Purdue Men’s Basketball Sweet Sixteen Bound

The Purdue men’s basketball team is headed to the Sweet Sixteen.

The Boilermakers secured their spot defeating the Miami Hurricanes 79-69 in Round 2 of the NCAA March Madness tournament Sunday afternoon. It’s the team’s third consecutive year to make it to the top sixteen.

In a back and forth game, Purdue was resilient with players including CJ Cox, Braden Smith, Trey Kaufman-Renn and Fletcher Loyer providing key points to lead the team to victory.

Head coach Matt Painter said having consistent experience on the team is critical to wins like the one against Miami.

“I thought we would have had better numbers today if we could have rebounded the ball better,” Painter said. “Like we were doing some good things, and then we just weren’t getting, you know, some of those rebounds, but these guys were doing their job. And you know, that’s where it shows up.”

During the game Cox suffered an injury and left the court. Painter confirmed Cox hyperextended his knee and will have to see how treatment goes before determining his status for the next game.

Even with Cox’s unexpected departure and others not having the best game, Purdue forward Trey Kaufman-Renn said the team’s built with a depth of players that can step up when needed, something that’s critical in tournaments like March Madness.

“When you know, you know, maybe one or two guys aren’t playing well to begin with, to have other people that can come in and pick them up is just really important.”

Sunday’s win also marked Painter’s 500th win at Purdue over the 21 seasons as the school’s coach. Painter credits recruitment efforts to find the right players that fit with the team’s needs and have a high competitive spirit.

“That's how you end up getting a lot of victories, because you have really good players that are committed,” Painter said.

Purdue is the only Division One men’s team from Indiana to make the NCAA tournament.

The 2nd seed Boilermakers will play 11th seed Texas Longhorns Thursday in San Jose, California in the Western Conference semi-finals.

Contact WFYI All Things Considered newscaster and reporter Samantha Horton at shorton@wfyi.org or on Signal at SamHorton.05