{"id":106764,"date":"2026-03-05T12:25:41","date_gmt":"2026-03-05T12:25:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/05\/top-25-roundup-no-15-purdue-ekes-out-victory-over-northwestern\/"},"modified":"2026-03-05T12:25:41","modified_gmt":"2026-03-05T12:25:41","slug":"top-25-roundup-no-15-purdue-ekes-out-victory-over-northwestern","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/05\/top-25-roundup-no-15-purdue-ekes-out-victory-over-northwestern\/","title":{"rendered":"Top 25 roundup: No. 15 Purdue ekes out victory over Northwestern"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<section id=\"0\" class=\" w-full\">\n<div class=\"xl:container mx-0 !px-4 py-0 pb-4 !mx-0 !px-0\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.deadspin.com\/tr:w-900\/28403733.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/images.deadspin.com\/tr:w-900\/28403733.jpg\" alt=\"NCAA Basketball: Purdue at Northwestern\" class=\"w-full\" fetchpriority=\"high\" loading=\"eager\"\/><span class=\"text-0.8 leading-tight\">Mar 4, 2026; Evanston, Illinois, USA; Purdue Boilermakers guard C.J. Cox (0) shoots the ball over Northwestern Wildcats guard Justin Mullins (20) during the first half at Welsh-Ryan Arena. Mandatory Credit: David Banks-Imagn Images<!-- --> <!-- --> <\/span><\/div>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-1\">\n<p>C.J. Cox scored 21 of his career-high 27 points after halftime and Trey Kaufman-Renn had 11 points and 10 rebounds to boost No. 15 Purdue to a 70-66 victory against Northwestern on Wednesday in Evanston, Ill.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-2\">\n<p>Purdue (23-7, 13-6 Big Ten) stopped a two-game skid while snapping a three-game winning streak for Northwestern (13-17, 5-14).<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-3\">\n<p>After Jordan Clayton drilled a corner 3-pointer to put the Wildcats ahead 66-65 with 1:03 remaining, the Boilermakers took the lead for good with a Cox trey on the ensuing possession. Purdue sealed the game from the free-throw line while capitalizing on two critical Wildcats turnovers in the last 36 seconds.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-4\">\n<p>Northwestern senior Nick Martinelli, the conference&#8217;s leading scorer, had 28 points in his final game at Welsh-Ryan Arena. Jayden Reid added 16 points for the Wildcats, who were without Jake West (ankle).<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-5\">\n<p>No. 7 Houston 77, Baylor 64<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-6\">\n<p>Sharpshooting Emanuel Sharp hit 5 of 10 3-point attempts in a 19-point outing as the Cougars closed their home schedule with a comeback win over the pesky Bears.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-7\">\n<p>Maintaining their one-game conference margin over third-place Texas Tech, the second-place Cougars (25-5, 13-4 Big 12) took their first lead with 7:16 left in the game and then roared away from the Bears (15-15, 5-12) behind a 20-3 run.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-8\">\n<p>Houston&#8217;s Kingston Flemings posted a game-high 21 points to go with seven assists, and Milos Uzan scored 12 points. Baylor&#8217;s Tounde Yessoufou totaled 20 points and 12 rebounds while Caden Powell had 12 points and six boards.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-9\">\n<p>No. 20 Arkansas 105, Texas 85<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-10\">\n<p>Darius Acuff Jr. had 28 points and tied a season high with 13 assists, senior Trevon Brazile scored a career-high 28 points in his final home game and the Razorbacks clinched a double bye in the Southeastern Conference tournament with a win over the Longhorns in Fayetteville, Ark.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<p><\/p>\n<section id=\"section-11\">\n<p>D.J. Wagner scored 15 points and Meleek Thomas added 13 points for Arkansas (22-8, 12-5 SEC), which bounced back strongly after a 111-77 loss at then-No. 7 Florida on Saturday.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-12\">\n<p>Matas Vokietaitis scored 21 points, Tramon Mark added 18 points and Dailyn Swain had 16 points, nine rebounds and six assists for Texas (18-12, 9-8).<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-13\">\n<p>No. 22 Miami 77, SMU 69<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-14\">\n<p>Tre Donaldson scored 17 points and Malik Reneau added 14 points and 11 rebounds to help the Hurricanes beat the short-handed Mustangs in Dallas.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-15\">\n<p>The win guaranteed Miami (24-6, 13-4 Atlantic Coast Conference) a third-place finish in the conference standings and a double bye in the upcoming league tournament. The Hurricanes tied the school record for regular-season victories.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-16\">\n<p>The loss keeps the Mustangs (19-11, 8-9) in a logjam at the middle of the league standings, with a move up to eighth still a possibility if SMU can beat Florida State in its final regular-season game. Jaron Pierre Jr. scored 27 points and Boopie Miller added 21 for SMU.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-17\">\n<p>No. 25 Saint Louis 79, Loyola Chicago 65<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-18\">\n<p>Amari McCottry scored 18 points as the Billikens closed the home portion of their schedule a perfect 19-0 with a win over the Ramblers.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-19\">\n<p>Dion Brown tallied 15 points and Robbie Avila pitched in 12 points as Saint Louis (27-3, 15-2 Atlantic 10) clinched a share of the league&#8217;s regular-season title, the No. 1 seed and a double bye in next week&#8217;s conference tournament. Saint Louis also tied a school record with its 22nd straight home win.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-20\">\n<p>Xavier Amos led Loyola Chicago (7-23, 3-14) with 25 points as he hit 6 of 7 3-point attempts. Kayde Dotson added 19 points for the Ramblers, who have lost five of their past six games.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"section-21\">\n<p>&#8211;Field Level Media<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/deadspin.com\/top-25-roundup-no-15-purdue-ekes-out-victory-over-northwestern\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mar 4, 2026; Evanston, Illinois, USA; Purdue Boilermakers guard C.J. Cox (0) shoots the ball over Northwestern Wildcats guard Justin Mullins (20) during the first<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":106765,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[177],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-106764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106764\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neclink.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}