Indiana Basketball Has Season's Darkest Night in Worst Loss to Purdue Since 1969

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — For nearly 20 minutes, Darian DeVries entered his own little world.

Standing on the Keady Court baseline Friday night, DeVries crossed his arms and surveyed his surroundings. He watched his players flush vicious dunks. He scanned the bleachers in Mackey Arena. He shared conversations with Indiana athletic director Scott Dolson and anyone else who approached.

DeVries appeared loose and vibrant. The Hoosiers' first-year basketball coach had no clue he was familiarizing himself with the scene of perhaps the darkest night of his debut season.

Bad bounces. Recurrent rebounding nightmares. A defensive disaster. Chants of "IU sucks" from the Paint Crew, Purdue's student section clad in all black, and waves and cheers at Indiana fans who headed for the exit at the under-four timeout. Loud applauses while Purdue emptied its bench — and Indiana kept four starters on the floor.

Together, the on-court product and crazed crowd snowballed into Indiana's most lopsided, uncompetitive defeat under DeVries. The Hoosiers (17-10, 8-8 Big Ten) trudged to a 93-64 loss to No. 7 Purdue (22-5, 12-4 Big Ten) on Friday night at Mackey Arena in West Lafayette.

"Nights like these are hard," DeVries said postgame.

Indiana looked no match for Purdue — and bore little resemblance to the team that, only three-and-a-half weeks prior, handed the Boilermakers a 72-67 loss at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall in Bloomington.

When he spoke to reporters Thursday, DeVries emphasized the significance of rebounding. Purdue dominated the glass, grabbing 30 boards to Indiana's 15. The Hoosiers nabbed only one offensive rebound and scored zero second-chance points. The Boilermakers, meanwhile, turned six offensive boards into 13 second-chance points.

The Hoosiers, like in their 20-point loss to Illinois on Sunday, faced a significant size disadvantage and failed to overcome it. If Indiana threw double-teams at Purdue's post players, it left open Boilermaker shooters, who often connected. If the Hoosiers didn't double, the big-bodied Boilermakers dominated inside.

Indiana had no answers.

Purdue shot 64.1% from the field, went 10 of 18 from 3-point range and averaged 1.55 points possession. When the Boilermakers reach such a level, DeVries said it becomes "incredibly challenging" to beat them.

"I thought we were battling on the offensive glass. We just couldn't get enough first-shot stops," DeVries said postgame. "That was probably even more of a bigger problem for us."

The Hoosiers started 3-for-10 shooting from the field and mustered only 10 points through the first nine-and-a-half minutes. They couldn't get to the rim, and Purdue's perimeter defense prevented quality looks.

Indiana's game plan centered around generating paint touches, but Purdue largely took the Hoosiers out of rhythm early. Eventually, Indiana hit a higher gear offensively as sixth-year senior guard Tayton Conerway attacked downhill and helped open the floor.

But none of it mattered. Indiana made 8 of its final 12 shots entering halftime. Purdue made 10 of its final 12. The Boilermakers carried a 17-point edge into the locker room, and their lead never grew smaller than 16 points.

Indiana trailed by 20 or more points for the final 16 minutes Friday night, and its deficit climaxed at 34 points with five minutes remaining. The Hoosiers never led. Their 29-point margin of defeat is their largest to Purdue since 1969.

It's the continuation of a troubling trend that perhaps best defines Indiana's status in DeVries' first season. The Hoosiers are 2-6 against ranked teams this season and 0-4 on the road. They've lost each of their road games by double-digits, including three by 20-plus points.

Indiana hasn't proven capable of hanging with elite teams away from the friendly confines of Assembly Hall. DeVries, asked postgame whether he places the onus on execution or natural ability, merely pinned the Hoosiers' struggles on the atmosphere's impact — which he noted works in Indiana's favor at home.

"It's an incredible environment. It's a tough place to play. It's what makes this home court advantage what it is," DeVries said. "These type of environments do present some challenges and stuff, and that's what makes college basketball so great. We have a similar advantage at our place, great environment. It's tough to come in there and win.

"It's tough to come in here and win. You got to play well, and I thought we didn't do our part tonight and certainly Purdue was on point tonight. They played really well."

After a mid-January stretch where it lost four straight games, Indiana resurrected its season with five wins in six contests. But as the Hoosiers enter their four-game sprint to the regular season finish line, they'll do so with no momentum at their back.

Indiana lost by 20 points Sunday at Illinois, and by 29 points Friday at Purdue — as lopsided, as ugly, of a week as the Hoosiers have experienced in DeVries' tenure.

"We played two really good teams, got beat on the road," DeVries said. "Disappointed that we weren't maybe certainly more competitive in the games to make it come down to the stretch, but we got to let those go."

Four days separate the Hoosiers from their next step toward clinching an NCAA Tournament appearance. They host Northwestern, a team DeVries said "puts up a good fight every single night," on Tuesday at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall.

Indiana wants to capitalize on the advantage that comes with being at home. The Hoosiers learned the hard reality of life on the road in the Big Ten across a sobering five-day stretch, one in which they saw the margin separating themselves from the next tier of contenders — the margin DeVries is responsible for trimming moving forward.

But Indiana's present focus is on picking up the pieces from a dismal, listless night to forget in West Lafayette.

"It's pretty difficult," senior forward Tucker DeVries said postgame. "But I think it's important for us to understand we got some big four games coming up down the stretch, and we're playing for a lot right now. And I think it's important that there's not much we can do right now about the previous game.

"We can learn from it and move on to the next one and use this to get ready for these next four games that are massive for us trying to make that NCAA Tournament, which we've certainly put ourselves in a position to play meaningful games coming down the stretch of the season."

Darian DeVries carries confidence the Hoosiers will be focused and ready to roll Tuesday night. They have been all year, he said.

But they haven't been forced to respond to a loss quite like Friday, when an unrelenting Boilermaker squad won loose balls, made shots, dominated the glass and drove Indiana to depths of defeat it previously hadn't tasted this season.

The Hoosiers were serenaded with jeers and boos. Their offense had little response. Their defensive struggles only ignited the black-out crowd sitting within Mackey Arena.

Through it, DeVries often held the same stance: Arms crossed, face blank. There was nothing to say, no more timeouts to call, no more bleeding to stop — only hopes and dreams to repair and confidence to rebuild.

The fate of Indiana's season rests in the balance of the final four games. The Hoosiers can't afford a repeat of Friday night — a night with little good, lots of bad and an abundance of ugly that DeVries hopes will soon be washed from his players' minds.

"We can't hang on to this one very long," DeVries said. "I mean, it's right here. It's that stretch run right now. So, the only thing that matters is your next one. And we got to go home, get ready. We’ve got a couple days to do it. So, Tuesday's the next big one, and that's what our focus will be."