Purdue trying to work out kinks

Victoria Sun

Wednesday, Dec. 19, 2001 | 10:40 a.m.

Texas A&M vs. Ill.-Chicago, noon

Miss. St. vs. Richmond, 2:30 p.m.

Cincinnati vs. La.-Monroe, 5 p.m.

Purdue vs. SW Mo., 7:30 p.m.

In some ways, the Purdue basketball team has resembled a jigsaw puzzle to coach Gene Keady this season -- one that he hasn't been able to solve.

Keady has been more liberal with his substitution patterns. During the Boilermakers' 80-73 win over Illinois-Chicago on Monday night in the first round of the Las Vegas Classic, he inserted several newcomers into the starting lineup.

The win snapped a two-game slide for the Boilermakers (6-4).

"I don't like to do it, but it depends on how they play," Keady said Tuesday afternoon. "We need to find out who can start and who can come off the bench and produce."

He'll get a better idea after this weekend.

Purdue is among eight teams, including No. 25 Cincinnati, Mississippi State and Texas A&M, participating in the pool-play tournament that begins second-round action Thursday at Valley High School. All first-round games were played at campus home sites.

"These are all games coaches like to play because we get a few extra games before the conference," Keady said. "It gives us a good time to teach and get out the kinks."

Technically, Purdue's win over Illinois-Chicago gave the coach his 500th career victory, but Keady has not reached the milestone in the eyes of the NCAA. The Boilermakers forfeited 19 games following the 1995-96 season for recruiting violations, and the NCAA no longer counts those as wins.

Regardless, Purdue held a ceremony to commemorate Keady's milestone after the game.

Keady, however, said his mind was elsewhere.

"I was worried about our kids getting better and worried about their improvement," Keady said. "I'm happy I did it, it's an honor.

"But I want to continue to make Purdue a national power. We're not that way yet and that's our challenge, to get them back to where they were before."

Junior guard Willie Deane leads the team in scoring at 14.4 points per game and is second in assists with 3.2. Senior center John Allison is averaging 11 points and a team-high 6.5 rebounds.

Keady is optimistic they will eventually blend with freshmen such as guard Brandon McKnight and Matt Carroll, both of whom Keady inserted into the starting lineup on Monday.

Last year's season was full of promise for Purdue after an 11-3 start, but injuries to Allison and senior forward Rodney Smith (9.2 points, 5.7 rebounds) turned the season upside-down.

Still, Purdue managed to finish 17-15 and made it to the Elite Eight of the NIT (ending a string of eight consecutive trips to the NCAA Tournament) before losing to Alabama.

The injuries forced Keady to play more inexperienced players, but that gave him plenty of hope heading into this season, in that those players are a year older.

But double-digit losses to Stanford, Dayton and Arizona have Keady scratching his head.

"We thought this year we'd come out and show something early and we've been lethargic against good teams," Keady said. "We're not playing hard. We don't know what's going on.

"Finally (Monday) night, they started playing right. We played pretty good the last 10 minutes especially."