DETROIT – Matt Painter was walking to shake the hand of the losing coach in an Elite Eight game for the very first time in his long head coaching career. This was a new feeling. And so was what happened next.
On his way to acknowledge the efforts of Tennessee’s Rick Barnes, Painter was swallowed in the biggest hug possible by the largest human most of us have seen. Zach Edey stopped Painter in his tracks and together they shared a moment that was four years – no, 19 years – no, 44 years – in coming.
Purdue, after decades of close calls and heartbreak in the NCAA Tournament, is returning to the Final Four for the first time since 1980. Painter, after nearly two decades of excellence as the Boilers coach, freed himself from the harangues of the obtuse who insisted he could not win the biggest games. And Edey, the two-time Sporting News Player of the Year, has carried the Boilers from the humiliation of losing to a No. 16 seed a year ago to NCAA basketball’s grandest stage.
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“Oh, it was just great. He’s a very selfless guy, and the fact they want to do it for you just like you want to do it for them, right?” Painter told The Sporting News. “But obviously I wanted to be respectful of Coach Barnes and his program and how they’re doing, and shake hands – and then we have time to celebrate afterwards.
“But what are you going to do when a Mack Truck comes at you? What are you going to do?”
Edey is 7-4, 300 pounds, but those numbers are the least of what he provided to Purdue in Sunday’s Midwest Region final at Little Caesars Arena. Edey scored 40 points and grabbed 16 rebounds, five of them at the offensive end. He converted 13 of his 21 field goal attempts and 14-of-22 from the foul line. He drew 16 fouls against Tennessee defenders, sending reserve big man Tobe Awaka to the bench with five personals in 13 minutes and starter Jonas Aidoo to the bench after just 10 total minutes because Barnes thought he offered too little resistance.
“I don’t think film does justice to how big and strong he is,” Awaka told TSN. “Once you see him in person, once you bump against him and press him, you kind of understand why he is so dominant and why he is who he is.”
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Purdue fans have a long list of moments that have defined their years of tournament torment, most recently the missed free throw with 17 seconds left that might have clinched a 2019 Elite Eight win over Virginia, followed by the absurd sequence that led to Mamadi Diakite’s game-tying basket at the buzzer. That led UVa to an overtime win and eventually an NCAA championship, and Purdue toward one of its darkest sequences of March sadness.
Over the past three seasons, Purdue lost to double-digit seeds each time, twice in the first round (to No. 14 North Texas in 2021 and No. 16 Fairleigh Dickinson in 2023, and in the Sweet 16 to No. 15 Saint Peter's in 2022).
“I think it’s been a year-long process – a process of processing,” Boilers forward Mason Gillis said in reference to that FDU embarrassment. “We had a lot of conversations about how we individually feel, how the media feels about us, how the coaches feel about us, how we feel toward one another. We really came together.”
Now those who follow the Boilers will have their choice of magical moments that assured their team at last would reach the Final Four.
Was it:
A) Lance Jones’ 3-pointer to make it 66-60 with 2:42 left, his shot coming off a high screen-and-roll action that dragged the defense down from the right wing and left Jones as an easy target for Braden Smith’s kickout pass?
LANCE JONES BIG TIME THREE!! pic.twitter.com/hvJx4gl5Ek
— The Field of 68 (@TheFieldOf68) March 31, 2024
B) Edey’s ferocious block of a layup attempt by Tennessee All-American Dalton Knecht with 33 seconds left and Purdue leading by five, the rebound immediately seized by Gillis?
ZACH EDEY REJECTS DALTON KNECHT AT THE RIM.
— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) March 31, 2024
WOW. #MarchMadness pic.twitter.com/QP1fRsoNcU
“It’s hard, because you never want to let your guard down,” veteran guard Ethan Morton told TSN. “I think Lance’s three was definitely the kill shot for us, but then they kept hanging around. when Zach got that block, I think everybody kind of really knew. It was just an unbelievable moment for this program.”
Tennessee, in many ways, was a terrible opponent for Purdue because they had no natural matchup for Knecht, who is 6-6, 213 pounds and burned them for 37 points and hit 6-of-12 from 3-point range. Painter tried early to match him with 5-11 Smith, theorizing his quickness and strength would make him annoying, at least, but Knecht found too easy a time shooting over him. Redshirt freshman Camden Heide, surely tall and dynamic enough, took a turn but struggled to get through screens. What worked best was putting Jones, at 6-2, into the equation. And the numbers came up right. Knecht was only 7-of-17 from the field, 2-of-7 from deep in the decisive second half.
From the time Tennessee established a 32-21 lead on Knecht’s 3-pointer with 5:11 left in the first half, Knecht converted just 36.3 percent of his shot attempts.
“I wanted to make it my main priority to lock in defensively,” Jones said. “When I lead defensively, it kind of trickles down and helps everybody else defensively.
“He was cooking. So I wanted to do anything I could to shut his water off.”
Yes, Jones mixed his metaphors, but you can do that when you close down an All-American.
“We've been through it all as a team,” Edey said. “It kind of happens when you come back. There's no scenario we haven't been in before. We're never going to panic, like anything. We're going to keep playing, keep executing, keep doing what we do.”
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Edey now gets to stand where other all-time great college players have. Of all The Sporting News Player of the Year winners – including Oscar Robertson, Jerry Lucas, Bill Bradley, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Bill Walton and Michael Jordan – only Iowa’s Luka Garza never reached the final four.
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And Zach Edey. Until Sunday.
When he got his turn to cut down the net, he didn’t bother with the ladder arranged under the goal. He reached up with the scissors and hacked off a big piece, then chopped that in half and handed part to Purdue legend Gene Keady, the Hall of Fame coach who was Painter’s mentor and predecessor and never got all the way there himself.
“It’s amazing. It’s never felt better cutting down some nets,” Edey told TSN. “But we’ve got a couple more games to play.”
