The whiteboard in the Purdue locker room didn’t make it out of March Madness intact after the Boilermakers were upset by FDU in the first round.
There are two sides to every March Madness upset. There’s the underdog, elated after pulling off the impossible, and there’s the favorite, stunned by a turn of events only reserved for their nightmares.
On Friday, FDU got to leave the court in Columbus on cloud nine having defied every odd to become the second No. 16 seed in NCAA Tournament history to beat a No. 1 seed.
Purdue, on the other hand, headed for their locker room as defeated laughingstocks who will have to process the pain of a historic upset for years to come.
And then someone punched the white board.
Someone destroyed Purdue’s whiteboard after the FDU upset
Reporters who got access to the Purdue locker room after the game immediately tweeted photos of the damaged whiteboard.
They also took note of a mark on All-American Zach Edey’s arm.
Put two and two together and you get a pretty good picture of what happened after the loss.
And who could blame whoever it was who took their frustration out on the board? It was literally the biggest upset in the history of college basketball. How does a player on a team that had national title aspirations process that?
The Boilermakers stormed through the Big Ten for the conference and tournament title. They boasted one of the best players in the country. The shortest team in Division I wasn’t supposed to pose them any problems.
Purdue’s players and coach can at least consult the Virginia Cavaliers, who are the only other No. 1 seed to go down in the first round. UMBC, who had just the perfect response to this latest upset, knocked off the Cavs in 2018. Now they have some company in the history books.
