Rule #1 If You Want To Play Basketball At Purdue: Don’t Have A Girlfriend
Everybody knows the line by now. "Women weaken legs".
You want to build a culture? You can't have too many girlfriend guys on the roster. You need a locker room full of guy's guys. A bunch of dudes who are ready to bro down at any given notice. The fellas want to get after it in the gym with a little Friday night pickup? You can't have guys who need to skip out because they have an anniversary date planned with their girl. The boys getting some extra reps in the weight room on Saturday morning before heading to the football game? You can't have guys who are out apple picking with their girl. Big conference game coming up later in the week? You can't have a guy who is moping around all day at practice because his girlfriend's been giving him shit about not spending enough time with her during the season.
Fact of the matter is that if you want to be a great college program, you basically need to have total control over the lives of these 18-22 year-old kids. You can't concede any of that power away to a girlfriend. Collegiate athletics are really the one aspect of American life that you can treat like Soviet Russia if you really want to. 5am practice, go to class, 12pm film session, go to class, 3pm practice, 5pm weight room, team dinner at 6:30, free time from 8:15-8:45, sleep, wake up, do it all again.
Matt Painter knows that there are two types of people in this world. There are winners, and there are girlfriend guys. The only thing he wants his players to be balls deep in is the gym.