Wednesday night’s game seemed to be shaping up to be a good one in Champaign, Illinois, as Zach Hicks opened the scoring for Penn State with a 3-pointer for his 1,000th career point.
Hicks would account for five of the early 11 points for the Nittany Lions as the visitors took a six-point lead with 14 minutes and 29 seconds left in the first half.
Then, a 15-0 Illini run happened, marking the beginning of the end for PSU. The Nittany Lions would only score 10 points for the remainder of the half (on 4-for-24 shooting) as Illinois took a 24-point lead into the intermission and never looked back.
Penn State Basketball Suffers Worse Loss of the Season at No. 13 Illinois
3-POINT STRUGGLES MOUNT UP
This most recent loss is part of a bigger trend for Penn State. It marks the fifth consecutive game Mike Rhoades’ squad has shot 26 percent or worse from 3. In the last two games, the Nittany Lions have made less than 17 percent of their 3’s (5-for-33 overall).
While PSU struggled to make distance shots (2-of-12 on Wednesday), Rhoades credited Illinois’ defense with contributing to his team’s overall inefficiency.
“They (Illinois) take certain things away,” Rhoades said postgame.
“Certain guys aren’t shooting the 3 … they played the numbers, and they really baited us into taking tough 2’s. We talked about it, easier said than done. When you get into the heat of battle, sometimes you lose your mind, and we took a lot of bad twos. And you know those twos, they’re not considered turnovers, but when they’re so early in the shot and they bait you into a tough two, or a hard two, it’s an easy rebound and go, and we fell for it.”
Add Nittany Sports Now as a preferred source in Google! Click here to add us.On all 2-point shots, Penn State went 18-for-53 (34 percent). If PSU isn’t producing from behind the arc or inside it, this could only be the start of a long, downward spiral.
PENN STATE BASKETBALL SLIDES IN RANKINGS
Following Wednesday’s loss, Penn State is now 53rd in the KenPom rankings and 51st in NET.
This two-game skid has dropped PSU 14 spots in KenPom and three spots in NET. Since beginning the full slate of Big Ten play on Jan. 2, the Nittany Lions are 1-2 and 2-3 overall in conference matchups.
In combined Quad 1 and 2 games, PSU is 2-4. The recent loss to Illinois most likely won’t change Joe Lunardi’s prediction that Penn State will be the first team cut from the field of 68 in March.
Will Penn State Basketball be the First Team Out of the NCAA Tournament?
And there will be no time to take a breath, as the Nittany Lions prepare for No. 15 Oregon on Sunday and then No. 16 Michigan State on Wednesday.
