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5 questions Rutgers must answer to beat Purdue Thursday night


This Thursday night Rutgers men's basketball team (10-15, 2-9 B1G Ten) continues to try and break its now eight-game losing streak against Purdue (15-9, 7-4 B1G Ten). It's going to be a tough game as the Boilermakers are coming off a tough loss on the road against Minnesota.

five questions the Scarlet Knights will need to answer if they're going to pull off an upset at the RAC at 7pm Thursday night.

1.Which Kadeem Jack shows up?
If nothing else, senior forward Kadeem Jack has been wildly inconsistent. Rutgers coach Eddie Jordan apparently had enough at the end of the loss to Ohio State and benched his starter for over ten minutes. This team desperately needs Jack to find his way back to the player we saw during and after the Wisconsin upset. Attacking the paint, fighting underneath - these are the things Jack excels at. These are also the things Rutgers cannot win without.

2. Can this team play 40 concurrent minutes of defense?
Rutgers often hangs around in games much longer than we expect, but at some point the defense always falls short. In the B1G Ten, you have to play tenacious, physical defense for 40 minutes and so far, Rutgers has not shown themselves to have the will to do it.

They're going to have to figure out a way for this game to be different and not let the Boilermakers push them around in their own house.

3. When they fall behind, can this team respond?
Maybe this is too pessimistic, but we know Rutgers will fall behind at some point. When that has happened during this losing skid, sometimes the Scarlet Knights respond and sometimes they collapse. If they collapse, they will find themselves once again digging a hole they cannot climb out of.

That's been the case more often than not this last month and a half.

4.Who is the third man?
We've talked many times about how Jack and Myles Mack are carrying the weight of this offense. At various times, Junior Etou and Bishop Daniels have both stepped up and helped carry the load. This will be critical against a very solid Purdue team, especially if Jack is still struggling. So who will step up? Will it be Daniels or Etou again? Or maybe Mike Williams and D.J. Foreman.

Someone has to, if just to start giving fans hope for next year when Mack and Jack are gone.

5.Can this team find a way to win?
At the end of the day, it all boils down to this. Rutgers finds plenty of ways to lose - can they find a way t o win? Can they avoid mistakes which have so often cost them games over the last month and a half? Can they play tight defense and find the open man on offense? Can they face down adversity?

Can they find a way to win? It seems like a simple thing, but so far the answer has been 'no.'

 

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The date was Jan. 26, 2010.

On that night, the Rutgers men?s basketball team lost its ninth consecutive game in what was former head coach Fred Hill Jr.?s final season at the helm.

Fast forward five years later and the Scarlet Knights (10-15, 2-9) are reeling. They now find themselves one loss away from equaling that streak Thursday when they host Purdue at 7 p.m. inside the Louis Brown Athletic Center.

An eight-game losing streak seemed unfathomable one month ago when the Knights shook the college basketball landscape with a historic win Jan. 11 against then-No. 4 Wisconsin at the RAC.

But since then, the relentless gauntlet of Big Ten play has taken its toll with Rutgers, now stuck in a seemingly infinite downward spiral.

With the Boilermakers (15-9, 7-4) coming to Piscataway ? winners of four of their last five, including three against ranked opposition ? the Knights? underdog persona continues against what is perceived as superior opposition.

Yet, despite the clear struggles in their new conference, junior guard Bishop Daniels stands firm on his preseason claim that Rutgers has just as much talent as any Big Ten team its faced.

?I don?t ever want to blame [losing] on that,? Daniels said of the talent level in the Big Ten. ?As players and as a team we just need to get together, and I still stand by my word from what I said in the beginning of the season. I don?t see any team that?s individually, player for player, better than us. It?s what they do as teams and that?s what we haven?t been doing. We haven?t been putting all our pieces together every game.?

Though recent results and some of the margins of defeat would argue the contrary, lack of depth has played an influential role in the Knights? struggles to piece together consistent performances.

But with freshman guard Mike Williams? return from an ankle injury last Sunday against Ohio State, and the continued development of freshman forward D.J. Foreman and freshman center Shaquille Doorson, Rutgers? young bench is slowly maturing.

?[Mike] hasn?t played, so I?m happy that he got a lot of time,? head coach Eddie Jordan said postgame Sunday against Ohio State. ?We?re pleased with D.J. [Foreman]. He?s up and down but [I like] his progress, his demeanor. Shaq [Doorson] had some moments out there. We?re developing our young guys.?

In order to counter the physicality and size of Purdue, the Knights will hope at the very least Doorson can provide strong minutes with 7-foot center A.J. Hammons creating a matchup nightmare inside.

Along with being the Boilermakers' leading scorer with 10.8 points per game, Hammons is a defensive force averaging three blocks per game, which is 10th best in the nation.

But Purdue has shown to be prone to careless turnovers, having committed 23 in its last game against Minnesota, resulting in a narrow 62-58 defeat.

Considering the Buckeyes had 15 turnovers against the Knights, it could be something they look to exploit.

?We need to give that same effort throughout the whole game and we pressed at the end, which wasn?t too bad,? Mack said of how to improve for Thursday. ?So I think we should throw a little bit of that in there in the first half and see how that works out.?

No matter what strategy Rutgers leans towards, a sense of urgency may be more valuable than any X?s and O?s Jordan and his staff create. Its winless streak now stands at 32 days.

Considering the Knights were humiliated in their last two home games by 20- and 19-point margins, respectively, urgency should not be the issue.

If Rutgers truly wishes to end its miseries against a Purdue team on the bubble for NCAA Tournament consideration, it must regain the junkyard dog mentality it?s lacked for much of the conference season.

?Our whole thing is we?re never going to give up,? Daniels said. ?We?re out here in the Big Ten just like any other team even though we get counted probably as one of the last teams every single time, but we play just like they are. We got to show that we?re dogs. I mean, we?re hungry. We haven?t won a game in I don?t know how long, so our main thing is just going out there and grinding. However we can get it, we?re going to get it.?