Final Four weekend a long time coming for these former Purdue men's basketball players

Spring breaking it on the porch of an Airbnb in Destin, Florida earlier this week, the sounds of birds chirping nearby, a cup of coffee in his hands and his heart bursting with basketball pride, Brandon McKnight started to speak, then stopped.

For the previous two days, McKnight couldn’t stop smiling and couldn’t stop talking about what it meant to see Purdue, where he spent three seasons (2002-05) as the starting point guard on the men’s basketball team, where he was a team captain, where he earned his degree in sociology, advance to the NCAA Men’s Tournament Final Four for the first time since 1980.

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What did it mean to a Boilermaker to see the Boilermakers take that big step in March Madness after so much March sadness?

“We’re like, ‘It’s about damn time,’” the 40-year-old South Bend, Ind. resident said with his trademark laugh. “It’s such a proud moment for all of us. It’s been like ... what’s the word I’m looking for? Ahh ... man ... I can’t put my finger on it.”

Maybe that Florida sun had sent McKnight’s brain into vapor lock. Maybe he was too delirious with joy to say what he wanted to say. Maybe he just couldn’t find the word. In any case, we’ll get back to him.

Back in South Bend, another former Purdue basketball player with deep Michiana hoops roots had no problem explaining what seeing Purdue get to its first Final Four in 44 years meant. Former Clay High School standout Jaraan Cornell helped the Colonials win a state championship, but he never could help the Boilermakers play for a national championship during his four seasons (1996-2000) in West Lafayette.

Now, they’re two wins away from a title.

“We’ve got bragging right now,” said Cornell, who works as the Teen Center director for the South Bend Boys and Girls Club. “This is it. This is not a movie. It’s the real thing.”

So real that it sometimes seems unreal. Cornell was 3 and McKnight wasn't born the last time Purdue played in a Final Four — in 1980 at the old Market Square Arena (ask your parents) in Indianapolis. Former Clay High School athletic director Greg Humnicky (Purdue, class of 1978), remembers 1980. He also remembers 1969 when Purdue also made a Final Four — in Louisville — before losing to Lew Alcindor and UCLA.

Humnicky’s school pride is often on display for all to see. He usually wears a black Purdue sweatshirt, when he’s not sporting a gold one. He has a black vinyl canvas with that gold Block P stretched across the exterior of his home’s garage door. He owns Purdue season tickets, albeit closer to the Mackey Arena roof than Gene Keady Court. He’s been to the football team’s two Rose Bowls (1967, 2000).

Nobody locally may bleed black and gold more than Humnicky.

“Just bursting with pride, let me tell you,” Humnicky said after he answered the phone sounding like he’d just finished a 5k. “This is fantastic. Just fantastic. You feel so happy for Matt Painter.”

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And happy for all of Purdue Nation. One of four No. 1 seeds, Purdue (33-4) plays No. 11 seed North Carolina State (26-14) in Saturday’s first semifinal (6:09 p.m., TBS). The winner of that game gets the winner of another No. 1 seed Connecticut (35-3) and No. 4 Alabama (25-11) in Monday’s championship game.

This isn’t a program that’s come from nowhere to get to Glendale, Ariz. on the sport’s showcase weekend. This Final Four has been building for the Boilers, who have won at least 26 games in seven of the last nine seasons. They’ve won at least 13 Big Ten games in seven of the last eight. That’s downright dominant. Painter’s program has become the gold (and black) standard of the Big Ten. One box remained unchecked.

The Final Four.

It had to get there.

Remembering all that good stuff dislodged McKnight’s momentary brain lock. He remembered the word he wanted.

“It’s validation,” McKnight said. “The last three, four years have been disappointing for Purdue fans because we knew they had the potential to go further than they did. Now, it’s finally here. I’m so happy for the program.”

It’s a program that McKnight remembers looking hard at during his junior year at South Bend LaSalle High School (again, ask your parents). Keady recruited McKnight to a program that had recently gone on a deep NCAA run.

Seeing that, knowing that, was one of McKnight’s deciding factors in choosing Purdue.

