks in with this rather awesome report. Not sure if anyone else paid for the broadcast and heard this:

"I was stupid enough to purchase the broadcast so that I could get a look at our freshman players. So I shelled out my $2.99 and logged in about 10-15 minutes early to make sure it would work. The broadcast loaded up right away with static shots of the crowd and of the cheerleaders. Shortly after the video came up, you could hear the announcers (the radio broadcast guys - Larry "the drunk" Clisby and some other guy) chit chatting. They didn't realize they were on air at the time. The talked about which freshman they liked for the year and then, in a spot of total awesomeness, the cameras cut to the cheerleaders and one of the announcers says something along the lines of "not much to look at on the cheerleading squad this year" and the other guy responds with "yeah, that's definitely the second team". About five minutes later they realized that their mikes were open and said, "I hope these mikes weren't on for a long time". Then later in actual game action coming out of a timeout, someone must have told them that their comments were aired because their aired some half assed apology. The first guy says, "I hope we didn't offend anyone on the cheerleading squad, they are a skilled bunch" and the second guy says that he was glad he didn't say anything negative. It was pretty funny. "

Nate also had the following observations on the game itself:

• Hummel looked unreal and hit everything and rebounded like crazy
• the refs called a ton of charges under the basket
• the announcers mentioned that JuJuan Johnson worked out with Paul Pierce over the summer. I hadn't read that anywhere yet this year so it was cool to hear.
• Smooge looked a little off shooting the ball and clanged a lot of shots
• Ryne Smith was still too tentative shooting the ball. His defense is starting to look better though as he's not totally out of control.
• Someone on Kentucky Wesleyan fouled Smooge hard on a drive to the basket and it got chippy for a bit as Smooge shoved the guy back.

Thanks, Nate!