Nittany Lions' Big Comeback Comes Up Short in 68-60 Loss at Indiana

Penn State head coach Patrick Chambers couldn’t deny his Nittany Lions’ effort in a 68-60 loss at Indiana Sunday afternoon.

Visiting the Hoosiers at a feisty Assembly Hall, nearly everything favored the hosts for the first 18 minutes. So much so, that nine turnovers, 34.8 percent shooting from the floor, and an 0 for 6 clip from beyond-the-arc left the Nittany Lions staring at a 19-point deficit with 2 minutes, 16 seconds left to play in the first half.

Producing a 30-5 run that spanned nearly 10 minutes of action between the two halves, though, the Nittany Lions worked themselves into a 48-42 lead on both ends of the floor.

“I'm proud of my team. We didn't start out well. Give Indiana credit, give Archie (Miller) credit. They jumped us early. And we came out of the halftime and really punched back. And that's everything,” Chambers said. “That's everything you want to see, the character of your team, you want to see them punching back. And we did that.”

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For the Nittany Lions (20-7 overall, 10-6 Big Ten), though, it was an effort that couldn’t be sustained.

Absent second-leading scorer Myreon Jones for a fifth-straight game, still battling an unspecified illness that sidelined him since a 20-point performance at Michigan State on Feb. 4, Penn State’s offensive firepower suffered from sustained stagnation at varying points. In the first half, the point was clarified by an 0-for performance from Myles Dread, Jamari Wheeler, Seth Lundy, and Curtis Jones, leaving Lamar Stevens (14 pts) and Mike Watkins (7) to shoulder the bulk of the scoring load.

Led by an aggressive, resurgent performance to close the first half and open the second half, Penn State’s extended its first lead since the opening minutes with a Dread layup with 12:17 left to play.

Still, the Hoosiers responded with a Jerome Hunter 3-pointer to spark a 13-0 run the next 4 minutes, 21 seconds.

Though Stevens stemmed the tide, part of a 29-point afternoon for the senior forward in which he became the program’s second-leading career scorer, a swell of missed shots, loose balls, offensive rebounds, and turnovers all turned against the Nittany Lions. Finishing on the wrong end of a 21-8 deficit in points off turnovers, even a slight two-rebound advantage on the glass wasn’t enough to upend the Nittany Lions’ critical miscues and missed scoring opportunities.

Unable to fully cut away Indiana’s lead, which fluctuated between seven and three points and only grew to double-digits with the outcome already out of reach for Penn State, Chambers credited Indiana for making the game-winning plays that his team did not.

“Things weren't going our way, but we competed to the end,” Chambers said. “On the road, you want to be in a one or two-possession game with four minutes ago. We were right there. We actually took the lead, but we were right there. They made some big plays.”

Pointing out Indiana’s mere five made 3-pointers, Chambers acknowledged the differentiating factors that have flipped Penn State’s eight-game winning streak and climb to No. 9 in the rankings into an abrupt two-game slide.

“(We’re) maybe fouling a little bit more than then we're usually fouling in the... eight-game win streak. And we're not making threes. We're not making shots. And then there were timely free throw misses, where we had to go there and make those free throws to keep it a one-point game, a three-point game, and we missed some of those,” Chambers said. “Again, (I’m) proud of the way these guys fought in the second half and competed, but we'll watch the film, we'll keep getting better. This is the Big Ten, man. This is the Big Ten. I mean, there's going to be nights where you play really hard and compete, which I thought both teams did, and you're going to lose. It's going to happen. It happened versus Illinois. And that happened here today. So we got to right the ship and get back to work.”

The Nittany Lions will have that opportunity when they host Rutgers (18-10, 9-8) Wednesday at the Bryce Jordan Center (7 p.m., BTN).

Notes:

- Stevens’ game-high 29 points helped the Nittany Lions make it a competitive game but, as Chambers indicated afterward, were not an encouraging indication for Penn State’s scoring.

“Lamar Stevens was great today, but he needs help. He needs help,” Chambers said. “We can't play that way. When we're successful, we're sharing the basketball and multiple guys get double-figures. If we're relying on one guy and man, did he put us on his back, and he was in foul trouble.”

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