Middle Tennessee's first touchdown
Raider QB Logan Kilgore felt no pressure and just lobbed the ball over the middle to Malcolm Beyah right in from of safety Logan Link with Albert Evans not yet having arrived on the scene. Beyah caught the ball at the 5 and jogged into the end zone between Evans and Will Lucas.
Middle Tennessee ran crossing post routes, with Joe Holland trailing another receiver hooking toward the front right corner of the end zone. When the two routes converged, it ran just enough interference on Will Lucas covering Beyah for the receiver to get a step or two.
Justin Siller's 32-yard catch off the goal line
Kicking off Purdue's first touchdown drive was a huge play made by Siller to swing field position in the Boilermakers' favor after it had gotten pinned down.
On a gutsy call to have TerBush throwing on first down, the QB rolled out with running backs sealing the edge and found Siller up the right sideline. The 6-5 receiver basically had corner T.L. Edwards basically posted up around the 25.
TerBush threw off own leg just inside the end zone as a Raider pass-rushed approach. Siller went up and caught the ball with his chest, then fell forward/dragged tacklers to the 33.
Jared Crank's touchdown
On third-and-goal from the 2 after a perhaps generous pass-interference call benefited Purdue, Jared Crank was at fullback and slipped out into the right flat as TerBush faked a handoff to Ralpg Bolden and rolled with Crank, with Siller running a route from right to left to draw a defender away from the action.
Pass-rusher Darin Davis left Crank to get after TerBush and TerBush lofted ball over him and Crank went up for leaping TD catch. It wasn't a great throw by any means, but Crank made a great play on the ball.
Akeem Shavers' touchdown run
With safety Derrick Crumpton either caught way out of position, leaning outside and Shavers burst up the middle and was able to split Arness Ikner and Marquise Dixon to get to the end zone.
The play was perfectly blocked.
Rick Schmeig, Nick Mondek and Justin Kitchens did a great job sealing their guys off right, Crosby Wright stood his guy up at the line and a pulling Peters Drey came left to right to pick up one last key block, freeing Shavers into the second level, burst up middle and ducked Dixon's ankle tackle at the 15 and scored easily.
Purdue executed the play perfectly, but whatever Crumpton was doing may have been a key to the play. The safety didn't appear to be blitzing, but rather just kind of standing around not close enough to the line of scrimmage to be a factor there and not deep enough to ever enough have a chance to get in the same area code as Shavers as he scored easily.
Antavian Edison's game-winning TD
On second-and-10 from the 35 with 57 seconds to play, Purdue snapped out of the shotgun with three receivers bunched to TerBush's left. The offensive line - to a man - held its guys up and Bolden cut down D-end Omar McLendon on the far side, all of which gave TerBush time to stare down the receivers to his left.
Then the play went straight playground. Antavian Edison had run from the center of the three-receiver formation to hook in front of a corner just a few yards upfield.
Edison ran a short route and held his ground, making himself available for a pass while Justin Siller ran up the field and Crosby Wright sat down on a smash route.
Then, Edison's and TerBush's eyes seemed to meet and Edison improvised, quickly busting right just as linebacker Norman Washington had over-run him at a poor angle. TerBush went with it and hit Edison in stride around the 22-yard line, behind everyone.
Incomprehensibly in that situation, Middle Tennessee had no one deep. So there was no last line of defense. Crumpton had blitzed but got completely taken out of the play by left tackle Dennis Kelly.
Purdue handled the blitz perfectly.
Note: Don't have good enough video on the field goal block.
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