Women's basketball reporter Ethan Conley writes about his brief trip to West Lafayette, Ind., where MSU lost.

Purdue's Mackey Arena is one of the more unique stadiums I've seen. It seems much smaller than it actually is. You walk in and think the place couldn't possibly hold more than 5,000 people, but more than 8,000 people were in attendance for a Thursday night women's hoops contest.

Everyone is packed in like sardines, and you can feel the noise reverberating throughout the tiny dome when Purdue locks down on the defensive end.

By the way, those Boilermakers? They're good. I mean really good. They're fast, they're deep, they're big ? and they're on a 13-game winning streak. It wouldn't be the least bit surprising to see them make a run to the Final Four.

As for the campus and downtown areas, there isn't much to speak of. Granted, there wasn't a lot of time to explore West Lafayette, but things looked pretty sparse.

Heading south down Interstate 65, it's miles and miles of corn, and suddenly you come to a Big Ten university.

At least there was free parking.