How the outcome of UConn vs. Purdue affects each program's legacy

GLENDALE, Ariz. — In their darkest hours, the Purdue Boilermakers began getting messages of comfort from the Virginia Cavaliers.

Purdue had just been stunned by Fairleigh Dickinson, a No. 1 seed ingloriously falling to a No. 16, and but one team could truly know how that felt. Five years before, Virginia had endured the same historical anguish against UMBC, and everyone remembers how that turned out — the Cavaliers cutting down the championship nets one year later, the ghosts of 2018 fully exorcised.

As Matt Painter tried to come to grips last March with the nightmare that had just enveloped his Purdue team, he looked at his phone and saw a message from Virginia coach Tony Bennett. The day before, Bennett’s Cavaliers had been taken out of the 2023 tournament by Furman by one point, so he had his own hurt to get over. But he understood what Painter was going through maybe better than any other person in America. “You're at a low when you have tough losses like that,” Painter said Sunday. “For him to think of us and to think of me and to reach out to me, that was great. So from just a humanity standpoint, there are some good people out there that are thinking about others even when they're down and out.”

To this very championship Monday, the day Purdue will try to bring down mighty Connecticut and replicate Virginia’s heartache-to-high-five journey, Painter still has Bennett’s message in his phone.

Nor was he the only Boilermaker to get healing words from the Old Dominion in that bleak aftermath. Several of the players heard from Kyle Guy, the Virginia guard who ended up Most Outstanding Player at the Final Four. Fletcher Loyer, Braden Smith, Mason Gillis. All those Purdue players are products of Indiana high school basketball, as is Guy, so they already had a connection. Now they were partners in pain. They still remember his words a year later.

Loyer: “He just said it’s not going to be easy to listen all these antics and all this media hate on you. You get hate, you get messages that shouldn’t be sent to people. But ultimately you’ve got to put the work in. If you want to be Virginia you have to go put in that work to be champions.”

Loyer received ugly mail?

“Every college athlete does. It’s a messed-up system that probably won’t get fixed but it’s something that shouldn’t be happening to kids in college.”

Smith:  “He gave me the rundown, you have to block out the noise and just focus on next year. Just hearing that from a guy like that, it made me think that bigger picture in my head. It happens, it’s part of the sport. Look where we’re at now.”

Gillis: “It just gave us that reassurance that it wasn’t over. We could do it. They did it. It’s a little bit harder doing something that nobody’s ever done before because you don’t have anything to look at. Just like young kids growing up, if they don’t have a role model to look up to if they don’t have something to achieve or strive for, they’re never going to get there because they don’t have that picture in their mind of what it could be.

“Kyle and Virginia gave us that picture and we’re chasing it.”

But here at the end, that chase has grown very difficult. The Boilermakers now face a Connecticut steamroller that has swept over the past two NCAA tournaments, winning 11 consecutive games by double digits, relentlessly plowing toward a repeat. There is no mystery to the Huskies about what is needed at a moment like this. They’ve lived at that level.

“We feel like we can make history,” Tristen Newton said. “We don’t need any different type of performance than we’ve been getting all season.”

It was just a week ago the Boilermakers were in their hotel room in Detroit, watching Connecticut blow apart Illinois with a 30-0 run. The Illinois team Purdue had beaten by five and six points in tough struggles. “You see how hard they can play for 40 minutes and that’s impressive,” Loyer said of Connecticut.

“What they do a great job of is when blood is in the water," Painter said. "When you show weakness or you turn your back on pressure, you dribble in place, you leave your feet, you don't play on two feet, those guys are the best in the business. They will make you pay.

“They’re just waiting for you to do something stupid. Don't do something stupid.”

In a way, Purdue doesn’t mind the position. The Boilermakers have been the team to beat in the Big Ten for years, which is why they’ve been court-stormed 11 times in their last 12 road losses. It’s become familiar, being run over by students of other conference schools. But now they’re the underdog story.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Mackey court storm so it shows the respect teams have for us,” Zach Edey said. “We haven’t had this. Everyone’s kind of counting us out right now.”

