O'Gara: Why there's great irony in Purdue preparing for Donovan Clingan, UConn

They won’t do the Spiderman meme, but maybe they should.

Zach Edey and Donovan Clingan squaring off in a national championship feels like a throwback matchup that’ll remind the older generation of Hakeem Olajuwon vs. Patrick Ewing in the 1984 title game. Forty years later, a battle of the bigs won’t quite be of that stature, nor will it be a battle of guys who are mirror images of each other (I should’ve explained that the Spiderman meme is 2 guys dressed up like Spiderman who are pointing at each other … you get it). Edey’s craftiness around the rim is superior to Clingan’s, which makes sense given considering that the Purdue center had a 2-year head start on the UConn star.

But irony? Oh, that’s there with these 2.

Purdue fans have gone to bat for Edey and the way he’s officiated. The All-American averages about 2 calls against him per game. Against Tennessee in the Elite Eight, he drew 10 fouls before he was whistled for his first foul. That’s standard for Edey. Nobody in America draws more fouls than him at 10 per game.

Dare I say, Edey might have met his polarizing equal in Clingan.

Spend any time watching Clingan and you’ll see that Edey isn’t the only 7-footer who draws frustration from opposing fan bases based on the way he’s officiated. In the NCAA Tournament, Clingan averaged 2 fouls per game. He hasn’t hit 4 fouls in a game since Feb. 14 vs. DePaul — he only hit that mark 4 times all season — and he hasn’t fouled out of a game in his career.

Yes, something’s gotta give.

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Will both teams trust their 7-footers to defend without fouling? It wouldn’t be surprising. Clingan is a different matchup for Purdue than Alabama, which didn’t have anyone capable of matching his size and eventually brought on the double teams more in the second half. It didn’t help the Tide that Grant Nelson picked up a pair of early fouls and a thin front-court was limited even more in its attempt to slow down Clingan.

As we saw with Clingan, sometimes, even playing perfect defense still can bring on a whistle:

If this is a foul on Nick Pringle, just let Donovan Clingan sit in an empty gym with a ladder. pic.twitter.com/oJEJ1DTXhc

— Connor O’Gara (@cjogara) April 7, 2024

Yes, Clingan will get some of those calls in his favor. Brace yourself, Purdue fans.

There’ll also be times when it looks like Clingan forces contact at the rim, and he still somehow doesn’t get whistled. Nelson put the UConn big man on a poster, yet there wasn’t a foul called even though it appeared that Clingan’s off-hand knocked him to the ground:

GRANT NELSON OH MY GOODNESS 😱#MarchMadness @AlabamaMBB pic.twitter.com/6qi24R5ZBm

— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) April 7, 2024

But again, Clingan didn’t get in any sort of foul trouble on Saturday night. He’s an excellent defender, which was why he had 4 blocks, 2 of which came in the first 2 minutes. He also isn’t shy about contesting at the rim and daring officials to blow the whistle.

Sound like anybody else you know, Purdue fans?

Don’t get it twisted. This isn’t some plea that both bigs be whistled for a bunch of cheap fouls and they spend the majority of Monday night on the bench. That’s no fun. That’d be a repeat of the 2007 title game when Joakim Noah and Greg Oden both got into foul trouble early. Oden still played 38 minutes, but Noah was limited to just 21. It changed Florida’s flow of the game, but the Gators overcame it. Oden was brilliant with 25 points and 12 rebounds. It just wasn’t enough to prevent Florida from making history by repeating as national champs.

The irony is that 17 years later, Edey is trying to do what Oden and the Buckeyes couldn’t. That is, avoid being a historic footnote in a repeat bid.

Even if UConn does win yet another NCAA Tournament game by at least 13 points — all 11 NCAA Tournament wins during this 2-year run have checked that box — Matt Painter’s squad did more than enough to move past its March woes. Of course, finally cutting down the nets for the first time in program history is the last remaining goal for Monday night. Doing so by slowing down Clingan and the immovable Huskies would only add to the legend.

A Clingan-Edey matchup was the only fitting way for this tournament to come to a close. Purdue could very well see how the rest of college basketball feels by night’s end. Alternatively, Edey could have 1 more take-no-prisoners showing in the tank for Clingan. A year removed from Purdue’s loss to 16-seed Fairleigh Dickinson, which was the shortest team in Division I, going out on top against the other elite 7-footer in the sport would be … ironic?

Nope. It’d be perfect.