After Purdue stomps Maryland, Braden Smith gives boorish crowd a final bucket, and message
Braden Smith is dribbling in the final minute of No. 1 Purdue’s 67-53 blowout of Maryland. The shot clock is running down and the crowd has just been so nasty, and Smith had both on his mind when he dribbled off a Zach Edey screen and rose for that righteous jumper of his. Smith buries the 3-pointer with 41 seconds left and then sneers at the Maryland fans in the front row.
He didn’t glance. Didn’t look, didn’t stare, didn’t even glare.
Sneered.
This is what you get — well, this is what you should get — when you act as boorishly as Maryland fans Tuesday night at College Park, Md., but say this for the denizens of the Xfinity Center: They’re consistently good at being awful.
Maryland enjoys one of the biggest home-court advantages in college basketball, and not because the place is full all the time. It’s not. Maryland sold out three whole games at home last season — three of 17 — and was maybe 25% empty Tuesday for the No. 1 team in the country. Why? Because Maryland isn’t a basketball school. Not a football school, either. It’s an obnoxious school, the one thing you can always count on seeing at Maryland: obnoxiousness.
Purdue vs. Maryland player ratings: Another Edey double-double, Smith stuffs stat sheet
But again, it makes it difficult for visiting teams to win here. The Terps entered the game 8-0 at home and riding a 19-game home winning streak, tied for third-longest in the country. They’d won their past 14 Big Ten games here, too. Not every opponent has the mental toughness of the 2023-24 Purdue basketball team.
Wait until you see how the Boilers shut those fools up.
Maryland: Big Ten's worst crowd for decades
Yeah, you’re right, I need to calm down.
But this stuff gets old, you know? Just some quick background: I’ve been going to games at Maryland since 1998, back when I was covering the ACC for the Charlotte Observer and Maryland played at Cole Field House and its fans were assaulting Duke family members in the crowd. The school found itself negotiating a settlement with Carlos Boozer’s family in 2001 after fans showered the Duke family section with bottles, one of which hit his mother.
Even now, 25 years later, fans at Maryland are still doing the same stupid chant at the end of convicted child pornographer Gary Glitter’s famous anthem, “Rock and Roll, Part 2.” You might recognize it as the “hey” song, because that’s the only lyric: Hey!
But at Maryland, when the guitars and sax moan out the first part, fans don’t just chant: “Hey!” They follow with:
“We’re gonna beat the hell out of you
“And you and you and you and you.”
Cliches and followers, these people. Did I mention Gary Glitter also was convicted of child sexual abuse? You can’t tell a Maryland fan anything.
But what you can do, if you’re Purdue, is put them in their miserable place. Like this:
After Purdue guard Lance Jones air-balled a 3-pointer early in the game, the crowd gleefully shrieked “air ball, air ball” every time he touched the ball. This continued until early in the second half, when Jones touched the ball three times in 2½ minutes — and made a 3-pointer all three times.
The crowd left him alone after that.
The crowd had another target from the start, senior Mason Gillis, who made a mistake in June 2021 I won't defend: pulled over on suspicion of drunk driving. He plead guilty, spent a year on probation and was suspended for nearly a month of games. Every time he touched the ball Tuesday night, 2½ years later, Maryland fans screamed “DUI, DUI!”
And you know, if that’s all they did — taunt Gillis for a potentially deadly mistake he absolutely made — I’d be writing about something else. But Maryland fans also were screaming "we're going to beat the hell out you” and taunting Lance Jones and doing whatever else they were doing, away from the rest of our eyes and ears. Can’t even imagine.
As for Gillis, the crowd was taunting him in the first half when he drove the baseline and dished to Zach Edey for a dunk. The crowd might have continued its taunt, but good luck hearing that over the sound of Zach Edey roaring. Minutes later, same thing. Gillis has the ball, the crowd’s chanting, and now Gillis is shooting and scoring and the crowd is absolutely quiet.
Pretty soon the Boilers have doubled up the Terps — score: 28-14 — and Maryland fans are realizing they’ve picked a fight with the wrong dude. Purdue’s the dude, I’m saying. The whole team. Maryland’s crowd is a mean-spirited bully, and Purdue gave them a two-hour, well-deserved wedgie.
And Braden Smith shut them up
This is one of those things we can’t know, yet: How will Purdue do in the 2024 NCAA tournament?
That’s the only question that matters this season, a problem not of the media’s creation but Purdue’s creation. Boilers coach Matt Painter will tell you as much: The Boilers have done this to themselves, numbing lots of us to their regular-season excellence because March matters above all, and Purdue hasn’t handled March well of late.
But this team looks different. The guards, for starters. Smith is having one of the best seasons by a pure Big Ten point guard in history. At 12.8 points, 5.4 rebounds and 6.8 assists a game, he’s halfway toward becoming one of just five Big Ten players — ever — to average those numbers for a season. Who’s his company? Well, Magic Johnson did it twice.
Smith is a sophomore who looks nothing like his freshman version, other than that Tom Cruise face. Fletcher Loyer, the other freshman guard a year ago, is shooting much better across the board — 42% from the floor compared to 36.7% as a freshman, 39.5% on 3-pointers (compared to 32.6%) and even 88.9% from the line (79.4%). Smith and Loyer combined for 25 on Tuesday.
Zach Edey is averaging more points (23.2 ppg compared to 22.3 ppg last season) in 1½ fewer minutes. He had 23 and 12 rebounds Tuesday.
This Purdue team is deeper than a year ago, with elite — I mean, elite — talent like Cam Heide, Myles Colvin, Caleb Furst and Ethan Morton all averaging less than 15 minutes per game.
And then there’s what we saw Tuesday, something you can’t count with numbers: Purdue’s toughness. Were the Boilers tough last season? Sure, they were tough — a soft team doesn’t win the Big Ten — but not tough enough to handle the pressure of March. This Purdue team, based on what we saw Tuesday, can handle it.
Gillis had four points, three rebounds and two assists and didn’t miss a shot, despite that environment. Jones broke open the game with those nine points in 2½ minutes, turning a 32-19 halftime lead into a 43-23 laugher. Edey was booed all game, as usual, and had that 23-and-12 while holding Maryland’s Julian Reese scoreless in 34 minutes. Reese, a preseason All-Big Ten pick who was averaging 14.3 ppg and 9.7 rpg on 52.1% shooting, had zero points and seven rebounds. Took just four shots, and missed them all.
But here’s the toughest thing I saw, courtesy of Braden Smith, the 2022 IndyStar Mr. Basketball winner from Westfield:
Midway through the second half, Smith attacks the rim and misses a high-arcing layup attempt. Next time down he attacks the lane, leaving his feet and turning to pass to … nobody. The ball floats to Maryland’s Jahmir Young (26 points), who goes the other way for a layup.
Next time down the court Smith dribbles into a 3-pointer and makes it, then sags his head — still mad at himself, but not so mad that he was incapable of attempting, and making, a tough shot.
By game’s end, after Purdue had jumped to an 8-0 lead and opened it to 22, all we needed was a final score and a final message. Braden Smith provided both by drilling a 3-pointer and then sneering at the most dislikable crowd in the Big Ten.
Find IndyStar columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter at @GreggDoyelStar or at www.facebook.com/greggdoyelstar.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Purdue basketball shuts down Maryland, shuts up obnoxious Terps crowd
