Last season Purdue got its season off to a raucous start with defending champion Villanova coming to Mackey Arena as part of the Gavitt Tipoff Games. Our Boilers were Big Ten favorites, but this was billed as a game where Purdue could show it was a national contender too. We gave The Wildcats our best shot, but Caleb Swanigan and Dakota Mathias both missed tying 3-point attempts in the closing seconds and Villanova had a hard-fought 79-76 win.
At the time I was despondent. Yeah, we played well, but Villanova still had an answer.