There is nothing normal about this trip to the NCAA Tournament from the Purdue Boilermakers.
In some ways, it is the norm though. Purdue and the NCAA Tournament are as tied together as any program in the sport. Purdue has been a top-four seed in the NCAA Tournament for the last nine seasons. It was 2015 the last time Purdue came into the NCAA Tournament with something higher than a 5 next to its name.
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For chapters of that stretch, that mark was more of a warning sign than a point of pride. Purdue became bit players in Cinderella stories. It was this senior class that helped make Purdue’s triumph take center stage over its tragedy.
Fletcher Loyer and Braden Smith, who have started since day one at Purdue, were joined by Kaufman-Renn in their second seasons in direct response to Purdue’s loss to FDU.
Since then, Purdue has won a B10 regular season title, two B10 Tournament titles, made its way to a National Title and a Sweet 16. Purdues seniors have lived a thousand college basketball careers at this point and have seen it all, all while wearing the same jersey.
It’s enough experience at this point that there’d be no shame in getting caught up in the nostalgia and sentimentality of one final trip to the Tournament together.
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But if there’s sentiment to be found, it’s not coming out of the lips of Braden Smith or Kaufman-Renn.
“Just win,” Braden Smith says matter of factly, straightening up from putting on his shoes before Purdue’s 2:45 practice ahead of its 15-2 matchup with a dog statue obsessed Queens team on Friday night when asked about how he stays level with everything waiting for him tomorrow night.
It is a fitting juxtaposition to Kaufman-Renn’s approach to the same answer. There is a pause in Kaufman-Renn before every answer as he considers the mortaltiy of his own college basketball career. Smith’s straight to the point bluntness has been matched by Kaufman-Renn’s philosophic saunter towards answers for the last four seasons. It is no different here.
“Our goal at the beginning of the year was to win a National Championship,” Kaufman-Renn says after a pause. He reflects then on his Aunt’s last high school game, and how it was the most depressing thing he’d seen, knowing that was the end of her ever playing basketball on a team again.
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Then, Kaufman-Renn provided his solution to avoid a similar fate, “I plan on winning my last game so I don’t have to deal with that.”
But whether poet or point guard, Purdue’s principles remain the same. One game at a time. Just win.
On the court, it is Smith that makes sonnets of sling passes. Anticipates movements like the greats constructed lines of syllables. There is rhyme and reason to each dribble. Purpose and passion in each glance of his eyes. Every second on the floor for Smith has accumulated into what will occur on Friday night, and probably on the first few pages of the next and final chapter of Smith and Purdue’s legacy.
For a team that has done almost everything already, together, it will together break a record that has stood nearly four decades. With just two assists, a mark Smith has reached in every game except for twice in his career (once in his sophomore and one in his freshman season), Braden Smith will step above every point guard before him and sit on top of the all-time assists leaderboard in college basketball history.
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The question is not if, or even when, but who. Who will be the one to make the record breaking basket?
“He’s the best passer of all time,” Kaufman-Renn said about Smith and what his record means.
Will it be the philosopher Kaufman-Renn, who has matched Smith verse for verse on the short roll the last two seasons, that will combine to break the record? Or will it be Loyer, the stoic who has leant his voice to lead the team as Kaufman-Renn and Smith learned to use theirs?
Or will the assist go to one of those that will follow in this senior classes’ steps? Or again, will it be Cluff who caught the pass that had Smith break the all-time Big Ten record at Wisconsin? The important final piece and physicality that the team needed last season.
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The thing about stories, and teams that have this much continuity, the story lines are everywhere. Whoever scores the record-breaking bucket, it will be a story worth telling. It will seem fitting and storybook.
In a college basketball landscape sketched in fleeting colors, Purdue has put the old in gold.
It now starts its final script. Like those before them, the final page will read fade to black.
The question will be will they be bringing the gold with them?
