No. 12 Purdue left the weekend with exactly the kind of response it needed.
After splitting with Iowa and No. 1 Nebraska last week, the Boilermakers stayed home and handled business in West Lafayette, taking down No.
20 Minnesota in five sets on Friday before sweeping Northwestern on Sunday. The two wins pushed Purdue to 13-6 overall and 6-4 in Big Ten play, with seven matches left in the regular season.
A big part of the surge came from Heaney, who keeps looking more polished as the season rolls on. Against Minnesota, she put together a stat line that jumped off the page: 19 kills, 11 digs, six blocks and four aces, while hitting .390 in Purdue’s five-set win.
She came back two days later and stayed productive against Northwestern, finishing with 10 kills, nine digs, five blocks and two assists as the Boilers hit another high note in a three-set sweep. For the weekend, Heaney piled up 29 kills, 20 digs, 11 blocks, five aces and four assists.
The serving game also finally showed the kind of punch Purdue has been chasing. The Boilermakers have been more aggressive from the line all season and have regularly forced teams out of rhythm, but the ace totals had still lagged behind, as the team ranked 18th in the Big Ten.
That changed over the two-match stretch, when Purdue produced 14 aces across eight sets - a clear step up from the 1.00 aces per set it had been averaging. Heaney led the way with five aces, MaryKate Scheumann added three, and Elle Schara and Ryan McAleer chipped in two apiece.
McAleer also reached a major milestone on Friday. The Purdue libero posted a team-high 18 digs against Minnesota and joined the program's 1,000-dig club.
She kept the pressure on Sunday as well, adding 10 more digs in the sweep of Northwestern. Across the weekend, McAleer finished with 28 digs and nine assists.
Taylor Anderson did what she usually does: run the offense at a high level and make the people around her better. The setter had 48 assists, 14 digs and five kills against Minnesota, then followed with 35 assists, five digs and two kills against Northwestern. Purdue leaned on her all weekend, and she delivered again.
The broader theme was familiar too. Purdue has built a reputation over the last two years as a team that keeps coming, and that showed up again in both matches.
Minnesota controlled the fourth set Friday night with a 25-19 win and seemed to carry the momentum into the decisive frame, but Purdue steadied itself and closed out the fifth, 15-12. On Sunday, Northwestern pushed early at Holloway Gymnasium while still searching for its first Big Ten win of the season, but the Boilermakers found enough answers to finish the sweep.
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The bigger proving ground is coming quickly, though, and it should tell Purdue a lot more about where this group stands. A non-conference matchup with UConn is next on the schedule, and Painter views it as an important early test for a team that has looked sharp in exhibition play but still needs a measuring stick against elite competition. For a roster trying to build on that promising start, this week offers the kind of challenge that can either confirm the early buzz or expose how much work remains. [Read more 🡒]