Boilers hope for help from
transfer players
By Keith Thomas
Assistant
Sports Editor
After sitting out a full
season, Purdue’s transfer trio is ready to make contributions to
a basketball team in need.
Now, it's a matter of finding
out where they fit into Gene Keady's 2000-01 Boilermaker basketball
team.
Keady lost five seniors to
graduation from last year's 24-10 team, all of whom had productive seasons
and careers.
Transfers Willie Deane, Joe
Marshall and Travis Best couldn't be arriving to assist this new-look
Boilermaker team at a better time.
"They're going to be kind
of fun to see how they put the pieces together," said Keady, who's entering
his 21st season as the Boilermaker head coach.
According to the trio, the
transition from their respective schools will not be that difficult
of an adjustment.
And according to returning
guard Maynard Lewis, it won't be too difficult an adjustment for the
rest of the Boilermakers either.
"I think they'll help in
all aspects of the game," said Lewis. "Travis is a great shooter, Joe
is really athletic and Willie looks like a scoring point guard to me."
With eight of the 13 players
on Keady's roster being guards, which includes all three transfers,
there are going to be some positional adjustments as well.
"I've been working a lot
at small forward right now," said Marshall, who is a junior transfer
from Mississippi State. "It shouldn't be a big transition for me."
With the trial of Marshall
at small forward, Deane and Best have been able to continue to challenge
for a starting job at guard.
Although senior Carson Cunningham
is now the point guard, he is also nursing sore knees from offseason
surgery and is on a "strict minute diet," according to Keady.
This opens the door for Deane and Best to gain some playing time at
the point.
Deane, who transferred to
Purdue from Boston College, has no problem with pushing the ball up
the floor for the Boilers.
"I prefer the (point), but
I can play (2-guard) if they need me to score," said Deane, who proved
that when he came off the bench to score 19 points in Purdue's first
exhibition on Nov. 2 against Athletes in Action.
Keady said that when Deane
isn’t relieving Cunningham at point, letting him shoot the ball
won’t be a problem either.
"Like most eastern guys,
he hasn't seen a shot he doesn't like and I like that because he's not
afraid to shoot and if I say something about it he doesn't take it personal,"
said Keady.
However, if Deane plays some
at point guard, Best will remain primarily at shooting guard, which
doesn’t bother Keady either.
"Travis has really been impressive
in shooting," Keady said.
Several of Best’s teammates
say he may be the best shooter of the three transfers.
Best, a Frankfort, Ind.,
native and transfer from Louisville, said he thinks he can help the
team by tossing up some long shots.
"I think I can provide some
three-point shooting," said Best. "My overall goal is to help this team
win, so I’ll do whatever it takes to reach that goal."
Best added that no matter
what role the transfers play on the team, which has been picked by many
preseason prognostications to finish in the lower half of the Big Ten,
they are going to enjoy every minute of it.
"After sitting out last year,
I think we all have something to prove this year," said Best. "And with
this team being picked sixth to ninth (in the Big Ten), I think we're
all hungry."
One reason this Boilermaker
team hasn’t received a lot of positive preseason hype is because
of the losses of key players from last year’s team, such as forward
Brian Cardinal and guard Jaraan Cornell.
Best said he thinks this
year’s squad won’t resemble last year’s much, if at all.
"We'll see a totally different
offensive style from this team and probably defensive style too," Best
said. "Last year's team was very good, but it was just a different style
team."
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