Indiana Women’s Basketball Wins Convincingly at Purdue

Indiana headed to West Lafayette desperately needing a win in the rivalry game.

The Hoosiers had beaten Purdue last time out, at home on February 15, but went 1-2 after that, dropping two straight games. Indiana also entered the game having lost its last three road games.

Led by Sydney Parrish, Indiana got off to a fast start that helped set the tone for what ended up being a dominant 77-57 win over the Boilermakers.

In the opening three minutes alone, Parrish recorded a steal and an assist, bringing the urgency that head coach Teri Moren had missed since Indiana’s win over then no. 8 Ohio State in Bloomington.

Parrish finished with a game-high 20 points, to which she added eight rebounds and two assists. She also avoided turning it over in her 30 minutes of play, which had been a big point of emphasis for Moren.

Matching their senior leader’s intensity, the Hoosiers raced out to a 24-8 lead and finished the first quarter up 15. They maintained the same lead at half before getting the lead to 20 points by the final buzzer.

At stake was Indiana’s perfect record in Quad Four games, which could be an impactful metric come Selection Sunday. The Hoosiers have some quality wins, like the win over the Buckeyes, but are just 10-8 in Big Ten play – Moren’s worst conference record since 2018-19.

Not only was Indiana able to win by a big enough margin to potentially move up in the NET rankings, but the Hoosiers saw some shots go down on the road.

Parrish went 2-5 from deep, part of a 7-20 shooting night for Indiana as a team. Yarden Garzon went 3-6, finishing with 15 points and moving into first in program history for made 3-pointers (208).

Shay Ciezki was Indiana’s second leading scorer in the game with 18 points. She also tied Lexus Bargesser for the team lead in assists, with four.

Chloe Moore-McNeil, who drew the attention of her head coach in the press conference following the loss to Maryland, had a quiet performance, scoring just four points and missing both 3-pointers she took.

The result of the Nebraska and Iowa game will determine Indiana’s Big Ten Tournament seeding later Sunday, but the win over Purdue eliminates the Boilermakers from the conference tournament and ends their season.

Indiana is a lock for the field though, and picked up some momentum with the impressive win over the in-state rival.