Billy Oliver scored a career-high 21 points and Penn State held Purdue to a season-low 31 percent shooting in a 65-45 win Thursday night to end a six-game losing streak against the Boilermakers.
Tim Frazier added 15 points, including a leaning banker in traffic in the lane to extend the lead to 54-38 with about 8 minutes left. The tough bucket capped an 18-6 run to put the game out of reach and secure first-year coach Patrick Chambers' first Big Ten win at Penn State (9-7, 1-2).
Robbie Hummel's 14 points and five rebounds paced Purdue (12-4, 2-1), which lost to Penn State for the first time since a 67-64 defeat three years ago in Happy Valley.
This one wasn't nearly as close. Playing with four fouls, Oliver hit back-to-back 3s with just 5 minutes left for a 19-point lead. The Nittany Lions outhustled their opponents and outrebounded them 38-26.
Matt Glover led Penn State on the glass with 11 rebounds.
D.J. Byrd had 12 points for Purdue, which narrowed a 15-point deficit in the first half to 36-32 off Hummel's layup with 15:15 left.
But Penn State regrouped and went on a 7-0 run finished by Frazier's layup on the break following a steal by Glover.
An uncharacteristically sloppy first half left Purdue trailing 32-18 halftime, the Boilermakers' lowest-scoring half of the season. Penn State held Purdue without a field goal the final 6:46 of a half in which coach Matt Painter's club committed seven turnovers, or about three less than its average for an entire game.
Oliver, a 6-foot-8 forward who likes to roam the perimeter, scored 12 in the first half on 4-of-6 shooting from 3-point range.
Penn State led by as much as 15 in the half on Sasa Borovnjak's layup with 3 minutes to go before Purdue made its second-half push.
