Upstart bait

 This is not how Purdue and Matt Painter wanted to be remembered, but they're stuck with it now. They're officially the school that keeps the Madness fed.

Or “upstart bait,” if you prefer.  Chum for all those ravenous Little Schools That Could. The One Shiner Moment that makes someone else's One Shining Moment possible.

Fairleigh Dickinson? 

Be honest. You thought Fairleigh Dickinson was a character in a Jane Austen novel.

You thought, as a teensy 16-seed going up against Zach Edey and 1-seed Purdue, it was Fairly Ridiculous to think the Knights were anything but dinner. 

You thought ...

And then the teensy Knights (smallest lineup in the tournament!) from teensy Fairleigh Dickinson started scurrying around the Boilers like fire ants, and the Purdues started going into Dazed And Confused mode, and, hey, look: Is that history I see?

You bet is. Fairleigh  Dickinson 63, Purdue 58. 16-seed over a 1-seed. Matt Painter suddenly becoming not one of America's finest coaches (which he is), but the guy who's now lost to a 13-seed, a 15-seed and a 16-seed in consecutive Dances.

Champion of the underdog, unwitting division. King of March Badness. That's Painter's albatross now.

(Even worse for Painter and Purdue: Indiana cruised past Kent State, which at least some of us saw coming. When so many people are making the Hoosiers a sexy pick to lose to a 13-seed, you can pretty much bet the house it won't happen. Upsets in this deal only seem to happen when no one's looking.)

Where were we again?

Oh, yeah. Purdue.

Who, when you step away from this, probably was facing its worst nightmare last night.

 That sounds absurd to say when the opponent was a team that lost 15 games this season and didn’t even win its humble conference, but not really. FDU is small, quick and unafraid. The Knights relentlessly attacked on offense, and doubled Edey on defense like a terrier with a mailman's pants leg in its mouth. And they can shoot.

All of the above has been the recipe for beating the Purdues all season. And it was last night.

A team that, outside of Edey, has struggled with its shooting confidence for the last six weeks really struggled with it, in the face of all that FDU fierceness. The Boilermakers missed 21 of 26 attempts from beyond the 3-point arc. They shot 35.8 percent from everywhere. You'd say they couldn't hit water if they fell out of a boat, but that might be too generous.

It was more like they couldn't hit water if they were knee-deep in it.

And so, down they go. Into the kind of history no one wants to occupy.

All the gurus who thought they were a paper 1-seed, they were right. So was Tobin Anderson, the hilarious FDU coach who called his shot when he said he saw no reason his Knights couldn't beat Purdue. And so were all those IU fans who now have something besides five moldy national championship banners with which to torture their rivals.

Purdue becoming only the second 1-seed ever to fall to a 16-seed? In the entire history of Da Tournament?

Ouch. That's gonna leave a mark.