Impact on Purdue basketball program intertwine Glenn Robinson, Jaden Ivey

MILWAUKEE – Different era. Different generation.

Similar impact?

Nearly 30 years ago, Glenn Robinson almost single-handily took Purdue’s program to the Final Four, which would’ve ended a 14-year drought. This season, the gap between Final Four berths has grown to more than four decades and can Jaden Ivey carry the Boilermakers to college basketball’s ultimate prize? 

This isn’t a story comparing Robinson – or if you prefer Big Dog – and Ivey, an electrifying and talented guard who is one of the fastest humans in the sport with a basketball in his hands.

The 6-foot-8 Robinson was a forward. The 6-4 Ivey is a guard.

Their skillsets are different, but both can beat defenders off the dribble and live in the paint. Robinson’s overall strength allowed the Gary native to battle through contact and his competitive spirit fueled him to dominate the competition. Ivey’s ability to twist and turn his body around defenders at the rim is one element that makes him an All-America level talent and one NBA teams crave.

Ivey won’t lead the nation in scoring – as Robinson did his last year with the program and earn consensus national player of the year honors – in part because of how coach Matt Painter assembled this year’s team, which begins NCAA tournament play Friday against Yale in Milwaukee.

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“I think Jaden is the most talented player to come through here since then,” said Painter, a teammate of Robinson's during the 1992-93 season. “He’s in a different position; he has the ball more, so he’s a different player being a lead guard. But we haven’t – since Glenn Robinson – had a lottery pick, let alone the first pick of the draft.”

Lottery selection

Robinson was the first overall pick in the NBA Draft in 1994, selected by the Milwaukee Bucks, the beginning of an 11-year professional career that was cut short by injuries.

While Ivey won’t be the No. 1 pick in this year’s draft, he’s considered a lottery selection. Although Ivey hasn’t made an announcement regarding his future, all signs point to him leaving Purdue after this season to begin his professional career.

Robinson didn’t have a two-headed center, including a 7-4 bemouth in the middle, the numerous 3-point shooters, or the deep bench that Ivey plays with to alleviate the scoring pressure that has made Purdue one of the top offensive teams in the country.

“Glenn was a bigger player, but both of them are vastly talented,” said current Purdue assistant coach Brandon Brantley, a teammate of Robinson’s at Purdue. “Glenn had a different mentality. Glenn is a guy, who grew up right across the street in the projects by Gary Roosevelt. He had a mentality that he was going to kill everything in his path – it didn’t matter what it was.

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“I think his skill got better as he went along. There were some guys that you could argue were more skilled, but Glenn’s will was so strong you couldn’t break him. That’s not to say you can break Jaden’s (will) but Jaden is a different kid, a different generation but he’s a guard, uber-athletic. He can get by people and he can shoot.”

As Purdue begins this highly anticipated journey through the NCAA tournament, Ivey is the centerpiece of how far Painter’s team can go. He’ll need help from centers Zach Edey and Trevion Williams, the 3-point shooting to improve, the deep bench to produce, and the Boilermakers to take care of the ball.

Purdue likely can’t make it all the way to New Orleans without Ivey at the top of his game, similar to when Robinson almost took the program to the Final Four in 1994.

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“Glenn was the type of guy you want in a bar fight,” said former Purdue coach Gene Keady, who recruited Robinson to the program. “He’s a tough cookie. He would fight for you until death. He’s the best player I coached except for Sidney Moncrief at Arkansas.

“He had a warrior mentality – he was going to battle to the end, had great skills, and was hungry. He played hungry.”

Robinson’s 44 points against Kansas in the Sweet 16 advanced Purdue to face Duke in the Elite Eight where the Blue Devils prevailed. The Boilermakers have been on the doorstep of the Final Four two other times since then – 2000 and 2019.

'Smart kid'

“When Jaden’s got it going, we have to put the ball in his hands if we want to win games and when he’s cooking, we’re really hard to stop,” Brantley said. “It’s the same when we put the ball in Glenn’s hands - they’re just so talented.”

Keady called Ivey “a smart kid that plays hard. That’s a pretty high compliment. And he takes the ball to the hole. I like that. It’s the way he attacks the goal and plays good D.”

The 85-year old Keady, who lives in South Carolina but will be attending Purdue’s NCAA tournament games, does see a similarity between the two superstars.

“I think the fact they want to win so bad is a parallel,” Keady said.

How Robinson went about winning is different from Ivey, who learned the game from his mother, Niele, a former star guard at Notre Dame and played for the WNBA’s Indiana Fever and is now the head coach for the Fighting Irish.

It doesn’t mean that Ivey can’t help the program move one step beyond where Robinson and the Boilermakers were stopped.   

To have a generational talent like Ivey is good for the program. Three of Painter’s players on this year’s team played in FIBA U19 World Cup last summer and Ivey and Caleb Furst contributed to Team USA winning the gold medal.

“I remember being around Glenn Robinson and all the attention he had to go through and it’s a good problem to have but it’s still difficult,” Painter said. “I think the attention Caleb (Furst) and Jaden and Zach got us by being in the U19’s really raised some eyebrows – Purdue’s got three guys competing at a pretty high level.

“We’ve had a lot of guys participating in the USA Basketball through the years, but this is a guy in terms of his projection is a lottery pick, which is something we haven’t had in a long time.” 

Mike Carmin covers Purdue sports for the Journal & Courier. Email mcarmin@gannett.com and follow on Twitter and Instagram @carmin_jc

EAST REGIONAL

Fiserv Forum, Milwaukee 

Friday

Purdue (27-7) vs. Yale (19-11)

Time: 2 p.m. 

TV: TBS

Radio: WAZY (96.5)

Second round: Winner plays either Texas or Virginia Tech on Sunday.