Preseason play begins
 By
Doug Healey
Assistant Sports Editor
Tonight's 7 p.m. game in Mackey Arena marks the
start of the men's basketball exhibition season, but it also marks the
return of Carson Cunningham, a graduate student at Purdue who plays
point guard for the International Select team, which lost to Notre Dame
108-75 Thursday night.
"I think it's gonna be interesting," said senior
John Allison, who played with Cunningham for three years. "I'm looking
to stick it to him, personally. I'm eager to see what he's gonna pull
out of his bag of tricks because Carson's pretty much a magician on
the court, so we'll see what he does."
Purdue coach Gene Keady said he compares an exhibition
game to the dress rehearsal of a play.
"You gotta get your uniforms on right, you gotta
get the costumes there and you gotta get adjusted to the visuals," said
Keady. "It's a great starter for the season because you gotta go through
all of the things it takes to become a winner."
Senior Rodney Smith said he's excited to get the
season started.
"I'm sick of practicing and I'm ready to play some
games so our team can see how to play at a high level every day," he
said.
Playing at a high level includes the exhibition
games, not just the regular season, Smith said.
"We approach it like any other game," he said.
"We want to go out and try to blow people out by playing good, solid
defense, rebounding well and running a good offense.
"The No. 1 thing we need to work on is defense,
and the second most important thing we need to work on is rebounding
because those are the worst two things we did last year as a team."
This will be the first game for three new Boilermakers
— Darmetreis Kilgore, Brandon McKnight and Matt Carroll. Smith
said it's a good opportunity for the new players to get used to a game-type
atmosphere.
"It's good because the crowd's yelling; you have
to play at an intense level, be able to make shots and get back on defense,"
he said. "It's good for the young guys so they can get carry-over from
practice."
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