The Three Pointer | Purdue (17-5; 9-2) vs. Iowa (13-8; 4-6)

The Boilers will travel to Iowa City to take on a dangerous Iowa team that has underperformed so far this season

Following their rivalry win against the Indiana Hoosiers, the Purdue Boilermakers will take to the road against the Iowa Hawkeyes in hopes of remaining just one game back of the Michigan State Spartans in the B1G regular season race. The Boilers were able to overcome a poor shooting and rebounding night to escape with the victory as Trey Kaufman-Renn hit a right hook with under 10 seconds remaining for the go-ahead points.

The Iowa Hawkeyes will enter this matchup without their best player Owen Freeman. It was announced on Monday that the sophomore big man, who was named co-B1G Freshman of the Year last season, would miss the rest of the season due to surgery on an injured hand/finger. The talented sophomore was averaging a team best 16.7 points and 6.7 rebounds while also adding in 1.8 blocks and shooting 31.3% from behind the arc. The Hawkeyes will rely more heavily on Payton Sandfort and Josh Dix, two talented guards, to pick up the scoring burden.

Purdue has consistently grown this season and that is evident from what they are getting from Braden Smith and TKR. Smith, recently named a finalist for the Bob Cousy Award for the nation’s best point guard, enjoyed a month that no other players this century had done by recording 150+ points, 80+ assists, and 25+ steals in a single month (via OptaStats). Not to be outdone, TKR has boosted himself into All B1G and All American status by averaging 18.4 points, 6.2 rebounds, 2.4 assists, and shooting 60.4% from the field overall. The two were also recently named to the mid-season Oscar Robertson Award Watch List for the nation’s best player.

Let’s jump into ‘The Three Pointer.’

1 | Get Into the Paint and Score

Gene Keady said long ago that it wasn’t about who you played but more about when you play them. Purdue fans can strongly say that is a positive about playing Maryland earlier in the season along with Rutgers as those young players seem to really be figuring things out. The same can be said about an Iowa team that just lost their best player, Owen Freeman, who will be missing the rest of the season due injury/surgery.

Freeman was one of the best freshman in the country and shared the B1G Freshman of the Year award with Mackenzi Mgbako (Indiana Hoosiers) and was seemingly well on his way to a first or second team B1G selection. Instead, a Hawkeyes team that has struggled all season with stopping opponents from scoring inside the paint will have to do so without their best interior defender.

Enter Purdue’s dynamic duo of Trey Kaufman-Renn and Braden Smith. The two have been stellar in their junior seasons as Smith ranks fourth and TKR seventh in the Kenpom National Player of the Year rankings (Cooper Flagg and Johni Broome are a distant first and second). TKR has flashed an incredible array of post moves with his back to the basket and shown, however infrequently, that he can face up to the basket and challenge slower defenders from the wing as well.

Smith, on the other hand, has shown some struggles from behind the arc the last several games going just 5/25 (20%) over the last seven games. He isn’t forcing those shots and they are largely coming within the flow of the offense or in transition, but he needs to be hitting those shots for the Boilers moving forward. That being said, he has started to attack the interior of the defense with more intent to score as evidenced by what we saw him do to the Hoosiers. His ability to snake through a defense and get himself into scoring position places so much stress on opposing defenses and when you combine that with a player like TKR who can catch and score or spray passes to the perimeter, it makes it incredibly difficult to stop. It would be helpful if Heide and Colvin could cut to the rim and finish when Smith is able to do that to open up the arc for Loyer, Harris, and Cox more.

2 | Stay Out of Foul Trouble

The one thing that can really hamper Purdue’s success that has flared up in the last several weeks has been foul trouble to some of their most important players. Those issues from CJ Cox are somewhat expected as the freshman adjusts to the physical nature of the B1G while also trying to figure out how officials are going to change from game to game. He struggled with some foul issues that saw him to the bench early in games when discretion would have been better served.

The same kind of understanding can’t be extended to veterans like Smith and TKR who have to be on the floor as much as possible for Purdue to be successful. In the last five games, TKR has struggled with foul troubles as he has had 4 personal fouls in three of them (Indiana, Ohio State, Washington). It hasn’t hurt his production in that span of time as he has averaged 21.2 points but his foul issues in the last two games has limited him to below his season average in minutes by almost 4 and 6 minutes.

There will be times where both players will need to forfeit a foul to stave off momentum or not give up an easy bucket, but those should largely come in the second half only. The silly fouls, like TKR’s two moving screen calls against Indiana simply can’t happen (although you could argue some responsibility for those fouls can be placed on Smith coming off those screens and not allowing TKR to get fully set). When both Smith and TKR are on the floor together, the offense simply works better as the two have seemingly continued to grow in their understandings of how to play off one another in a similar manner as to how Smith and Edey did two seasons ago.

3 | Challenge Iowa’s Three Point Shooters & Force Them Into Contested Midrange Jumpers

Without Owen Freeman, the Hawkeyes lack a true interior scoring threat and may try to spread the Boilermakers out. That likely plays into Purdue’s hands a bit more this season than in years past with how interchangeable their bigs are in TKR, Furst, Burgess, and even Heide to switch. The issue is Iowa continues to have one of the best offenses in the country under Fran McCaffrey and they can score at all levels. So what can the Boilers do?

