Lions good to the last drop

Jeff Rice

UNIVERSITY PARK — The nation, along with a crammed Bryce Jordan Center, waited for a little more than two hours late Thursday night to see if Penn State was an NCAA Tournament team.

CDT photo/Christopher Weddle

Penn State’s Talor Battle celebrates after making the game-winning shot with less than a second to play to lift the Nittany Lions to a 64-63 win over No. 23 Illinois on Thursday.

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The Nittany Lions’ answer, in the final second, was an emphatic “Yes.”

Talor Battle drove through the entire Illinois defense, and his layup bounced off the glass, rolled around the rim and in with 0.3 seconds left, giving Penn State a 64-63 win over No. 23 Illinois before 13,091 delirious fans.

“You can’t draw it up any better,” Penn State coach Ed DeChellis said. “Two heavyweights just slugging it out, and we made the last play. We’re 10-7 in the league, we’ve won 21 games — I don’t know what else people want.”

Stanley Pringle led the Nittany Lions (21-9, 10-7 Big Ten) with 20 points on his 22nd birthday, going 4-for-4 from 3-point range and drawing Penn State within three, 63-60, with his fourth triple with 1:47 left. Battle, who had 15 points, six rebounds and four assists, was the only other Nittany Lion in double figures.

As usual, the sophomore point guard saved his finest play for the final minutes.

A pair of clutch free throws from David Jackson made it 63-62, and after Illinois’ Trent Meacham missed a runner with 24 seconds left, Battle charged upcourt ... only to lose his dribble at the top of the key, resulting in a held ball. The Illini had the possession arrow.

“I went right to my teammates and said I’m going to make it up to you, I promise,” Battle said.

After the Illini’s Mike Davis left the front end of a one-and-one short with 8.4 seconds left, Battle got his chance. As the Illini scrambled back on defense, he flew up the left side of the court, rounded the corner, twisted his body to avoid a charge as he shot and watched and waited for the ball to drop.

“When you shoot the basketball, you know whether it’s going in first before everybody else does,” Battle said. “Even though it was bouncing, I knew it was so soft it was going to stay in.”

Mike Tisdale’s desperation, full-court inbounds heave was harmlessly batted away, sending a stream of students pouring onto the court.

Demetri McCamey led Illinois (23-8, 11-7) with 16 points. Tis-dale added 12 and Chester Frazier 11. The Illini led 58-50 when Calvin Brock put back a miss that hadn’t drawn iron just about the time the shot clock expired. Replays showed he didn’t get the shot off in time, but the Illini took and maintained a 10-point lead with 5:11 to play. On the same play, Penn State senior forward Jamelle Cornley had suffered an injury to his left shoulder. He reentered the game two minutes later, after Andrew Jones had fouled out with 4:40 left.

It looked bleak for Penn State. To everyone but the Nittany Lions, that is.

“We were in the huddle, T (Battle) said we’re not losing, Coach said we’re not losing,” Pringle said. “And we kept it like that.”

The Illinois team that shot 30 percent from the field in a 38-33 loss to Penn State in Champaign on Feb. 18 was nowhere to be found Thursday. In its place was an efficient offensive unit that played terrific man-to-man defense on the Nittany Lions, holding Cornley to seven points and seven rebounds (several of which came after his injury and while grimacing in pain) and, for the most part, containing the dangerous Battle.

After a quick 8-0 spurt gave the Nittany Lions an 8-5 lead, the Illini responded with nine unanswered points and led for very nearly the remainder of the game.

All but 0.3 seconds. “We had the lead, we had our chances,” Illinois coach Bruce Weber. “It’s a tough pill to swallow. I couldn’t be more proud of our kids. I think they came ready to play. We just couldn’t get it done.”

Battle and Pringle bounced off the podium in the media room at about 11:30 p.m. Thursday. The Nittany Lions will board a flight to Iowa at 10 a.m. this morning and play the Hawkeyes at 2 p.m. Saturday in Carver-Hawkeye Arena, their quickest turnaround of the conference season.

Penn State might need to beat the Hawkeyes to stay on the good side of the bubble, but a stubborn and savvy performance before a primetime ESPN audience earned the Nittany Lions some invaluable buzz and gave the tournament selection committee, if it was watching, plenty to think about.

“Hopefully they did see it,” said Battle, in between thanking the fans and Penn State quarterback Daryll Clark, who rousted the crowd during pregame introductions from midcourt, “but we still got another game.”