Purdue loses at Illinois

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (WLFI) - Matt Painter was ejected for the first time in his Purdue head coaching career as the Boilermakers dropped a 79-59 decision to Illinois Wednesday night in Champaign, Ill.

Painter was assessed consecutive technicals with a little over eight minutes in the game, earning an automatic ejection. By then the game was out of reach as the Boilermakers could never get within single digits of the Illini the second half.

“You want your team to play harder, you want your team to embrace the physicality of the game and then they weren't,” said Purdue head coach Matt Painter. “It's just the whole game they push and they push and we do have a physical guy now at 280 pounds and you can’t just wail on him. Throughout the course of the game he just ignored it. That's what I was really arguing with him about.” Said Painter.

Terone Johnson led Purdue with 18 points. A.J. Hammons and D.J. Byrd added 10 points as the Boilermakers lost for the fourth time in their last five games.

"It's just frustrating for it to be February and those types of things are still happening. For us to come out knowing that's how we won last game against Illinois, knowing they'd come two times harder at us, I don't understand why we'd get out-rebounded and outplayed," said junior guard Terone Johnson.

Purdue drops to 5-7 in Big Ten and 12-13 overall.

D.J. Richardson scored 18 points to lead Illinois.