Purdue women win in OT at Nebraska

LINCOLN, Nebraska (WLFI) - Purdue women's basketball team held on to pick up a 69-66 win in overtime against Nebraska on Saturday.

The No. 14 Boilermakers never trailed No. 25 Nebraska in the extra period, but Purdue's Sam Ostarello's basket with 43 seconds left made it 68-66 Purdue.

“We made some big plays, they made some big plays and it was just a great basketball game. I think it was great for women's basketball and I think it was great for the Big Ten,” said Purdue head coach Sharon Versyp.

Ostarello poured in 17 points and a career-high 19 points in the victory.

 “I saw it from warm-ups. She was just in the zone, everything she was shooting was going in and I knew she was going to have a good game,” said Purdue guard KK Houser.

Courtney Moses and Drey Mingo each added 17 points for the Boilers in another close battle between the schools. All three games between them have gone to overtime.

“Even when we got ahead a good amount we knew that they were going to battle back and sure enough that is what happened and it was like that the whole game. It came down to our defense and knowing what we were doing defensively which really kind of frustrated them I felt like,” said Purdue forward Sam Ostarello.

Nebraska won the regular-season meeting at Purdue in triple overtime in the teams' first matchup last season. Purdue would go on to win the tournament championship in double overtime in Indianapolis last March.

The Boilers improve to 13-2 overall and 2-0 in Big Ten play. Purdue returns to action on January 14. The Boilers play host to Ohio State with tip-off set for 7:30 pm.