The Indiana-Purdue basketball rivalry is getting an unplanned renewal on the Big Ten's grandest stage.
The No. 4-seeded Hoosiers (20-9) and No. 5-seeded Boilermakers (20-11) will clash at around 2:30 p.m. Friday in the third round of the Big Ten's Women's Basketball Tournament at Bankers Life Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.
The victor between the in-state rivals will advance to play the winner of No. 1 seed Ohio State and No. 9 Northwestern at 4 p.m. Saturday.
"It's tournament play, so if you want to stay there and enjoy the tournament you've got to win," IU head coach Teri Moren said. "To me, that's the biggest motivator. And the fact that we're still playing towards something, and that is seeding. That is putting ourselves into position to get a bid to the NCAA Tournament. There's great motivation in that."
The Hoosiers find themselves in an eerily similar position that they were in this time a year ago. Like last year's team, the 2017 version of Indiana earned the Big Ten's No. 4 seed and heads to Indianapolis firmly on the NCAA Tournament bubble despite earning a double-bye in the conference tournament.
Based on numerous NCAA Bracket projections, it would appear Indiana is one win shy of locking themselves into the NCAA Tournament field. A loss would leave the Hoosiers sweating come Selection Monday.
"It just was a short year ago that we were in the same scenario with the double-bye and didn't play very well against Northwestern," Moren said. "We're doing everything to make sure that doesn't happen to us."
Purdue, meanwhile, never trailed en route to a 72-58 win over No. 12 Illinois on Thursday for the right to play Indiana. Boilermaker junior guard Andreona Keys dropped a career-high 26 points on 10-of-14 shooting in a winning effort over Illinois.
Including the Big Ten Tournament victory, Purdue now owns the second-longest winning streak in the conference at five straight wins.
"We've got to do a lot of things," Purdue head coach Sharon Versyp said Thursday when asked what her team needed to do better against IU the second time. "We've got to be able to play defense. We've got to be able to rebound. We've got to be able to make adjustments on the fly. They're a good shooting basketball team. So we've got to be able to limit some opportunities."
Indiana won the Barn Burner Trophy 74-60 in its only game against Purdue this season back on Jan. 19. Four players scored in double figures, led by junior forward Amanda Cahill's 19 points and eight rebounds and junior point guard Tyra Buss's 18 points and eight assists.
The surprise of that victory was sophomore forward Kym Royster, who scored a season-high 14 points on 7-of-11 shooting. Her breakout that game was by far her best performance of her inconcistent second season in Bloomington where she currently averages 4.4 points and 2.7 rebounds per game.
"How about Kym Royster tonight, right?" Moren said postgame after that victory. "Focused. I thought offensively she played within herself. She didn't force shots. She didn't seem rushed. Really just felt like she allowed the game to come to her but was very aggressive."
The Boilermaker's rely heavily on guard play, so any production from Royster the second go around would go a long way toward alleviating pressure on Cahill and senior center Jenn Anderson in the post.
Senior guard Ashley Morrissette leads the way with 15 points and 4.5 assists per game. Bridget Perry, a 6-foot-2 senior, leads the way in the post with 10.2 points and 5.2 rebounds per game.
Last year's upset loss on Friday still looms on the Hoosiers' mind, Anderson said. On that day, she said her team didn't come out focused and ready to play energized basketball.
As a result, IU played flat, Anderson said. The Hoosiers dug themselves into an early hole that they were never able to climb out of and were forced to sweat things out in the week leading up to the NCAA Tournament bracket reveal.
Moren overhauled her team's Big Ten Tournament preparation schedule on purpose, focusing the majority of the week on getting up as many shots as possible. The Hoosiers took Sunday off, returned to practice Monday, took Tuesday off and then hit the ground hard again Wednesday.
With her team's NCAA Tournament fait hanging in the balance, Anderson hopes it works.
"We have to go up there and we have to play," Anderson said. "We have to be ready to play because it's one-and-done. You don't have a comeback game or anything else after that."
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