Purdue wins home opener by 56

By Paul Trembacki
Sports Editor

The Purdue women's basketball team converted turnovers into points all game and took advantage of an incredible Eastern Illinois scoring drought to win their home opener 89-33 Sunday afternoon.

After Eastern Illinois (0-2) scored to make it 16-14 with 9:32 left in the second half, No. 11 Purdue (1-1) went on a 10-0 run and outscored the Panthers 33-8 to close the half.

"I'm really proud of the way my team played the first 10 minutes of the ball game; unfortunately, a game is 40 minutes," Eastern Illinois coach Linda Wunder said. "At that point, I think Purdue really turned up their intensity level."

At halftime, Purdue coach Kristy Curry told the Boilers she wanted people to leave Mackey Arena satisfied that they saw the Boilers dominate for 40 minutes.

"A lot of times it’s not how you start, but how you finish," Curry said.

The Boilers came out after halftime with a 26-1 run and held the Panthers without a field goal for the first 8:49 of the second half. Eastern Illinois hadn't scored since 1:47 remained in the first half — a span of 12:38.

"Our energy and enthusiasm were there today," Curry said. "I'm very, very pleased with how our team came out and played today."

The Panthers scored just 11 points on 5-of-28 shooting in the second half with four of those points coming in the final minute. The Boilers scored 40 in the second half to improve to 26-1 all-time in home openers and extend their home-winning streak to 13 games, dating back to their national runner-up 2000-01 season.

"Great defense leads to great offense and I think that's what helped us," said sophomore forward Shereka Wright, who led the Boilers with 16 points and added four assists, three steals and three rebounds.

Eastern Illinois had 28 turnovers and Purdue had 18 steals, five of them from Kelly Komara. Komara, who had 14 points on 6-of-8 shooting and four assists, said the Panthers's offense became too predictable.

"I knew they were going to try to reverse the ball and I just tried to get out there and make a steal," Komara said. "Fortunately, they kept passing it to me."

Purdue's lead was so great that none of the starters played the final eight minutes. Sophomore Lindsey Hicks led the reserves with 13 points on 5-of-8 shooting and five rebounds. Curry was happy that Hicks was aggressive about trying to score.

"She's done a better job with that," Curry said. "I'm very pleased with Lindsey's effort."

Purdue's two walk-ons, Crystal Vander Plaats and Brea Williams, played the final 2:50. Williams even had an assist.

With the reserves in, there wasn't much of a letdown.

"We’re a great team," Wright said. "A lot of people talk about depth on our team. We have a lot of depth. Once the starters go out, it doesn’t mean the game has to slow down. That’s a great emphasis for us."

The game was Purdue's first in a week after they lost 80-75 to No. 4 Oklahoma.

"We're always looking to come out after a loss like Oklahoma and work on things," Komara said. "It was a great win in the sense that we got a lot of people a lot of time and that's important early in the season to give some of our new faces some experience because they're going to be important to us as the season progresses."

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Sports editor:
Paul Trembacki

Assistant sports editor:
Doug Healey

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