Tonight, the Penn State men’s basketball team opened up their 2025-26 regular season against the Fairfield Stags. The Bryce Jordan Center was full of energy, and the Nittany Lions did not disappoint. Penn State defeated a scrappy, talented Stags’ squad 76-68.
Fairfield opened up the game, not intimidated, and got up with a score of 15-2 at the media timeout of the 15:10 mark in the first half. Braden Sparks led the charge with 6 points and Cam Estevez with 5 points.
Penn State started to settle down, began their full court press, and battled back to tie the game, 17-17, halfway through the first half.
Eli Rice knocked in two big threes on their run and Kayden Mingo continued his excellent play scoring 7 points with beautiful drives to the hoop and drawing fouls. At the media timeout with 7:36 left in the first half, the score was tied 22-22.
Freshman sensation from Turkey, Melih Tunca, started to showcase his international skills. He came off the bench and scored 8 points on 4-5 shooting to help give Penn State the lead 32-29 with 3:57 left in the first half. Fellow freshman Kayden Mingo continued his strong play with 10 points.
At halftime, the score was all locked up at 37-37. Freshmen Mingo and Tunca led the Nittany Lions with 10 points apiece. Rice added 8 points on 3 of 4 shooting and Slovenian, freshman forward, Tibor Mirtic added 4 points and 4 rebounds.
For Fairfield, it was Braden Sparks leading all scorers with 16 points shooting 6 of 12 from the field.
To start the second half, both teams kept exchanging buckets. At the 15:59 mark, the Stags took the lead 46-43. Penn State freshmen Ivan Juric and Tibor Mirtic kept the Nittany Lions in striking distance with strong takes to the rim and solid rebounding.
Dominick Stewart then hit a huge three at the 13:30 mark to cut the Stags’ lead to 4 to make the score 52-48. Stewart then hit a jumper to cut the lead to 2 with 12:40 to play. Junior portal transfer, Sasa Ciani, then completed a 3-point play after drawing a foul with a nice move to the hoop.
The Stags would not let up and the score with 7:52 to play was 56-56. They continued crashing the boards and had 3 offensive rebounds in 1 sequence. Both teams, though, kept trading buckets.
Stags’ guard Braden Sparks and PSU’s Ivan Juric each hit a huge three and the score was 66-63 Fairfield with 3:24 left in the game.
Melih Tunca drained a much needed three with 1:50 to play and Mingo drove to hoop and drew an ‘and 1′ with 1:27 to play in the game giving Penn State the lead 71-68. The BJC was rocking.
With 30 seconds to play, the Nittany Lions were up 75-68, and they never looked back. Penn State defeated Fairfield 76-68.
Tunca led the Nittany Lions with 19 points off the bench and shooting 7-11 from the field. Mingo added 15 points, Juric 13 and Rice 10 for a well-balanced scoring attack.
Nittany Lions’ next game is Saturday, November 8 on the road against New Haven.
