Here's what Purdue head coach Matt Painter said after the Boilermakers' 69-61 win over Penn State in the Big Ten Tournament quarterfinals. Read his full transcript, or just watch the attached video of the entire press conference.
Indianapolis, Ind. Purdue head coach Matt Painter and his boilermakers will advance to the semifinals of the Big Ten tournament with a 69-61 win over Penn State on Friday night.
Read Painter's full postgame transcript, or watch the attached video of the entire press conference.
Matt Painter: First of all, it was obviously a really good college basketball game. How they can do different things from a defensive point of view on their third day, I still don't know. I just asked him and I still don't understand what he said.
But the ability to mix and match things to try to keep us off balance was genius. I thought this is for our guys, just trying to simplify them and just go ahead and pass the ball so they don't try to overdo things. Then once we started doing that, we felt more open and better looking.
But they're a good team, and in your first year trying to keep things together it's really hard, especially when everyone is new to you. You can see how they strengthened our program and Penn State clearly earned a decent fare.
It's hard to go against them. I knew the game was going to start like this because we have double byes every year and it seems like people get to play a game or two and get into that second or third game. Looks like they have an advantage to begin with. I thought our guys were really flexible, thought they just hang in there, pretended, did a lot of cool things.
And maybe the player of the game for us was Brandon Newman. This is a great sign. it's very difficult. I told my guys in our locker room, we found a guy who I think would be an all-conference player for us at some point in his career. We have another guy who played eight, nine minutes that he's a really good player. It's hard, I want to start him and let him play the full 40 minutes. This is just not the way it works. It's part of making sacrifices and being on a great team.
But our men just stood there and worked hard, did a lot of little things and grinded it. I think it was a question for this team as the season went on, can we grind it out, and I think they proved in a neutral court that they can do that and not just outsource to someone can do.
> On Purdue's slow start...
Coach Matt Painter: Yeah, it's probably a combination of a lot of things. Just the fact that they've played some games doesn't always seem like they're more familiar with the surroundings, there are more familiar games, and they've made good plays. He had to make some shots there. Instead of the regular close-outs we had, a few guys flew over the shooters and they went away with two thirds of the kill.
We had a few good looks, but then we replaced it quickly. We had 10 turnovers in the game, but we probably had four of them in the first four, five minutes, if I'm not mistaken. So I guess it was just a combination of that. As Jaden said, we just had to settle into the game, but I think it was his playing well, playing already and we weren't giving ourselves a chance for some of those turnovers.
Q. On Brandon Newman...
Coach Matt Painter: Certainly, I think he's capable, he's on our team. You get and you play, you know, 20 games in a season and then someone who struggles in a role. I mean, last year we struggled in the same role after we dropped him from the starting lineup.
So are you better off as a team given the minutes he split with someone else? If you play 8 to 10 minutes, it's really hard to be functional. I prefer to give them in pieces rather than playing 8 to 10 minutes and subbing four times and having a hard time.
It doesn't circle around it. You want that as a player, you want it to circle around you. Now, when it revolves around you, like with Zach and Travian and Jaden, who fits in with those now. A lot of people who are close to those people will only look at it from the point of view of the person, they are not looking at it from the perspective of the team. So he just struggled in that role, but if he had played more roles and he was more of a focal point, he would have had more success.
But Sasha Stefanovic, Jaden, Ivy, they are very good players. You know, Carson and Dakota in that stretch. For two years, he was a starter for us, he would finish a few games for us, but he was probably the best. He could have played that role. And apparently he proved that he was a starter too and that he could play 30 minutes in that role as well. It was a small combination of having a large guard there guarding them as well. They turn you back down and they get to the rim and they do stuff and I think that really helped us. So obviously his ability - if he was going to play junk defense, then also his ability to make an open shot.
But he worked really hard. He used our men, used our coaches, he comes every single day, he gets extra lift, he shoots extra and that's how you play well. When you're disappointed, I told my people that apart from the best players on our team, I know how everyone feels. So for him to be able to come out and be productive, you have to tip your hat to him. It was a great performance and we can't have won that match without him.
Q. On Jaden Ivey...
Coach Matt Painter: When he gets in some of those plays, he's very quick, especially face-to-face, face-to-face. For most people all you really want is to get her out, you know, the numbers aren't. But he can go to the people to make up the numbers for himself.
I thought he was killed when he finally found the theft. He got hit again in the end and he just played through it. I always tried to make Carson Edwards put the brakes on those plays and he never listened to me. It was like walking through the third base coach sign, the stop sign, so I wouldn't even try that with Jaden.
But he creates a lot of drama right there and that was a huge drama. It was a huge game in the game to be able to get it into two possessions and get that stop. But he is a talented boy. When the ball is loose on the open court you need angles to play and sometimes he makes his own angles. He would be a really good free protection because just like he can track down people, he can be out of a play and back in a play.
Q. On Michigan State rivalry..
Coach Matt Painter: From our point of view, they're the ones who went to the Final Four and we didn't, so like they're the flagship event of our conference. That's how we've always seen it. If you want to be that team, you want to win our league, you want to advance to the NCAA tournament, you have to be able to compete with them and beat them. And apparently this year we didn't beat them. They were a better authority than us and now we get a chance to go back and compete with them again.
But no, we have a lot of respect for him, we just got a lot of respect for his program. They are blue collar. There is nothing cute in it. They're going to come to you, they're going to defend, they're going to play the right way. There is depth in them. He always has depth and you have to connect with him or they will embarrass you, so it will be a good Big Ten matchup, but we have to play better. We played really well in spurts. We have to be more consistent. We weren't very consistent when we played him for the first time and a lot of it was with him.
On preparing for a quick turnaround...
Coach Matt Painter: Just move on to the next game. It's great that we won. We are very lucky to have won. Penn State was great and we did a lot. We had 23 straight days without a day off. We also had the second longest stretch in our league. We had 16 days without a day off. We played a lot of 9:00 games this year.
We played a lot of guys going to the NCAA Tournament twice. Not all of them, but I think we probably had to play the most or second most than anyone in our league, so we're ready. But they are ready too. They go through a gauntlet of their own and everyone has that. So that's what this league does, but you still have to show up, you have to show up and play. And as I said before, we have to be more consistent.