The 22nd annual Jimmy V Classic took place Tuesday night to continue the week-long initiative hosted by ESPN to spread cancer awareness and receive donations.
Jimmy Valvano died from metastatic cancer less than two months after his ESPYs speech. At that time, the V Foundation was in its infancy. Two years later, the Foundation received a lift of support with the debut of the Jimmy V Classic.
This year’s men’s matchups include No. 5 Duke vs. No. 21 Florida and No. 18 Purdue vs. Arizona State.
In the first game, Isaac Haas and Vincent Edwards were both 6 of 9 from the field and had 16 points on Tuesday night as No. 18 Purdue dominated Arizona State in every phase of the game for a 97-64 victory. Vincent Edwards hit 4 of the Boilermakers 15 three pointers of the bench.
“I think we have very high potential, potentially a championship team,” Haas said. “We have to just continue to do what we’re told and follow our scouting reports and do our defensive and offensive assignments. If we just stick to those principles, we’re going to be just fine. We’re going to do great things with this team.”
The Boilermakers improved to 7-2 after holding the Sun Devils to just 35.8 percent shooting, including 4 of 26 from 3-point range. Purdue, meanwhile, shot 59.4 percent from the floor, with the 15 3s coming on 27 tries.
“We identify ourselves with making jump shots,” Sun Devils coach Bobby Hurley said. “Right now, we’re a soft team. We don’t have any backbone.
“When we didn’t make our shots, as sometimes frontrunners might do, we folded and we gave in. It was sad to see. For a city that’s a blue-collar city and an arena that has so much tradition and so many good players that played on this court, to look like that was embarrassing.”