Diamont’s Late Score Lifts IU Over Purdue 23-16

The Indiana Hoosiers were able to defeat the Purdue Boilermakers 23-16 to keep the Old Oaken Bucket.

Bloomington, IN – Zander Diamont’s one-yard quarterback keeper with under a minute to play lifted the Indiana Hoosiers over the Purdue Boilermakers in the annual Old Oaken Bucket game Saturday afternoon, 23-16.

After Akeem Hunt broke an 82-yard touchdown run early in the third quarter to take a 13-3 lead, the Indiana Hoosiers outscored the Boilermakers 20-3 the rest of the way en route to their first Big Ten win of the season in their final game.

Four Purdue turnovers. Losing players to injuries and a (questionable) personal foul. Kicking field goals instead of scoring touchdowns when given a short field because of foolish plays by IU.

Each and every one of the aforementioned issues led to the eventual demise of the Boilermakers.

"“Very unfortunate ending to the season,” said Hazell. “I thought our guys played hard. I didn’t think we did a very good job in the end zone. We also weren’t able to convert some third downs in the red zone. We weren’t able to stop them on the last two drives. You feel bad that you have to let your seniors go away this way, especially when you had an opportunity to win the football game.”"

Danny Ezechukwu, who led the Boilers on defense last week, was hit with a personal foul penalty early in the third quarter.

After Ryan Russell sacked and stripped Diamont, Ezechukwu was caught up in the pile and appeared to be pushing an IU player’s hand off of him. Ezechukwu made incidental contact with the referee which led to the ejection.

Akeem Hunt was lost for the game in the second half after taking a huge hit. Coach Hazell said after the game that there was no ‘official diagnosis’ but Hunt complained of headaches while on the sideline. Hunt finished his final game with 19 carries for 182 yards and the long, touchdown run.

Defensive lineman Ryan Watson was also unavailable to finish the game for Purdue.

While Appleby’s sub par performance and three interceptions didn’t directly lead to Indiana touchdowns, they halted Purdue drives when they needed as many points as possible today.

Appleby finished the day an abysmal 19-35 for 123 yards and the three interceptions.

"“We had a lot of opportunities during the game,” said Appleby. “We moved the ball with great efficiency. We just have to be able to punch it in in the red zone. We didn’t score enough points today. I think my job as a quarterback is to take care of the ball. As an offense, we’ve got a long way to go. I’ve got a long way to go.”"

It’s tough being a quarterback with one legitimate target.

Senior captain Justin Sinz finished the game as Purdue’s leading receiver and stretched his consecutive games-with-a-catch streak to 24.

Seeing Sinz hold back his tears in his final postgame press conference was tough.

"“To go out like this as a senior and captain of the team, it hurts,” said Sinz. “It’s certainly not what we envisioned for the season. Looking back, we have no regrets really. When you play hard and do the right thing you can’t really have regrets.”"

Shane Wynn scored on a 41-yard reverse to tie the ballgame at 13 and you could just feel the tide turning. Or so it seemed.

After Purdue punted to the Hoosiers, Andy James Garcia forced a fumble inside the IU 25-yard line and the Boilermakers recovered.

Purdue could only settle for a field goal that made the game 16-13 early in the fourth.

Indiana added another field goal to tie the game with 6:31 to play giving the Boilers another chance.

Like most of the day, the Purdue offense sputtered setting up IU’s eventual game-winning drive and that was all she wrote for the season.

Thoughts:

Purdue won one game last year. There were obvious strides made this season, but ending on a six-game losing streak puts a sour taste in your mouth when the team was in position to win at least two, maybe three more games.

Zander Diamont was equally as poor as Appleby. The freshman quarterback looked like a poor high school kid running around to try to save his life most of the day. He finished 15-24 for 119 yards.

To his credit, he didn’t turn the ball over on the day.

Tevin Coleman, Indiana’s all-world running back, was held in check in the first half but finished with 134 yards on the ground.

During the second half, Coleman eclipsed the 2,000 yard mark for the season.

Frankie Williams and Raheem Mostert deserve some praise for their return-game efforts.

After IU tied the game, Mostert returned the ensuing kickoff to the IU 40. It was negated by one of the most idiotic, bone-headed penalties I have seen. Williams also returned a punt 37 yards.

Closing: I was overjoyed when I found out that I would be able to cover a team and school I attended for a year and grew up cheering for, regardless of their record.

It was a long and challenging season, but I truly believe Purdue can turn things around and go bowling. Maybe that’s just the fan in me.

Like Purdue, I’ve got a long ways to go. But this was a start and I enjoyed every second of it. Being my first year writing, I just wanted to improve with each story. Hopefully I was able to give all of my readers a little different perspective than your standard newspaper or ESPN column.

I sat in the booth in Saginaw after the final Chicago Blitz game I called and then again in Palm Springs after the final out was recorded and reflected on everything.

As I sit in the press box here at Memorial Stadium, I’m doing the same thing.

For whatever reason, seeing this giant IU flag wave in the south end zone after a disappointing loss hurts.

Let’s all hope that Purdue football returns to at least a bowl game in 2015.

I’ll leave you with another quote from Coach Hazell. This program is headed in the right direction. We will see what happens in 2015.

"“I have to take a step back and evaluate everything. I think we’re making some strides but we need to get better .We will take a look at every single thing when we leave here.”"