The possibilities are many Monday night. “I’m sure people have been waiting to see this for a while,” the Huskies’ Cam Spencer said. Especially Edey vs. Donovan Clingan, 7-4 vs. 7-2. That’s 14 feet, 6 inches and nearly 600 pounds of conflict in the paint.

If Connecticut wins . . .

The Huskies join Florida, Duke, UCLA, Cincinnati, San Francisco, Kentucky and Oklahoma State as the programs who found a way to repeat. Not many in 86 years.

If Purdue wins . . .

The Boilermakers become the 38th different program with a national championship. The irony, of course, is that the school who sent alum John Wooden out into the world to win 10 titles has yet to win one.

If Connecticut wins . . .

The Huskies will be 6-0 in national championship games, which is rather staggering. They also will have won 24 percent of the titles handed out in the past 25 tournaments.

If Purdue wins . . .

The Big Ten finally gets to stop talking about going 24 years without a championship. Then again, if Purdue loses, it will be the eighth consecutive title game loss for the league going back to 2002, involving the seven different schools.

If Connecticut wins . . .

It’ll be the first time in 17 years one conference has won both the NIT and NCAA titles. Both Big East champions — UConn here and Seton Hall in the NIT — would have beaten teams from the state of Indiana to do it.

If Purdue wins . .  .

Matt Painter becomes the seventh coach in the past 72 years to lead his alma mater to the title. The last was North Carolina’s Roy Williams in 2018.

If Connecticut wins . . .

The Huskies will be 12-1 all-time in the Final Four, the best percentage in history.

If Purdue wins . . .

It’ll be the first time in 72 years that the nation’s leading scorer — in this case Zach Edey — played for the national champion. The last was Kansas’ Clyde Lovelette in 1952.

If Connecticut wins . . .

Dan Hurley would become the 16th coach with multiple championships.

If Purdue wins . . .

Connecticut will trail in the second half of an NCAA tournament for the first time since the second round in 2023.

If Connecticut wins . . .

The Big East will have won four national championships in the past eight tournaments.

If Purdue wins . . .

The Big Ten will have won four national championships in the past 37 tournaments.

If Connecticut wins . .  .

It will be mission accomplished. The Huskies have never been shy about saying where they intend to go.

“For a lot of the year we've used the external slights, the perceived slights, all those things, the world's against us mentality.” Hurley said. “I think that gets you through, like, the regular season, Big East grind, January, February, where the team's tired and you've got to create these different things. Where we really used that motivation external, everyone's trying to get us, they want what we’ve got, we're the champs. Somebody is going to have to rip this out of our hands. We used that a lot.

“But once you get to this time of year, everything is just you are who your identity is. The way you play, it's very automatic. It just comes down to hoping that it's your night.”

If Purdue wins . . .

It will be the journey completed from the lowest of the March valleys to the highest of the April peaks.  As Virginia did five years ago, the Boilermakers will forever mute all the stones that have been hurled their way since March 17, 2023.

“We’ve heard everything,” Edey said “We’ve kept our mouths shut and just played basketball.”

It would seem these two have been on a collision course for months. So much the better they finally meet, and on the last night, no less.

From Connecticut’s side, Newton,

“You feel like anything else but a national championship is a letdown to not only ourselves, but all of UConn nation, the fans, the alumni, everybody. So gotta get the job done tomorrow.”

From Purdue’s side, Gillis.

“All year we wanted to play the best team, and they are the best team. So it’s a perfect story. We took the early loss last year, they won and they’re back in the national championship. They’re the big dogs, they’re UConn, they’ve won multiple national championships. And we’re Purdue. We’ve never won a national championship.

“And so now it’s our time.”

It’s somebody’s time, anyway. Lots of people will be watching. Probably including the 2019 Virginia Cavaliers.