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VOLUME 26, ISSUE 2 25 retained for situational use — but it continues to practice it mostly for the benefit of zone offense. "We still have to play the same way," Thompson said of zone. "We want to get our bigs looks and really feed off them, and with them, it's go- ing to be big to not turn the ball over when they see the double-team com- ing or they see different defenses. "But as guards on the outside, we don't want to settle (for threes) even though we have some really, re- ally good shooters on the team. We want to be able to make plays off the dribble, make plays for someone else and not settle for threes or settle for being passive, just passing the ball around the perimeter." DEEP AND VERSATILE On paper, Purdue's roster would seem to be the deepest Painter's had in West Lafayette, with eight players who've started double-digit games in their college careers. The Boilermakers project to be so deep that junior Basil Smother- man, a player with 20 career starts in the books, who helped Purdue win games last season and happens to be the team's best athlete, approached Painter in the summer about the possibility of redshirting. That might happen. That's depth. Effectively, Purdue has two re- turning starting centers, two return- ing starting shooting guards and two returning starting small forwards. And if Thompson and Swanigan earn starting positions, five of those eight past starters will be coming off the Boilermaker bench. "We have 13 guys on scholarship for the first time in a while," Painter said. "Any time you have guys that understand competition and go out there and try to get in front of peo- ple, they're going to get an opportu- nity to play. And not just having 10 or 11, but 13 guys, that just makes it even more competitive." How Painter manages all those pieces might be interesting. He will have options, in part due to the flexibility players like Edwards, Davis and Swanigan can provide. "I think we're versatile enough to go up against anybody in the coun- try," Davis said. "We can go big, we can go small, we can go super-big and we can go super-small. We have quick lineups and pound-the-ball-in- side lineups. There's a lot of things we can do." BIG GOALS After Purdue imploded in the fi- nal minute against Cincinnati last March, Boilermaker players fell numb in the locker room afterward, some of them consumed with emo- tion, others simply dazed, perhaps at the thought of having done so much last season only to come away with so little when it mattered most. Then, those players, all but two of which remain on Purdue's roster, couldn't have known that Hammons would be back to see his eligibility through to the end and that Swan- igan would eventually add an elite piece to a frontcourt already growing organically into something big. Had those returning players known then what they know now, perhaps that moment might have felt like more a beginning than an end. Now, the road back — and be- yond, Purdue hopes — begins. It starts with a non-conference slate that includes ranked oppo- nents Vanderbilt and Butler in West Lafayette and Indianapolis, respec- tively; an ACC/Big Ten Challenge trip to Pittsburgh; and neutral-site games against Old Dominion and either Florida or Saint Joseph's in the Hall of Fame Tip-Off Classic in Connecticut. Then, it's on to the Big Ten, where Maryland is a popular Preseason No. 1 pick nationally; Indiana is con- sidered a top-10 sort of team; and Michigan State and Wisconsin are still Michigan State and Wisconsin, both of them coming off Final Four berths. That says nothing about Michigan, now fully recovered from a walking-dead type of season rav- aged by injury, or Iowa, expected to be a tough out this season, too. Unlike last season, or the year be- fore, or the year before that, Purdue enters the winter surrounded by ex- pectations. The Boilermakers will delve into their non-conference season con- cerned — in the big picture, at least — about NCAA Tournament seed- ing, as opposed to just qualification. They'll enter the conference sea- son with credible championship as- pirations. "We're capable of everything," Hammons said. j