Purdue 83, Iowa 73: ice cold in Iowa City

The Purdue Boilermakers shot a damn-near spotless 61 percent from the floor and 59 percent from deep en route to a convincing 83-73 win over your Iowa Hawkeyes.

It was looking pretty dire for more than a few moments for Iowa. Keegan Murray committed his second foul with just over 11 minutes to go in the first half, and wouldn’t see the court until after the frame. Jaden Ivey answered with an easy layup to make it 21-9 bad guys and things seemed pretty deflated.

Thankfully, Kris Murray and Payton Sandfort were able to keep Iowa’s head just above water. Sandfort hit a 3 to bring Iowa back to within 10—the Hawkeyes were 1-11 from deep before his connection.

Purdue closed out the half riding Ivey and Trevion Williams to amass a 48-33 lead at the break.

About 30 seconds into the second 20 minutes, Filip Rebraca tweaked his ankle, bringing in Kris to get his minutes. Eric Hunter slammed a 2 to give Purdue a 17-point lead, Pat McCaffery nailed a 2, and Sasha Stefanovic made his millionth three to put Iowa in an 18-point hole.

The Hawkeyes then amassed an 11-0 run, with help from deep via Keegan and Jordan Bohannon, and spotless visits to the line from Kris.

Kris eventually made it a 4-point game after a stripey shot from deep.

Ivey then made threes on consecutive possessions, but Keegan answered with a tre of his own. Joe Toussaint drew Purdue’s seventh foul with just over 10 minutes to go, and the candle still flickered for the Hawkeyes after he made both his shots to bring it 66-60 bad guys.

Needing a breather, Kris was eventually replaced with Rebraca at the under-4 timeout.

Isaiah Thompson then posted seven straight points for the Boilers, ending his night with 18 points, a career high.

A field goal drought that surpassed three minutes doomed Iowa and its imperfect press, leaving the horses to sleep out of the barn.

The rest

• Once again, the Murray’s need to play together more.
• The only counter to that is, Pat is really having himself a nice season. He had a clean 11 points and 4 boards, but that’s still not better than Kris’ 23 points in 24 minutes.
• This is the first time in my 12 years of Iowa fandom where the Hawkeyes haven’t had a reliable deep threat. They shot 8-27 from deep.
• Purdue, meanwhile, was sex from range, shooting 13-22, including a 3-4 effort from Ivey and 4-6 from Thompson.
• The turnover bug almost bit Purdue, with 15 giveaways compared to Iowa’s 9.
• Iowa was 17-18 from the charity stripe, while Purdue was just 10-22. The Hawkeyes aren’t good enough in transition right now to lean so heavily on the easy shots, while Purdue... doesn’t really need them.
• The TV crew said there were 20 NBA scouts in attendance tonight. I can’t remember ever hearing about a scout visiting Carver, let alone 20 of ‘em.