Upsets, and alerts

 They closed the book on Day 1 of the Madness last night, and damn right there were upsets. Some squared-jawed kid who looked like he stepped out of the 1950s shot down 3-seed Kentucky. A 13-seed, Samford, made lordly Kansas pee its pants before losing by four. 

Three 11s (Duquesne, Oregon and North Carolina State) beat three 6s (BYU, South Carolina and Texas Tech). And then there was that 14-over-3, Oakland from the Horizon League showing John Calipari's crew the door -- led by the aforementioned squared-jawed kid, Jack Gohlke, who drowned the Wildcats beneath a rain of 10 threes.

And today?

Today, or rather, tonight, the object lesson of Day 1 presumably will not be lost on Purdue. 

It is, after all, the demon that has both haunted and driven the Boilermakers for a solid year, and tonight they confront it at last. The ghost of Fairleigh Dickenson either gets exorcised for good, or it morphs into the ghost of Grambling and another year's bedevilment. 

The upsets of Thursday, traditionally, become the upset alerts for Friday in these first days of Da Tournament. But for Purdue, a 1-seed in against a 16-seed once more, the upset alert for tonight happened 12 months ago, when the Boilermakers lost to the aforementioned Fairleigh Dickinson and their rep as  pre-eminent March chokers became cast in some base metal.

The world being the mean and twisted place it is, there are folks practically lusting for a Fairleigh Dickinson repeat, because nothing makes you a figure of loathing like success. Two straight Big Ten titles and two straight No. 1 seeds comes with its own forbidding territory, and so Purdue has become a villain in some quarters, led by a 7-4 monster named Zach Edey -- whom the uneducated say is Just Tall, and the unobservant miss what a decent young man he is.

Radio tonsil Dan LeBatard called him a "plague" the other day, and said in so many words that the way Purdue plays makes him ill. Some other radio tonsil got on the air and said if Purdue doesn't make the Final Four THIS time, the school should part ways with head coach Matt Painter.

Which proves that just as there's no accounting for taste sometimes, there's also no accounting for stupidity. And there's a lot of it out there to account for these days.

The flip side to all that is how many people are saying this isn't the same Purdue team as last year's, and how much that is a Mr. Obvious pronouncement. Edey is even more a force than he was a year ago, and he plays on a team for which he doesn't have to be. Braden Smith has gone from callow freshman to one of the nation's best point guards. Fletcher Loyer found his shooting touch from the three-point arc, lost it, and then resumed arc-welding.

Transfer Lance Jones gives the Purdue backcourt an element of athleticism it didn't have a year ago. The bench is deeper and can come at you in more ways. The Boilers who died at the arc last year knock 'em down regularly now.

Conclusion and/or fearless prediction: Grambling is not going to be this year's Fairleigh Dickinson.

Conclusion and/or fearless prediction, the sequel: Purdue has put so much weight on this moment, invested so much energy and grim purpose, that real Upset Alert might be awaiting it Sunday.

If the Boilers win tonight, see, they'll get either nine-seed TCU or eight-seed Utah State. If the chalk holds, it'll be Utah State. The Aggies are 27-6 and have four double-figure scorers, and they have two guards (Ian Martinez and Darius Brown II) who've made at least 48 threes this season. And they have four guards who play heavy minutes (24 minutes or more per) and average 8.5 points or better.

In other words, the Aggies are guard-driven. And it's guard-driven teams who tend to give Purdue the most trouble.

Not sayin'. Just sayin'. 

And alertin', as it were.