Purdue’s Matt Painter receives praise from fellow coaches

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (WISH) — Purdue University men’s basketball head coach Matt Painter has found plenty of success over the course of his tenure in West Lafayette, Ind.

In fact, just within the last four seasons, he has led the Boilers to three appearances in at least the Sweet 16 round of the NCAA Tournament. The Boilermakers even made the NCAA National Championship Game during the 2023-24 season, falling to the national champion UConn Huskies.

There is a lot of respect for what Painter has been able to do from coaches all across the country. That evidence was backed up in CBS Sports’ annual “Candid Coaches” series.

The “Candid Coaches” series “spotlights relevant topics and issues in men’s college basketball. Gary Parrish and Matt Norlander polled roughly 100 coaches in recent weeks on a variety of subjects. Coaches spoke on background and were provided anonymity to offer unfiltered opinions.”

The “Candid Coaches” topic was that released on Tuesday asked coaches, “Who is the best X’s and O’s coach in college basketball right now?”

Painter was voted as the best. Here are the results:

• Matt Painter (Purdue) – 19%
• Dan Hurley (UConn) – 18%
• Greg McDermott (Creighton) – 16%
• Kelvin Sampson (Houston) – 7%
• Ben McCollum (Iowa) – 5%
• Randy Bennett (St. Mary’s) – 4%
• Tom Izzo (Michigan State) – 4%
• Dusty May (Michigan) – 4%
• Bill Self (Kansas) – 4%
• Rick Barnes (Tennessee) – 2%
• Chris Collins (Northwestern) – 2%
• Grant McCasland (Texas Tech) – 2%
• Nate Oats (Alabama) – 2%
• Rick Pitino (St. John’s) – 2%
• Mark Schmidt (St. Bonaventure) – 2%
• Other – 7%

There were some quotes as well from coaches sharing their praise for Painter.

• “Paint runs great stuff by design of his lineup. He’ll always have an anchor for his offense, a scoring center. Lots of 3-point shooting. And when he has a dynamic playmaker his sets are almost impossible to stop. Then he has a ton of counters. You think you know what’s coming, then he flops it. Then he flips the flop. You gotta turn them over, ’cause you can’t get enough misses.”
• “He has had exceptional players but he has not had super-talented players on the same team. He schemes and designs gameplans that beat more talented teams.”  
• “Paint has turned an unheralded recruit into a National Player of the Year [Zach Edey] and another unheralded recruit (possibly) into the NCAA’s all-time assist leader [Braden Smith]. Nobody is better and putting their players in positions to succeed.”

Painter’s 2025-26 Boilermakers are consistently ranked as one of the best teams in the country entering the season. Their first game of the regular season is Tuesday, Nov. 4 against Evansville.

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