The son of former NBA All-Star, Gilbert Arenas, Alijah, put a damper on today’s THON game after the 6′-6″ freshman guard scored the game-winning shot for USC with 0.7 left on the clock.
In a game that saw 12 tied scores with 10 lead changes, Arenas sent the Trojans back to the West Coast earning their first-ever victory in State College, 77-75.
For Penn State, Freddie Dilione V. led the Nittany Lions with 23 points, four rebounds, four assists and three steals. Josh Reed tallied his eighth-straight double-digit scoring effort with 17 points. Freshman, Ivan Jurić, returned from a two-game illness layoff and registered 13 points and eight rebounds. Dominick Stewart rounded out the Nittany Lion double-digit scorers with 11 points.
Penn State coach, Mike Rhoades, spoke to the media after the thrilling nail-biter.
“Close, but no cigar. Just not enough to finish down the stretch. We got that lead and we’ve done a great job all year with this group of not turning the ball over and today we just had way too many turnovers that led to them getting baskets that we couldn’t defend. I thought it was like 12 or 14 points in the first half and I thought when we got that lead we made some poor decisions.”
Add Nittany Sports Now as a preferred source in Google! Click here to add us.“Our guards had too many turnovers today and they haven’t most of the year and that really hurt us.”
“They made one more play than we did…just wish we would have made that play a little bit better…and that’s the execution part.”
You can watch Coach Rhoades’ postgame presser in its entirety below.
