Is Zach Edey The New Kareem? His Opening NCAAT Weekend Unmatched Since Lew Alcindor

They both speak softly - or barely at all - and carry a big hook. Along with lots of points, rebounds, blocked shots and total domination.

"We did what we needed to do to win," Purdue 7-foot-4 center Zach Edey said on CBS after a 106-67 win over No. 8 seed Utah State Sunday. "I sound like a stuck record."

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar won five NBA titles with the Los Angeles Lakers and one with the Milwaukee Bucks after winning three NCAA titles at UCLA from 1967-69. (Getty Images).

So did 7-2 UCLA center Lew Alcindor back in the late 1960s and through most of his Hall of Fame NBA career with Milwaukee and the Los Angeles Lakers as he won six NBA titles. Alcindor also took UCLA to three national titles in 1967, ‘68 and ’69 before going public with his name change to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and religious conversion in 1971.

Well, Edey did something over the weekend in the opening rounds of the NCAA Tournament that had not been done since 1968 when Alcindor was a junior at UCLA. And he didn't say much about it either.

Zach Edey Put Up Lew Alcindor - aka Kareem - Numbers 

Edey, a senior from Ontario, Canada, scored 53 points with 35 rebounds over Purdue's first two games of the NCAA Tournament - 78-50 over 16 seed Grambling on Friday and Utah State two days later. Edey hit 19 of his 28 shots overall for a .678 percentage in scoring 30, then 23 points with 21 and then 14 rebounds. He became the first player in the first two games of an NCAA Tournament to score 50 points or more with 35 or more rebounds and a shooting percentage of .650 or better since Alcindor.

Alcindor scored 28 points with 23 rebounds in a 58-49 win over New Mexico State and had 22 points and 18 rebounds in an 87-66 win over Santa Clara in the 1968 NCAA Tournament. The junior from Harlem, New York, scored 50 points on 15 of 21 shots over the two games for a .714 percentage and had 41 rebounds. UCLA went on to win its second straight national title and would win four more in a row under coach John Wooden, who finished with 10 in 1975. 

Purdue 7-foot-4 center Zach Edey leads the nation in scoring with 24.5 points a game and is second in rebounding at 12.1. (Getty Images)

"He's just performed like he has here the last couple years," Purdue coach Matt Painter said of Edey on Sunday. "Three years ago, he was a good player for us. He caused problems. He did things, but it wasn't where he is now. He's just continued to get better."

If Painter did not sound overly excited about it, he wasn't.

READ: Don't Appreciate Zach Edey? You Shouldn't Cover Basketball

"We expect it," he said. "Like we go into games, and like our staff always looks at me and says, what do we need to do? I say, ‘Well, Zach needs to get 20 rebounds,’ and everybody always laughs at that. But you're not asking somebody to do something he can't do. He can do that."

No. 1 Seed Purdue Vs. No. 5 Seed Gonzaga Friday

No. 1 seed Purdue (31-4) and Edey will be back in action against No. 5 seed Gonzaga (27-7) on Friday (7:39 p.m., TBS) in Detroit. 

Edey does lead the nation in scoring with 24.5 points a game and is second in rebounds with 12.1. He is third in double-doubles with 26. As a junior last season, Edey won the Wooden, Naismith and Associated Press player of the year awards and the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Award that goes to the best center. He led the nation with 27 double-doubles. He may not have gone in the first round of the NBA Draft last year, but he is expected to do so this year, despite Dan Le Batard's infatuation with not liking him.

READ: Why Doesn't Dan Le Batard Like Zach Edey?

Of course, many thought Jabbar's game was a little dull, albeit extremely consistently dominant. 

"Just get him to be consistent and explain where you think the double is coming from, and then explain some of the actions," Painter said of Edey's steady development.  "They're going to attack him. Everyone is going to attack him, because they want him out of the game. He has great knowledge of the game, and he understands the game, but he also doesn't have a wall."

Edey takes coaching.

"Most players have a wall to where, are they really listening 100 percent to what you're saying? He didn't have all that crap from recruitment," Painter said. "So he just stops. He just takes it in. There's not a pushback. He's great. He's easy to coach. He's obviously got some great physical skills, but he's pretty intelligent."

Edey has improved his draft stock by staying. But he also wants to help redeem Purdue and get a ring.

The Boilermakers embarrassingly lost to No. 16 seed Fairleigh Dickinson, 63-58, in the first round of the NCAA Tournament last year. And Purdue, ever the underachiever, has never won the NCAA college basketball championship. It reached the national title game in 1969 … losing to - you guessed it - Alcindor and UCLA, 92-72, at Freedom Hall in Louisville.

With a win over Gonzaga and a win Sunday over the winner Friday's game (10 p.m., TBS) between No. 2 seed Tennessee (26-8) and 3 seed Creighton (25-9), Purdue will reach its first Final Four since 1980. 

"There's no satisfaction," Edey said pointedly Sunday and actually went on for more than two sentences. "I don't think anybody on this team - like I didn't come back to make the Sweet 16. I came back to make a run, a deep run. Nobody is satisfied with where we are now. Everybody wants to keep pushing."