Notre Dame hangs on to beat Purdue in overtime, loses Brianna Turner to injury

The ObserverThe Observer Top Stories In the second quarter of No. 1 seed Notre Dame’s NCAA tournament clash with No. 9 seed Purdue at Purcell Pavilion on Sunday, almost everything went right for the Irish.
Almost everything.
The only problem was that the one thing that went wrong was the worst thing Irish head coach Muffet McGraw could have to deal with.
Junior forward Brianna Turner suffered a knee injury that put the game, and her team’s championship hopes, in doubt.
Irish junior forward Brianna Turner goes up for the layup during Notre Dame’s 88-82 win over Purdue on Sunday at Purcell Pavilion.
The Irish escaped with an 88-82 victory over Purdue and advanced to the Sweet 16, but now their star player’s status is now in question for the remainder of the tournament.
Although Turner got to the free throw line in the game’s opening seconds, it was the Boilermakers (23-13, 10-6 Big Ten) who opened the scoring, giving the Irish (32-3, 15-1 ACC) their first deficit of this year’s tournament. Purdue continued to hold the advantage through the first quarter, leading 17-13 at the end of the period. Senior forward Bridget Perry and freshman guard Dominique Oden led the Boilermakers offense early, combining for 15 of those 17 points.
In the second quarter, however, the Irish proved why they were given a No. 1 seed. First, it was freshman guard Jackie Young and freshman forward Erin Boley who took over, scoring the first 12 Irish points of the quarter to give Notre Dame the lead. Young said she was determined to make a difference after having a limited impact against Robert Morris on Friday.
“I just knew I had to come out and produce today,” Young said. “I didn’t have a great game last game, so I knew I had to do some things to help my team. I knew that started with ...


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