The No. 12 Purdue Boilermakers fell to a disappointing 72-67 loss to the Indiana Hoosiers at Bloomington Assembly Hall on Tuesday evening to continue their run of bad form. The Boilermakers have now tumbled from No. 4 in the AP Top 25 Poll to outside the top 10 in a week.
Matt Painter’s team has now lost its last three games, including last week’s defeat to the No. 9 Illinois Fighting Illini at Mackey Arena and a narrow loss to the UCLA Bruins on the road.
Purdue Continues Worrying Slump
The Boilermakers led 23-19 in the first half, before being outscored 21-6 by the Hoosiers to trail 40-29 at halftime. The first half was characterized by Indiana being first to loose balls and rebounding better than Purdue, who turned the ball over seven times, while going 7-of-15 from the free throw line in the game.
The Boilermakers’ defense is creakin’, and they allowed the Hoosiers to shoot 48.1% from the field and 35% from deep. Similarly, last week they let the Fighting Illini shoot 48.2% from the field and 47.4% from deep, exposing the team’s Achilles’ heel.
During his postgame news conference, Painter did not mince his words about his team’s woeful performance in Bloomington.
“It gets frustrating, I’ll be frank with you. We’ve got too good of a team…We’ve got to find some guys that will do it for 40 minutes,” Painter said. “We’ve got to have some guys with better resolve to be able to counter that, and we didn’t. It’s part of competition.”
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“We have to have a better focus and understanding, and defending and understand what they’re trying to run. Who the hell has the ball? Who am I guarding? Am I in this gap and getting back? Am I in this gap, stopping the ball like, things we work on every single day,” Painter added.
Purdue’s slate doesn’t get any easier with clashes against the Maryland Terrapins, No. 5 Nebraska Cornhuskers, No. 3 Michigan Wolverines, and No. 7 Michigan State Spartans still on the horizon.
The Boilermakers no longer have their Big Ten fate in their hands, with the Wolverines and the Cornhuskers distinguishing themselves as the frontrunners for the conference championship title.
Painter’s team returned several experienced players for a tilt at both the Big Ten and national championships this season and was a favorite in many quarters to finally go all the way after several close shaves in the past few years.
Their unexpected mid-season wobble has left them fighting for a favorable seed during the 2026 NCAA Tournament.
