HONOLULU — Towering Zach Edey and the Purdue Boilermakers reached the Maui mountaintop.
They just had to go to Oahu to do it.
Edey, a 7-foot-4 throwback center, had the key putback with 16 seconds left to cap his 28-point, 15-rebound effort and the No. 2 Boilermakers earned their first Allstate Maui Invitational championship in four tries in the prestigious early-season college basketball tournament with a 78-75 win over No. 4 Marquette.
The 40th edition of the event was held at the University of Hawaii’s SimpliFi Arena at the Stan Sheriff Center because of the Aug. 8 wildfires that destroyed much of historic Lahaina town, the longtime home of the tournament. About 4,000 vocal fans mostly split between the Purdue and Marquette fan bases, gave the game a worthy championship feel.
Purdue (6-0), Matt Painter’s hard-nosed Big Ten team from Indiana, had to fight its way through one of the most stacked Maui fields ever — No. 11 Gonzaga, No. 7 Tennessee and another Final Four contender in Marquette (5-1) over two and a half days.
Edey, the reigning Naismith Player of the Year in college basketball, had players hanging off of him constantly as he battled his way to the rim. At one point, Marquette’s 6-foot-10 Oso Ighodaro was assessed a flagrant foul for pinning Edey’s arm to hold him down from grabbing a rebound.
Painter said Edey could win another top player award.
“He’s a horse. He’s a moose down there,” Painter said. “When he comes to compete, which he does … he plays hard.”
He got supportive efforts from guards Braden Smith (18 points), Fletcher Loyer (10) and Lance Jones (11), the last of whom hit a three-quarter-court heave that dropped through the net for a 45-33 lead at the break. It was one of the longest shots ever hit in the Sheriff, which opened in 1994.
Jones and Edey were asked who had the better shot.
“His was the winning putback, so I’ll say his,” Jones said.
Said Edey, “It was 100 feet away, I dunno; it’s hard to compete with that.”
For the entire first half, Purdue seemed immune to the chaos that Marquette caused against top-ranked Kansas in Tuesday’s semifinal.
Marquette, Shaka Smart’s smaller but more explosive group, staged a second-half rally from 15 points down early in the second half.
Edey was a load for Ighodaro, who had to take an early seat with foul trouble. But Ighodaro, the focal point of the Golden Eagles’ attack with his athleticism and play-making ability, flushed a two-handed dunk past Edey on a drop-off from Kam Jones to make it a three-point game with under three minutes left.
The Golden Eagles got a critical stop and Ighodaro stuck a 10-foot floater over Edey to get within 76-75 with under a minute to go.
Purdue’s Smith missed a 3-pointer, but Edey was right there for the offensive rebound and put back for a three-point lead with 16 seconds left.
The Golden Eagles’ Tyler Kolek, who led his team with 22 points, missed a 3 but Purdue’s Mason Gillis and Edey missed front ends of 1-and-1 free throws to give Marquette a chance to tie at the buzzer.
Kam Jones bobbled the ball at mid-court and got off an awkward shot that was well short.
Lance Jones said he was instructed by Painter to take a foul to prevent a 3-point shot, but improvised he saw Kam Jones off-balance.
“I (decided) to play him straight up,” Jones said.
Purdue came up short in Maui appearances in 1999, 2006 and 2014. Marquette was also playing for its first Maui title.
“They earned the win today. We had some misfortune at different times in the game, but to win games like this you have to overcome misfortune,” said Golden Eagles coach Shaka Smart, who slapped the elevated wooden court several times to exhort his team for more intensity.
“Regardless of circumstances, we have to play our way,” Smart said. “What we do, it’s not going to work against Purdue unless you can do it with max effort.”
Ighodaro scored 12 of his 18 in the second half and shot 8-for-10.
Brian McInnis covers the state's sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii. He can be reached at brian.mcinnis@charter.com.