How Penn State men’s basketball lost a close battle with Rutgers in regular season finale
Penn State men’s basketball lost to the Rutgers Scarlet Knights Sunday afternoon in Piscataway, 59-58. The loss means the Nittany Lions will play on opening night of the Big Ten Tournament and will not get a first round bye.
The game played out much as you’d expect one featuring two stingy defenses in a regular season finale. Neither team was making shots early, but it was Rutgers that was able to get easier looks around the rim to create a gap.
The Nittany Lions, meanwhile, were getting the shots they wanted but couldn’t get them to fall. They found sophomore guard Dallion Johnson open in the corner multiple times, but he was unable to connect on those early looks from deep.
He and the rest of the team’s struggles allowed the Scarlet Knights to build a 25-15 lead with 4:34 to play in the first half. The Lions made a push to get back in the game, going on a quick 6-0 run, but Rutgers scored the final four points of the half to head into the game’s final 20 minutes up 29-21.
Penn State finished the first half with a chance despite a nightmarish offensive start. The Lions shot 17.9% from the field and 8.3% from 3-point range in the half, but managed to get to the line for 12 free throw attempts and the 10 makes from the stripe kept the offense slightly afloat.
Their cold stretch continued into the second half, with the Lions missing shot after shot from beyond the arc, while Rutgers was able to get a baseline of efficiency that allowed the Scarlet Knights to build on their lead and extend it to as high as 15 with 13:34 to play in the game.
Penn State made a push from there, however, slowly dwindling the lead from 15 to seven and going into the game’s final 3:46 with a chance to close it the rest of the way. The Nittany Lions’ initial push was fueled by three 3-pointers, which was two more than the team had made until the run started.
Another 3-pointer, this time from junior forward Seth Lundy, was the second bucket in what turned into a 9-0 run that brought the deficit to zero and gave the Nittany Lions a renewed hope.
The Scarlet Knights scored four straight from the foul line to go up 59-55, but a 3-pointer by senior guard Sam Sessoms cut it to a one-point game with 11 seconds on the clock.
A steal by Lundy got the ball back for the Nittany Lions, but a 3-pointer at the buzzer by Sessoms didn’t fall, ending their regular season with a loss.
Player of the game
Senior center John Harrar: The Nittany Lions struggled with consistency Sunday afternoon, but that wasn’t the case for Harrar. The senior center was firing on all cylinders from the start, giving maximum effort in all 34 minutes he was on the court. The results were familiar for Harrar, with him crashing the glass on both ends of the court, ending Rutgers possessions and cleaning up his teammates’ misses. The senior wound up with 17 rebounds, six of which came on the offensive end, and 15 points on eight free throw attempts that mostly resulted from his work on the glass. Harrar has been a constant for Penn State for a long time this season and his final regular season game as a Nittany Lion was more of the same.
Stat of the game
1: That’s how many 3-pointers Penn State made on its first 16 attempts from beyond the arc. The Nittany Lions got many of the looks they strive for from deep — senior Myles Dread open from above the break, Johnson open from the corner — but nothing was falling for them. The team’s poor shooting ultimately was too much to overcome, despite the Lions making five of their final eight attempts from 3-point range. Had the Lions made a single extra shot early, the story of the game could have been much different, but instead they’ll open the postseason Wednesday on the first day of the Big Ten Tournament.
Up next
Big Ten Tournament: The Nittany Lions will put their chances at the postseason on the line this week as they travel to Indianapolis for the 2022 Big Ten Tournament. They’re in need of a deep run in order to have an opportunity at the postseason, and will need to win the entire conference tournament to make the NCAA Tournament.
While that deep of a run will be a major uphill battle, Penn State has proven it can hang with any team in the conference under first-year head coach Micah Shrewsberry and should be able to stay close with all of the opponents it takes on this week at the tournament.
