Purdue basketball looks forward to center who ‘opens up some things' returning stronger from injury

Indianapolis Star

3 days ago

Daniel Jacobsen attacked Purdue men's basketball's first summer practice with an enthusiastic abandon, diving on the floor for a loose ball at one point and crashing into stout teammate Trey Kaufman-Renn in the process.
Jacobsen spent months yearning for the thump of assistant coach Brandon Brantley's padded arm into his lower back. The Boilermakers' 7-foot-4 center was finally healthy, cleared for full contact — and most satisfyingly, back on the floor with his team in a real way.
'It's something I've been dying to do for months,' Jacobsen said after that June 9 practice. 'It kills me watching. So it was great to get out there.'
A broken tibia one minute into the second game of his career became an inflection point in the 2024-25 season. Purdue never replaced his rim protection. Defensively, it missed the rebounding presence of his height and reach. His pick-and-roll opportunities with point guard Braden Smith — as well as his ability to stretch defenses from 3-point range — would have further complicated an already tough defensive assignment for opponents.
Now Jacobsen stands as a significant reason why Purdue may be the nation's No. 1 preseason team. Matt Painter searched far and wide for help in the offseason, bringing in Australian center Oscar Cluff by way of South Dakota and guard Omer Mayer from Israel. All along, he also had Jacobsen ready to pick up where he left off from what started as an impressive freshman debut.
Jacobsen departs with Team USA for the FIBA Under-19 World Cup in Switzerland around 40 pounds heavier than when he arrived at Purdue last summer. That cracked bone ruined his first-year plan. It also accelerated his second-year mission.
Rob Jacobsen watched from home in Colorado as his son prepared to build upon his impressive debut — 13 points, seven rebounds and three blocks against Texas A&M Corpus Christi — in Purdue's second game against Northern Kentucky.
Any parent knows every last detail does not always make it home from college. So the elder Jacobsen was surprised when his son took the court with a neoprene sleeve on his right leg from the shin up past his knee.
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'Sometimes kids wear stuff like that for decoration as much as any real reason — elbow sleeves or whatever — because it looks good or makes them feel good,' Rob Jacobsen said. 'I wasn't sure what it was.'
Jacobsen had felt some pain in the leg. He thought perhaps he was dealing with a case of shin splints. He'd been working hard to earn that spot in the starting lineup. Gain required pain.
In truth, a stress fracture had begun to form in that leg. One minute into the game against the Norse, a defender bumped that specific area of the leg as he and Jacobsen stumbled over each other in the lane.
That fluke contact cracked Jacobsen's lower leg bone. Multiple medical personnel later told the family that might have been the best possible scenario. The bone was compromised enough that a catastrophic break, such as the open fractures suffered by Louisville's Kevin Ware or Paul George while with the Pacers, could have awaited in his future.
'It was kind of going to happen eventually,' Jacobsen said.
Jacobsen's only previous injury of significance came after his sophomore year of high school, when he fell and injured a wrist. He wore cast and the bone took an annoyingly long time to heal.
This injury, though, required surgery and bed rest. Leaving bed was no picnic, either. Imagine the difficulty of doing everyday tasks without bending one leg. Now imagine you're the size of a small tree.
Following surgery at Forte Sports Medicine and Orthopedics in Carmel, Jacobsen needed an emotional boost, too. He received the full extent of the Boilermaker family treatment. Rob said that extended down to the student managers who helped around the apartment, including one who made a special laundromat trip for an oversized bed comforter.
'It reinforced it in spades — that you're dealing with good people who are good people first and good basketball people second,' Rob said. 'All the way down to the freshman student managers. They're there for the right reasons.'
When he left active status, Jacobsen joined a dedicated subgroup of the roster. On the road, he often worked out with classmate Jack Benter, using a conventional redshirt season, and the Boilermaker walk-ons.
After team dinners on the road, director of strength and conditioning Jason Kabo took them to the sometimes hit-or-miss hotel fitness room to get in a workout. Occasionally they stumbled onto a rare treasure, such as one in Michigan with a squat rack.
Kabo said Jacobsen lifted six or even seven days a week during the season. Initially that involved a lot of balance work and upper body exercises, back one day, chest the next. When they finished, Koba whipped up a protein shake for recovery.
'We were inseparable,' Kabo said.
Jacobsen missed three weeks of Purdue's summer program prior to last season while helping Team USA win gold at another FIBA event: the U17 World Cup. He came back around 210 pounds — gangly, at least relative to most Big Ten big men.
Players struggle to add weight before the season because they are working so hard on their conditioning. Same goes for in season, since they burn so many calories on a near daily basis. Jacobsen managed to get up to the 230 range by the time of the injury. According to Kabo, because post-surgery recovery kept Jacobsen out of the weight room, he dropped almost all the way back to his arrival weight.
One of the only positives Jacobsen could take from the injury was how it allowed him to begin gaining weight faster than if he had been playing.
Kabo said while Jacobsen lost weight post-surgery, he did not lose muscle mass. With those one-on-one workouts, he eventually added 35 pounds to his bench press max.
He started summer practice at 253 pounds. Only one day in, he said he already felt harder to displace in the post.
'We hope that he can continue to do that, or at the worst maintain his weight,' Painter said. 'Once you get into the season, you're not going to gain weight. But if you can maintain, that really helps.'
Kaufman-Renn did not want to publicly judge the impact of a bigger Jacobsen off a single practice.
He gladly spoke about what the center's return means for a national championship-aspirant team.
'I'm really looking forward to, not just him, but the combination of Braden and him playing together, and me being able to play the 4 and kind of play alongside them — just because he's such a lob threat and he can shoot the ball,' Kaufman-Renn said. 'I really think that opens up some things. Obviously I'm not as much of a lob threat, so to give Braden that option to go to consistently — I think it's going to be key for our team.'
Offensively, Jacobsen's goal is to be difficult to define. He wants to excel in all variants of pick-and-roll action. He wants to stretch defenses with the perimeter touch he barely had time to display prior to last season's injury.
He should immediately become one of the better shot-blockers in the Big Ten. Despite what assumptions one might make from his size, though, Painter said Jacobsen must establish himself as a consistent rebounder.
Purdue already bolstered one of last season's vulnerabilities when it brought on Cluff. Painter pointed out how last season's team was one of the nation's most efficient in transition, but could not capitalize enough due to its rebounding shortcomings.
Last season, under the circumstances, that issue was at least understandable, if not entirely acceptable. This season, Purdue endeavors to give opponents a painfully small margin for error in all facets. The development Jacobsen reaches for this summer remains essential to that.
The international competition in Switzerland becomes the next stage. Former Purdue assistant and Notre Dame coach Micah Shrewsberry serves as one of the assistants. For the training camp in Colorado Springs, Purdue assistant Brandon Brantley sent Jacobsen's summer program to Shrewsberry, one of the Team USA assistant coaches.
Jacobsen said he began to feel like himself again about a month before summer practice began. He's also a new self — one he's eager to finally inflict on the Big Ten.