Well, they need to just continue doing what they have grown to do better and better as the season has progressed: jump into passing lanes to tip passes and cause turnovers while forcing their opponent into contested mid range jump shots. Painter has become somewhat of an analytical savant over the last several years and statistically speaking the midrange jumper is the worst shot in basketball. For Purdue, that tends to be a strength when you have guys like Braden Smith, Fletcher Loyer, CJ Cox, and TKR who have shown a high ability to hit those shots. For most other teams, its just a difficult task to be consistent in that regard.

Against the Hoosiers, the Boilers really struggled to keep Galloway from getting inside and then really making it difficult for him. He nearly beat the Boilers himself late in the second half by finding open shooters (mostly Mgbako) and being able to get himself into positions to score by getting inside of 10 feet. Purdue wants to force those decisions and shot attempts from 12-18 feet where lanes are easier to close and shots come at a distance that are just harder to convert.

Iowa will still feature six high level shooters from behind the arc that play regularly in Josh Dix (45.2%), Drew Thelwell (43.1%), Ladji Dembele (39.1%), Pryce Sandfort (38.7%), Brock Harding (38.5%), and Payton Sandfort (34.2%). Against a team like this, you have to force some bad decisions and make them inefficient, especially a player like …..

And 1 | Limit Payton Sandfort’s Effectiveness by Making Him Inefficient

… Payton Sandfort. With Owen Freeman out, it is likely that the Hawkeyes are going to put the ball in his hands to score and make things happen for his teammates even more. A 6’8 forward who really plays more like a guard, Sandfort is going to lean more heavily on shots from behind the arc as he has taken more threes than shots inside the arc in eight of the ten B1G games for Iowa.

Sandfort is a tough guard for Purdue’s starting five but the first to likely draw the assignment is going to be Caleb Furst with Cam Heide, Gicarri Harris, and Myles Colvin all adding to it at some point. Boilermaker defenders will need to close our hard with their hands up to prevent the tall Sandfort from shooting over the top of them. He struggles a bit with putting the ball on the floor and Purdue will need to keep his length out of the lane to create shots for others, but making him take 20+ shots to get to his average with Freeman out of the game is a way to make Iowa’s offense struggle.

Sandfort can be a bit hot and cold but when he does get hot, watch out…

Players to Watch:

Payton Sandfort | Forward | 6’8 215 | Senior | 16.0pts, 5.7reb, 2.9ast, 34.2% 3pt

A 6’8 forward who can do a bit of everything, Sandfort is now the total focus of the Hawkeye offense with Owen Freeman out for the rest of the season. What kind of pressure does that put on him and how is the Iowa offense going to adjust? Sandfort is going to shoulder a lot more than he already has and Purdue will have to work to make him inefficient as possible because he is going to get his points.

Josh Dix | Guard | 6’6 210 | Junior | 13.3pts, 3.1reb, 3.0ast, 45.2% 3pt

One of the B1G’s best shooters, Dix has made a significant jump from his first two seasons to his junior one. Averaging 8.9 points last year, the jump to 13.3 will likely see more of an increase with Freeman out and Iowa needing more scorers to emerge. Loyer will likely start on defense of Dix but Colvin and Harris likely will take turns on the bigger bodied guard. His length can be a problem on the defensive end for opposing guards so don’t be surprised if they see if he can neutralize Braden Smith (Smith can likely get around him easily).

Drew Thelwell | Guard | 6’3 195 | Grad | 10.7pts, 2.4reb, 3.1ast, 2.0 stl, 43.1% 3pt

The Morehead State transfer, Thelwell played the Boilers last season in Mackey where he had 8 points and 3 rebounds. Thelwell’s shooting will be needed even more with Freeman out and the emergence of another scorer needed. Thelwell likely will be defended by CJ Cox or Smith but is likely dependent on who Iowa has as their primary ball handler (that is typically Cox’s assignment).

Prediction:

Had Iowa had Owen Freeman, I would be very cautious to give this one to Purdue. Iowa is one of those teams that can suddenly get hot from behind the arc and then there is very little you can do except warm the bus up and get home as quick as possible. Even with Freeman, Iowa has been one of the worst interior defensive teams in the country and the worst defensive team overall in the conference (and it’s not particularly close).

Iowa doesn’t have the guards that can handle Smith and they certainly don’t have the interior players to defend TKR on the short roll or when he gets one on one post up opportunities (I’d argue I’d like to see TKR in most opportunities to face up to defenders to simply give opponents more to look at when preparing).

This is a game where it is going to test Purdue’s ability to focus on the scouting report and not allow an opponent to play to their own strengths. Purdue doesn’t want Iowa to get out into transition and be put into poor defensive situations where they are scrambling to locate shooters. If that’s the case, Iowa’s Payton Sandfort and Josh Dix can and will put up big offensive numbers and can beat Purdue.

The Boilers will have every opportunity to get their conference record to 10-2 while Michigan State will have their first game on their west coast swing at UCLA. By the time the Boilers land from their trip to Iowa, they could potentially find themselves with a half game lead over the Spartans in the quest for their third consecutive B1G Title. That can’t happen though, without a victory against the Hawkeyes. Every game is difficult in the B1G and in Iowa will be no different.

Boilers: 78
Hawkeyes: 73