Purdue Boilermakers Mens Basketball Tickets
The Purdue Boilermakers men’s basketball team is a Division I program for Purdue University. The team is located in West Lafayette, Indiana and plays their home games at the Mackey Arena. The Mackey Arena has a capacity of 14,123 people and opened in 1967. The arena is one of the loudest in the NCAA due to its domed aluminum roof. The team plays in the Big Ten Conference. The team is currently coached by Matt Painter. In Painter’s seven-year tenure as coach at Purdue, he has turned them into a perennial contender, making the NCAA Tournament in each of the last six years, including consecutive runs to the Sweet Sixteen in 2009 and 2010. Painter holds a record of 160-77 in his tenure at the school including turning the team from a nine-win squad in 2006 to a 22-win squad in 2007.
The team played its first game in 1896, and since then, have been one of the preeminent teams in NCAA history. The team won at least one conference title in every decade between the 1910s and the 1940s including a Helms national championship in 1932. Despite their early success, it was not until 1969 that the team found their way in the NCAA Tournament. After a nearly ten-year gap between appearances, throughout the course of the 1980s, the team embarked on a miraculous run of success. In 1980, the team reached its second Final Four, and under coach Gene Keady, the team would make seventeen appearances in the NCAA Tournament, with two Elite Eight appearances and six Big Ten titles. Notably, Keady defeated Bob Knight’s Indiana Hoosiers in 21 of their 41 meetings.
Purdue has featured two National Players of the Year in John Wooden in 1932 and Glenn Robinson in 1994. The team has also featured eleven players selected as consensus all-Americans seventeen times. Purdue is also notable for being one of just seven schools that have featured more than one first overall selection in the NBA Draft with Joe Barry Carroll in 1980 and Glenn Robinson in 1994. Overall, the team has featured 20 players selected in the first two rounds of the NBA Draft, and eight in the first round. Most recently, JaJuan Johnson was selected 27th overall in the 2011 NBA Draft.
Purdue plays a variety of rivalry games; however, none take on as much importance as the game between the Boilermakers and their in-state foe, the Indiana Hoosiers. While this has always been a heated rivalry, dating back to their first game in 1901; however, the matchups between Keady and Knight took this rivalry to a national stage. Purdue leads the series 112-86 in their nearly 200 meetings.
