Northwestern
Purdue
Purdue Uses Late Run to Defeat Northwestern
2/16/2008 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Feb. 16, 2008
EVANSTON, Ill. -- Northwestern led through the majority of the first half and was up two with under 10 minutes to go, but a late run by 19th-ranked Purdue allowed the Boilermakers to escape Welsh-Ryan Arena with a 71-56 win Saturday afternoon.
Kevin Coble scored a team-high 13 points for the Wildcats (7-16, 0-12), while Michael Thompson added 10.
E'Twaun Moore scored a season-high 28 points, while Keaton Grant added 15 points for the Boilermakers (21-5, 12-1), who maintained their first-place standing in the Big Ten race.
Purdue built a 10-point lead early in the second half, only to see Northwestern respond with 12 straight points to grab a 50-48 lead on Coble's 3-pointer with 9:45 left.
That brought the crowd to its feet, but Purdue doused the celebration with a 14-0 run that put it back ahead, 62-50.
The Wildcats were unable to draw closer than 10 points the rest of the way.
Northwestern came out of the gates on fire. Trailing 11-9 in the early going, the Wildcats used a 15-5 run to take their largest lead of the game at eight with 9:18 remaining in the first half.
NU's lead was still four with just over five minutes left before the break when Moore scored eight straight points as part of a 10-0 spurt by the Boilermakers that allowed them to take a 35-31 advantage into the intermission.
Purdue's lead would grow to 10 five minutes into the second half before Northwestern made its run to take the lead, only to see the Boilermakers answer right back.
The Wildcats forced 16 Purdue turnovers, while only committing six themselves en route to a 19-8 edge in points off turnovers.
Northwestern returns to action at 8 p.m. Tuesday when it travels to Iowa.
The Associated Press contributed to this report
