With Purdue in the thick of its football season and basketball practice starting Saturday, there is a lot to talk about when it comes to Boilermaker athletics. Here’s the latest news:
1) Purdue has gotten back into the picture with 2013 forward Derek Willis who committed to Purdue earlier this year only to revoke his commitment 2 months later. Since then, he has been recruited and offered by IU, Louisville, and Illinois. He is also being recruited by Kentucky. It was thought that the “ship has sailed” for Willis to reconsider his decommitment from Purdue and that Matt Painter and staff would move to their next recruiting target. But Purdue, in some form or another, did not quite give up. Willis has been naming Purdue as one of his leaders even though coach Matt Painter hasn’t visited with him recently…until this week, when Painter and Assistant Jack Owens watched one of Willis’ practices. It has also been reported that Willis will visit the following schools this weekend: Louisville on Friday night for their Midnight Madness event, Purdue on Saturday afternoon (no public event, just Purdue’s first practice that is closed to the public), and Indiana University’s Hoosier Hysteria event on Saturday night. Even though it seems like the odds are long for Purdue to land someone that has decommitted from their verbal scholarship acceptance, Purdue’s depth chart creates a fantastic opportunity for Willis to play at Purdue early and make a big impact on a talented roster.
2. Indiana coach Tom Crean made an unthinkably stupid mistake by visiting Gary Harris at his high school one day after the NCAA contact period ended. Is it possible that the head coach of a high major program would carelessly forget a very important date? That’s what most legitimate sports writers think, but Tom Crean is either: a) disorganized and foolish to not pay attention to well established dates in long standing NCAA rules or b) unconcerned with committing a secondary violation that will likely produce little penalty. In the end, it will probably only be a slap on the wrist (a short extension of the Hoosiers’ probation by the NCAA perhaps?) and nothing will come of it. But you have to wonder why the head coach of a program that has a recent history of breaking the rules would be so careless or unconcerned with violating NCAA rules.
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