“I remember thinking, ‘Man, that’s where I want to go to school because they’re going to Elite Eights,’” he said. “I never thought about a Final Four. Now, kids at home, they’re thinking about what college they want to go to, and they can look at Purdue and think about how it’s a Final Four school.”

McKnight and Humnicky both admitted that when Sunday’s Midwest Regional win over Tennessee in Detroit went final, when they watched Zach Edey clip part of the net and give it to Keady, when it really was real, they teared up. McKnight had to excuse himself from a watch party to step outside. He couldn’t weep in front of his wife and his kids over a basketball game.

“It’s just one of those moments that you’ll never forget,” he said.

Cornell stayed his usual stoic self.

“I was thinking about the feelings they were feeling,” Cornell said. “It was like, ‘Man, this is euphoria for them.’ It was kind of like euphoria for me.”

All three Boilermakers have spent the last four days trading text messages (Boiler Up!) with fellow Purdue family members. McKnight guessed he’s on about 10 different text chains with former teammates. Humnicky made sure to give some of his Indiana and Notre Dame basketball friends some business. Like, how do you like them apples?

It’s been a rough go for the Boilermakers and their fans the last couple of years. Maybe this weekend will quiet all those cracks about North Texas and Saint Peter’s and Farleigh Dickinson. That one may have stung the most.

None of that ever mattered to Cornell. Every year, regardless of what happened the previous March, and a lot happened, or didn’t happen, Cornell still fills out a bracket. Every year, it looks the same.

“I still always have Purdue winning the whole thing,” Cornell said. “No matter how I feel or what the past says or what history says.”

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Does this dream continue in the desert?

For them, for every Purdue fan, Saturday evening cannot get here soon enough. Cornell plans to watch the game at home. Alone. He’s declined all invitations to join friends at this restaurant or gather for that game watch. He also will silence his cell phone. No texts. No calls. No distractions.

Cornell joked that his phone sits silently for hours leading up to another Purdue game. As soon as the ball is tipped, and it’s usually Edey winning that tip, somebody’s hitting him up for something about Boilermaker basketball.

He’s not answering. Ever.

“I usually have my phone on Do Not Disturb the whole month of March,” he said. “When I watch games, I like to be somewhere quiet where I can hear the play by play and all the stories and things like that.”

Why did Humnicky seem so out of breath when he answered his phone earlier in the week? He was rushing around trying to find a flight to Phoenix. He has two game tickets. What he didn’t have was a way to get to Glendale.

Friday’s Allegiant flight out of South Bend International Airport and into Mesa is sold out. He was working on flying to Las Vegas and driving the 279 miles south to Glendale. Humnicky planned to call a couple of his cousins who live in the area and “bunk up with them.”

“One of my kids called and said, ‘Dad, you need to go. They may not get there again,’” Humnicky said. “So, I’m going.”

As is McKnight, who also had his two game tickets earlier this week. He and his 8-year-old-son, Caden, on his way to following in his father’s basketball footsteps, plan to drive six and a half hours from Destin to Nashville for a flight to Phoenix. It lands around 1:30 p.m. local time Saturday afternoon, a little more than 90 minutes before tip.

On Sunday, they’ll fly home, where McKnight is a regional sales manager for Hologic, a global medical technology company. It will be a hectic few days. What a way to end vacation.

“My wife told me that I’d be crazy if I didn’t do it,” said McKnight, who will superstitiously sport his Purdue retro-game shorts as he always does for every Boilermaker game. “She’s the boss, so I may just take her up on that offer. To have that father-son moment, these are moments that you just can’t pass up.”

Win Saturday and Purdue plays Monday for its first national championship of the modern era.

“They’ve got a shot,” Humnicky said.

“I say,” Cornell said, “we’re winning this whole thing.”

Follow South Bend Tribune and NDInsider columnist Tom Noie on X (formerly Twitter): @tnoieNDI. Contact: (574) 235-6153.

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Purdue men's basketball in NCAA Final Four still seems like a dream