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College basketball rankings: Houston jumps to No. 1 in Top 25 And 1 after Purdue's loss to Maryland – CBS Sports
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For the third consecutive day, there’s a new No. 1 in the CBS Sports Top 25 And 1 daily college basketball rankings. On Wednesday morning, it was Alabama. On Thursday morning, it was Purdue. Now, on Friday morning, it’s Houston — because Matt Painter’s Boilermakers lost for the third time in four outings Thursday night, this time 68-54 at Maryland.
“We have to be tougher,” Painter said following the loss that pulled Northwestern to just one game back of the first-place Boilermakers in the loss column of the Big Ten standings. “You have to come in here and win the possession battle. You have to have more rebounds and fewer turnovers. Now you can start right there and work toward something — [but] we didn’t do that. When you get on the road and you have fewer possessions [than your opponent], and now you don’t shoot well, oh, that’s going to be a long night versus a quality team.”
To Painter’s point, Purdue finished with 12 fewer rebounds than Maryland, including seven fewer offensive rebounds, took three fewer shots, six fewer free throws and made just 15.4% of its 3-point attempts. It was indeed a long night in a troubling stretch that has the Boilermakers slipping closer and closer to maybe being something less than a No. 1 seed in the 2023 NCAA Tournament, which seemed way unlikely just two weeks ago when they were 22-1 overall, 11-1 in the Big Ten.
They’re now 23-4 overall, 12-4 in the Big Ten.
That’s still great, obviously — but there’s no getting around the idea that Purdue has come back to Earth a bit for a variety of reasons, among them the fact that freshman guard Fletcher Loyer is just 7 of 27( 25.9%) from the field in the Boilermakers’ past three losses. Also worth noting: Purdue is 13 of 53 (24.5%) as a team from 3-point range in its past three losses.
Purdue is down to No. 4 in Friday morning’s updated CBS Sports Top 25 And 1 — behind No. 1 Houston, No. 2 Alabama and No. 3 Kansas. The Boilermakers will return to the court Sunday, when they host struggling Ohio State at 1 p.m. ET on CBS.
In: Maryland Out: FAU
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