Purdue run down by Michigan State

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (WISH) - Take two key players out of your lineup, any team would suffer, but when its Purdue's hottest shooter and best defender, its trouble. The emotion Purdue played with for a half ran dry, as did their shooting touch, and league-leading Michigan State ran away to victory.

"It's just different with their size and athleticism and ours. They get layups and they make them, we get layups and we miss them," said Purdue coach Matt Painter. Robbie Hummel, who led the Boilers with 24 points, 15 rebounds knows games in February are big.

"We basically prepared for this game same as we do any other game. At this point in the season, every game is huge. Obviously we really wanted to win this one extremely bad, but unfortunately we didn't."

For the first time after their off the court discipline that suspended D.J. Byrd for one game and sent Cathedral grad Kelsey Barlow home, the Boilermaker players opened up.

"It's a bad thing, you never want anything like that to happen to your program, but the guys in the locker room and the people that know this program and all the players know it was just a mistake, every kid makes mistakes," said senior Lewis Jackson.

Fellow senior Ryne Smith thinks it will bring the team together. "Honestly, I think its addition by subtraction., DJ's going to come back in full force, he's a great player for us, and I'll tell you one thing, when he comes back on Wednesday night he'll be ready to go."

Michigan State coach Tom Izzo, who dealt with his own team discipline a year ago knows how tough things can get. "Distractions kill you. To be honest with you, the job he and his staff did to get this team ready to play under the circumstances they were given is incredible."

"When something happens and you gotta part ways with guys it doesn't make you feel good, it really doesn't, because in a way I failed also because you're trying to reach people, that’s our job, that's what we do. But you wish them well and you hope things work out and if this decision helped him in life then so be it," added Painter.

So Purdue slips to 7-7 in Big Ten play, but with Byrd returning, and two home games left with Nebraska and Penn State, the Boilers should be in good shape to keep themselves off the NCAA tournament bubble.