A culture thing

I don't know what Purdue's men's basketball team will look like next season with Zach Edey gone -- I suspect the Boilermakers will be good again, if different -- but I do know one thing. And it's not because I'm a seer or a genius or anything like it.

("Gee, there's a revelation," you're saying now.)

I think the vibe will be the same. Different look or not.

I think this because Matt Painter is still Purdue's coach, and Painter does Build-A-Culture better than almost anyone else in college buckets. And he does it in an era when building a culture seems endearingly old-timey, like eight-tracks and Betamax and telephones with 12-foot-long cords.

You watch Purdue these days, and it's like going to your grandmother's house. Everything in it is 50 years old, but somehow it feels comforting and familiar and right because of that.

And, no, this is not because Painter's teams play the game the way they played it in 1960. It's because ... 

Well. Let's take what happened last week, for instance.

Last week Painter's top recruit, four-star stud Kanon Catchings, asked to be released from his letter of intent. Then, according to Painter, he "went back the next day and said everything was good."

Painter granted him his release anyway. 

He granted the release, he told Nathan Baird of the Indianapolis Star the other day, because Painter recognized Catchings' priorities were different from Purdue's. Regarded by some an NBA player sooner rather than later, Catchings began his high school career at Brownsburg, then transferred before his senior year to Overtime Elite, a basketball mill for high-end recruits in Georgia. He's now headed for BYU -- where his Overtime Elite coach was just hired as an assistant coach -- and his mother, Tauja, told the Star it was because Kanon is "looking for a program that can support his timeline" to the NBA.

Painter's response was, essentially, go with God, son. Wish you all the best.

"It was like, this is probably better that we can kind of part ways if you're questioning things before things start," Painter told Baird.

You could almost hear the shrug in that. And read between the lines that Catchings might have been concerned with how much playing time he was going to get on a still-loaded Purdue squad, and wanted some assurances regarding that.

Perhaps that's unfair to the young man. But if so, Painter's response was surely that he couldn't guarantee minutes to anyone, that minutes were earned in West Lafayette.

Because, again, culture -- funny little anachronism that it is in the time of NILs and unrestricted transfers and more players than ever looking to showcase their talents for the NBA.

There's nothing wrong with any of that, understand. But it's just not the way Painter does things, and likely never will.

And so, good for Catchings, and for his pursuit. But good for Matt Painter, too.