CHICAGO, ILL. - The Rutgers men's basketball team seeded No. 9 in the 2023 Big Ten Tournament takes on the No. 1 seeded Purdue Boilermakers on the Big Ten Network on Friday at noon.
THE SERIES
Rutgers and Purdue will meet for the 20th time all-time, with 15 of those matchups coming since RU joined the league in 2014-15. Rutgers has won five of the past six meetings. That streak included a 70-68 win in the meeting at Jersey Mike's Arena last season, as
Ron Harper Jr. hit a buzzer-beating shot to down the No. 1 ranked Boilermakers, the first ever win for RU over a top-ranked team as well as a win at Mackey Arena over No. 1 Purdue again this season on Jan. 2 65-64. The team's lone win at Mackey Arena came on March 7, 2020, an overtime victory that appeared to wrap up an NCAA Tournament bid for RU prior to the season promptly being cancelled during the COVID-19 pandemic.
WITH A WIN
A victory over Purdue would represent
- six wins in the last seven meetings against Purdue
- The second-straight win against Purdue
- The 16th ranked win at RU for head coach
Steve Pikiell
ABOUT RUTGERS
Rutgers men's basketball is back on the road for the sixth time in it's last eight games. Rutgers has been propelled by an outstanding defense. The Scarlet Knights are 19-2 when holding its opponent to 65 or fewer points and 10-1 when doing so in Big Ten games. Rutgers is 0-9 when allowing more than 65 points in Big Ten games this year. Rutgers has battled injuries since losing starting junior forward
Mawot Mag with a torn ACL in the first half of the game at Madison Square Garden against Michigan State on Saturday, Feb. 4.
RUTGERS LAST TIME OUT
Rutgers held Michigan to just one field goal in the first 18 minutes of the second half to secure the 62-50 win in the second rounds of the 2023 Big Ten Tournament against No. 8 seeded Michigan.
The 50 points allowed by the Rutgers defense is a school record for the best defensive performance by RU ever in a Big Ten Tournament game.
Rutgers limited Michigan to 19 percent shooting. Senior guard
Cam Spencer scored 18 points, and freshman guard
Derek Simpson added 13 for the 9th-seeded Scarlet Knights.Simpson started his fourth game of the season replacing forward
Aundre Hyatt in the starting lineup.
Fifth-year wing
Caleb McConnell collected three steals and is now three away from tying Eddie Jordan for first on Rutgers all-time list. A key 9-to-1 run to start the second half put the Scarlet Knights up 34-29. Another 12-0 Rutgers run finished off with a Simpson fast break layup gave the Scarlet Knights their largest lead of the night to bring the score to 52-39.
ABOUT PURDUE
Purdue wrapped up the regular season with a 76-71 victory over Illinois in front of the 57th straight sellout at Mackey Arena.
The win improved Purdue to 26-5 overall while finishing 15-5 in the Big Ten Conference. The Boilermakers are guaranteed to win the Big Ten Conference regular-season race by three games, the first time since 2014 (Michigan) that a team has won the league title by at least three games. Purdue has finished in the top three of the Big Ten standings in seven of the last nine seasons.
Purdue's 26 regular-season wins are the second most in a regular-season in school history, behind just the 27 wins during the 1987-88 season (27-3 record). Purdue's 51 regular-season wins over the last two seasons are tied for the most in a two-year stretch in school history, set three previous times. Overall, Purdue is 55-13 since the start of last season, tied for the fourth-most wins in a two-year span in school history.
LAST TIME VS. PURDUE
Steve Pikiell's 300th career win was a special one. Rutgers men's basketball claimed another historic victory vs. Purdue on Monday night. The Scarlet Knights defeated a No. 1 ranked Boilermakers team for the second straight season, claiming its highest ranked road win in program history with a 65-64 win over Purdue at Mackey Arena.
Junior guard
Cam Spencer hit the game-winning three-pointer late for RU in the team's final possession. His triple with 14 seconds remaining gave the visitors the lead for good, with the defense holding stout at the other end. Spencer finished shooting (6-8) from the field with 14 points and three assists.
MILESTONE WATCH
Paul Mulcahy enters the matchup with 447 career assists. He is now in sole possession of fourth place on RU's all-time leaderboard.
Caleb McConnell has 217 career steals. He just passed Myles Mack (211) for second all-time at RU and is three away from Eddie Jordan (220) for first all time.
Cliff Omoruyi has 124 career blocks. He's for ninth all-time at RU.
Cam Spencer has 67 steals on the season. He has passed Phil Sellers' 1975-76 campaign (61) and Steve Worthy's 1992-93 season of 62 steals for sixth most in a single-season in RU history.
