When Tad Boyle looks at Purdue, one of the marquee nonconference foes this season for the Colorado men’s basketball team, he notes a few similarities. And not just in the color scheme of the jerseys.
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Like the Buffaloes through the bulk of Boyle’s 16 previous seasons at CU, Purdue head coach Matt Painter has built a perennial Big Ten power that has leaned heavily on player retention and long-term development.
When Boyle talks with Painter, however, the differences between the programs loom large. And they loom largely along the bottom line.
CU’s Dec. 19 date against the Boilermakers in Indianapolis is one of several challenging nonconference matchups that will test the Buffaloes ahead of Big 12 play. CU plays San Diego State in San Diego in the inaugural Bill Walton Classic in the second game of the season Nov. 7. The Buffs complete a home-and-home series at Providence on Nov. 14. The week of Thanksgiving, CU faces Stanford and either Grand Canyon or Saint Louis at the Acrisure Series in Palm Desert, California.
As CU begins preseason workouts ahead of Boyle’s 17th season at CU, the Buffs will learn quickly if they have the mettle to compete in the rugged Big 12. Yet the early dates also could reveal just how Colorado’s lagging basketball budget holds up against national competition.
Boyle has a longstanding professional relationship with Painter, dating back to their days as assistants at competing programs in the Missouri Valley Conference — Boyle at Wichita State, Painter at Southern Illinois, where he eventually took over as head coach.
Boyle also has recent ties with the Providence program, as CU assistant Nate Tomlinson was an assistant with the Friars under Kim English, a former Buffs assistant. English brought Providence to the Events Center last year but was fired after the season.
So when Boyle references a financial playing field he knows isn’t level with CU’s basketball budget, the numbers are coming from actual conversations with the parties involved.
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“Purdue is a program that has traditionally retained players and developed players like we have. I think they’ve done a better job of retaining players than we have in the NIL era,” Boyle said. “I’ve talked to Matt Painter about that, and I think a lot of it has to do with budget.
“(San Diego State’s) Brian Dutcher is a good coach. San Diego State’s a good program. Providence has a new coach but they’ve got a really healthy budget. Nate worked there. I know what they pay their players and how they recruit. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t beat them. It just means we know they’re going to have talent. How quickly that talent comes together relative to how quickly our talent comes together — and what’s the talent discrepancy? — we don’t know that.”
CU’s nonconference slate also includes nine home dates, beginning with the season opener Nov. 2 against Abilene Christian. Getting quality opponents to play a road game at altitude always has been a challenge at CU, and the highlight of this year’s early home ledger is a Dec. 5 rivalry matchup against Colorado State.
The challenge of lining up a quality home slate has been magnified in the transfer portal era, as projected rosters often aren’t finalized when teams agree to matchups.
“The thing that’s changed is that it’s not as much about your team now as it is the opponent,” Boyle said. “I have no idea how good San Diego State is going to be. I know they’ve been good in the past but in today’s age of college basketball, we’re all dealing with the same issues.
“You’ve got to win games in November and December to get a tournament resume put together. You’ve got to win those games to get your NET ranking. We’ll be challenged. It’s just different scheduling now than it was because you don’t always know how your team is going to be when you schedule those games. And you don’t know how the opponent’s going to be. It’s a little bit of the luck of the draw.”
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