Nebraska men’s basketball has now lost back-to-back home games for the first time in the 2025-26 season after No. 13 Purdue held on to defeat the Huskers 80-77 in overtime.
The loss drops No. 7 Nebraska to 2-3 against ranked teams this season and 21-3 overall. The Boilermakers’ win moved them to 20-4 on the season and into a three-way tie for third in the Big Ten with Nebraska and Michigan State at 10-3.
“I thought our effort was great. We did a really good job executing,” Purdue coach Matt Painter said after the game. “We had a lot of really, really good looks that didn’t go down, especially in that second half, but our guys kept playing hard.”
Bad Start
Getting off to a good start has been a focus for the Huskers all season long. Tuesday, they did the exact opposite of that.
Purdue scored the first five points of the game, then eight of the first nine, then 14 of the first 15.
“The message to our guys was we lost that game in the first three minutes,” Fred Hoiberg said in his post-game press conference. “You dig yourself a hole, whatever it was, 14-1, call the timeout and we’re down double digits before the first media (timeout), and it’s hard to climb out of a hole against a team like that that’s got that type of experience, that type of leadership.“
The Huskers looked shell-shocked, out of character and lacked the toughness they normally play with.
Nebraska lacked the cutting and movement offensively, lacked the physicality defensively, didn’t generate steals or deflections and didn’t hit first on the defensive end when attempting to box out.
“We completely got away from who we were,” Hoiberg said. “Didn’t have much movement, we tried to go one-on-one, which to me is trying to get it all back at once.”
At halftime, Purdue led Nebraska 40-24.
Two seniors, Trey Kaufman-Renn and Oscar Cluff, out-rebounded Nebraska themselves in the first half, 16-14. Five of Cluff’s seven first-half rebounds were offensive rebounds.
The Huskers’ lack of size and physicality Tuesday night also showed in the first half, giving up 20 points in the paint and scoring just eight of their own.
The Comeback
The second half didn’t start much better than the first. The 16-point Boilermaker lead ballooned to 22 (46-24) just 64 seconds into the second stanza.
Nebraska dug as deep as they have all season to get out of the 22-point deficit, which still stood at 14 with 2:45 left in the game.
The Huskers found a way to force Purdue turnovers, deflect Purdue passes and convert those into points. They extended their defense to above the 3-point line, hard-hedged higher in their ball screen coverages and showed a 1-3-1 zone not just in the half court but three-quarter court.
The offense flowed much better in the second half for Nebraska. There was less standing and watching, less one-on-one play and more paint touches.
“We got back to running our offense and we were very efficient,” Hoiberg said. “We changed some things up defensively and I thought did a much better job with their hands and had good activity level.”
The catalyst for Nebraska’s turnaround was likely Berke Büyüktuncel’s tipped pass and dive for a loose ball at the midcourt line. It was a moment in the game, one in which Nebraska needed to get the sold-out Pinnacle Bank Arena crowd something to stand up and cheer for.
“That, to me, kind of flipped it when BK made those couple of hustle plays,” Hoiberg said. “I thought our execution was really good. But it starts when you make plays like that. Cale (Jacobsen) was the one at Rutgers that I thought flipped it when he went in there and had a couple of deflections and that got us going on the other end. We were talking and pleading for someone to go make a play. I thought BK made a couple of good ones for us.”
The Huskers showed their fight and refusal to give in, particularly when things go bad, which hasn’t been often in this season. Nebraska showed a determination, a toughness and the fight through adversity that Hoiberg has praised this team for all season.
Fixings
The Huskers haven’t been a great offensive rebounding team all season; in fact they haven’t been a great rebounding team overall in their 24 games.
Before the game, Purdue’s rebounding margin of plus-7.2 per game was 21st in the nation. They ranked 44th in the country in offensive rebounding percentage (35.6%).
Against Nebraska, the Boilermakers dominated the glass, out-rebounding Nebraska 54-37 and 21-6 on the offensive end.
After the game, Nebraska isn’t just the worst offensive rebounding team in the Big Ten; it’s one of the worst in the country. The Huskers’ 25.4 offensive rebounding percentage is 335th out of 365 Division I teams.
It hasn’t been an issue all season, but Tuesday night, the Huskers also lost the turnover margin 14-11. Eight of those turnovers were Boilermaker steals, dropping the Huskers from first in offensive steal percentage nationally to fourth (6.8%).
“The bottom line when you look at the box score, you give them 21 offensive rebounds and you turn the ball over 14 times, and that’s the game … When you give a team that many extra bullets, it’s hard to come out on top,” Hoiberg said.
