When a team's best defender rolls his ankle during warmups, the best a coach can hope for is the type of opposition shooting night Purdue lucked into in its first round NCAA Tournament win over Old Dominion Thursday, 61-48.
Nojel Eastern didn't start, but Purdue didn't seem to need him, as the Monarchs shot just 27 percent from the field and saw only three different players score in the game's first 28 minutes.
Not that Purdue was much better. All of the Boilermakers' losses this year have come away from Mackey Arena, and the rims at Hartford, Connecticut's XL Center were similarly unkind to the number three seed in the tournament's South Region, as Coach Matt Painter's team made just 38 percent of its field goal tries, going 9-for-30 from behind the three-point arc.
Ironically, the long-range percentage for Purdue would have been much better without the shots taken by senior sharpshooter Ryan Cline, who made just one of his 11 attempts.
Carsen Edwards scored 26 points for Purdue, but (characteristically) needed 23 field goal attempts to do it. Center Matt Haarms added 13.
With its win, Purdue advances to face defending tournament champion and sixth-seeded Villanova on Saturday.