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WEST LAFAYETTE – It is not how you start, it is how you finish.

The Purdue Boilermakers played an excellent three quarters on Saturday evening, taking a 17-10 lead over No. 21 ranked Notre Dame into the fourth quarter. It all went down hill from there.

The Irish scored to start the fourth quarter when Tommy Rees hit DaVaris Daniels for a 9-yard score to tie the game at 17 with 14:47 to play in the game. From there, the Irish scored 14 more points to eventually put away the Boilers, 31-24, Saturday night at Ross-Ade Stadium.

The Irish defense forced a Boilermaker punt following its game-tying touchdown and Rees wasted no time getting his team the lead.

The senior quarterback found Daniels on the first play of the drive for an 82-yard touchdown strike to put Notre Dame up 24-17 with 12:40 remaining. The Notre Dame defense did its job once again as senior cornerback Bennett Jackson picked off a Rob Henry pass taking it back 34 yards for Notre Dame’s third touchdown in as many minutes.

Daniels torched the Boiler defense with eight receptions for 167 yards and the two scores.

“I don’t know if it was frustration as much as it was this confidence that we were going to be okay,” Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly said. “I was never worried in the sense that there was a panic. I felt really confident that we were going to win the football game. We just needed to settle down a little bit.”

Purdue, now trailing 31-17, put together a fantastic responding drive led by Henry. The Boilermaker signal caller completed four of five passes for 68 yards including a nine-yard scoring toss on fourth down to Justin Sinz. Henry had a fantastic day for Purdue going 25-40 for 256 yards and three touchdown. All categories were career highs for Henry.

The Irish gift wrapped an opportunity for Purdue on the ensuing drive as Purdue’s Taylor Richards forced an Amir Carlisle fumble. Joe Gilliam recovered for the Boilers setting up the Purdue offense with a first and ten on the Irish 41-yard line.

The Boilermakers failed to score while the Irish turned to Cam McDaniel to run out the clock. The junior rushed 10 times for 42 yards on the final Irish drive to secure the win for Notre Dame. McDaniel had 56 yards on 16 carries for the game and had Notre Dame’s first touchdown of the day on a one-yard rush in the third quarter.

The Irish converted on third down four times on the game’s final drive and converted 11 times on 16 tries in the game while Purdue only converted seven of its 16 third downs. The conversions helped Notre Dame finish with exactly 400 yards of total offense, outgaining Purdue’s 294 yards.

While Notre Dame certainly controlled most of the second half, it was Purdue that burst out of the gates to start the game. The Boilers scored on their first possession when Henry hit Akeem Hunt for a 15-yard touchdown. The Irish defense had a hard time controlling Hunt as the junior tailback accounted for 94 all-purpose yards and the one scoring catch.

Purdue also had an 18-yard pitch and catch from Henry to BJ Knauf in the third quarter for a score, giving Purdue its 17-10 lead it took into the fourth quarter.

“Obviously a tough loss for us,” began Purdue coach Darrell Hazell said. “I thought our boys played extremely hard, they came in there and kept fighting. Obviously a couple plays we would like to get back. I was very proud of our football team tonight. We will continue to get better and that’s the whole key of this football team: to make strides forward, a win will come. I am very proud of our team tonight.”

Notre Dame (2-1) has now beaten Purdue in the last six meetings and are 57-26-2 in the series dating back to 1896. The traveling Shillelagh Trophy has been exchanged since 1957, to which the Irish hold a 38-19 edge.