Purdue Releases Italy Basketball Schedule

Today Purdue Sports released the basketball schedule for the mens basketball trip to Italy. The games are as follows:

August 9th vs All Star Italy

August 12th vs Atletas Kaunus

August 14th vs Vicenza All Star

August 16th vs Amici del Campetto

This trip comes at a perfect time for the basketball program. The 2007 recruiting class is now done at Purdue and the Boilers will be breaking in a new class with big expectations. While this trip is hugely beneficial for the team in general, it may be even more so for freshman Ronnie Johnson and AJ Hammons.

RJ is expected to have the starting point guard position from day one. Going from high school to college is always an adjustment, but being given the reigns of the team is a big responsibility. Going up against guards in professional league will help that process. With Hammons you can say the same thing. The teams Purdue is taking on are going to have players in the age range of early 20s to late 30s. In other words, grown men. Purdue isn’t able to test Hammons in practice like who he will face in Italy. If he can hold is own on this trip, it could bold well for his freshman season.

Don’t expect any live TV coverage online unless some random station comes up. PurdueSports.com did say they’d have updates every day, though they’ve said that before and it was inconsistent. Keep an eye on our Twitter account and check back here for any updates that we can find.