Seniors help Purdue respond in win over Michigan State

Purdue’s seniors took it upon themselves Wednesday evening to try to turn the Boilermakers around.

As they should.

It was the duo that had struggled in Purdue’s last game, combining for 10 turnovers in a 16-point loss at Northwestern on Saturday. But they had a reversal against Michigan State, when seniors Ashley Morrissette and Bridget Perry combined for 41 points, eight rebounds, six assists and only five turnovers in the Boilermakers’ 66-54 victory.

“That’s our job,” Perry said of the captains, including junior Andreona Keys, who helped slow MSU star Tori Jankoska. “We had to set the tone and show the young ones what it’s all about. But the young ones did a really good job of contributing also. They matched Ash, Keys and my intensity and really played well. It was a total team effort (Wednesday).”

But the veterans shined. Morrissette scored a game-high 24 points, including a critical three-point play with 4:14 left, when she drove the lane, absorbed heavy contact and converted a three-point play. It gave the Boilermakers 57-48 lead. Perry scored 17, including five during a third-quarter stretch in which Purdue (10-6 overall, 1-1 in the Big Ten) had to fend off charging MSU (11-4, 1-1). And Keys, who had nine points and five rebounds, hounded Jankoska, who scored 16 (five fewer than her average) on 6-of-18 shooting.

“We just have to bring it every night,” Morrissette said. “We can’t just say, ‘Oh, this night we’re going to slack off and see what happens.’ We have to bring it because we only have 14 games left in Big Ten play and every game matters.”

Purdue was on early, jumping to 9-0 and 15-4 leads against a Spartan team playing without head coach Suzy Merchant. The veteran MSU leader had been hospitalized overnight Sunday after fainting on the sideline during Michigan State’s win over Illinois earlier in the day. Merchant is back home, but didn’t make the trip to West Lafayette.

“It’s been a rough week obviously without our leader, Coach Merchant,” said associate head coach Amaka Agugua, who called Merchant day-to-day as she continues to be evaluated. “I thought we had two good practices in preparation for this and also a pretty good shoot-around today. I felt like we started the game and Purdue kind of just punched us in the mouth. We lost our energy a little bit and we were a little bit flat.”

The Spartans, however, didn’t go quietly, outscoring the Boilermakers 17-10 in the second quarter to turn a 10-point deficit into three at the half. Then to start the third, MSU outrebounded the Boilermakers an almost-unheard-of 10-0 in the first two-plus minutes and took a lead on a Jankoska jumper at 6:37.

But it was short-lived. Perry scored five of the Boilermakers’ next seven, and Dominique McBryde had a pair of nice post moves, hitting on a drive down the lane then on an up-and-under. Despite being outrebounded 14-4 in the quarter, Purdue outscored MSU by one.

McBryde, who scored eight of her 10 in the second half, hit two more buckets early in the fourth quarter, keeping the margin at six and setting up Morrissette’s three-point play.

“There was no hesitation,” Coach Sharon Versyp said of McBryde. “She just went at them. … She had a different flair about her and the kids saw that, too.”

Michigan State might have won on the boards, 47-30, but it turned its 19 offensive boards into only 15 second-chance points. And the Spartans were killed by their turnovers, 20 in all, which Purdue converted into 23 points.

“We had way too many turnovers, many of them unforced,” Agugua said. “But credit to Purdue, they did a great job of switching up their defense pretty much every possession.”

Against a mix of man and zone defenses, the Spartans shot less than 36 percent, with Jankoska the only player in double figures.

Purdue shot 40.4 percent, but was successful at the line — it made 17-of-21 attempts — and most importantly kept hold of the ball. After having 20 turnovers at Northwestern, the Boilermakers had only 11 vs. MSU.

“It was tremendous, a tremendous effort by the entire team to keep the turnovers down,” Morrissette said. “At Northwestern, they were unforced, so we had to focus on what we were doing that was creating those turnovers. We focused on that (Wednesday) and lowered it by around 10.”

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