The last time the Purdue basketball team walked into Coleman Coliseum, the Boilermakers witnessed one of the more memorable nights in the storied history of Alabama athletics. Something big happened on that occasion, much bigger than the game No. 5 Purdue won against Anthony Grant’s first Crimson Tide team.

Just before tipoff on the evening of Dec. 12, 2009, the air crackled with nervous energy as everyone’s attention turned toward New York City. They didn’t show the announcement live on the arena’s Jumbotron, but the crowd of 12,477 knew the second a man in a suit at a podium in the Big Apple delivered the news:

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