Tonight, the Penn State men’s basketball tried to get back into the winning column by taking on Mercyhurst University inside the Bryce Jordan Center.
Both teams started out in a man-to-man defense and the smaller Laker squad was not playing intimidated.
At the first media timeout (15:11) it was the Lakers over the Nittany Lions by the score of 7-6.
Penn State was only 2-for-9 from the field.
Brant Byers then came off the bench and drained two-of-three foul shots after getting fouled from beyond the arc and gave Penn State their first lead of the game at 8-7.
Penn State then started to settle in and was feeding Ivan Juric the ball inside and the big Croatian scored four straight points for the Blue & White to put them up 12-9 (11:36).
Byers then knocked in a three and Francois Wibaut, in transition, threw down a dunk to put PSU up 18-9 with 8:09 left until halftime.
Mercyhurst had to call a timeout.
Juric was leading all scorers with seven points.
After two buckets from Josh Reed and one from Roko Prkacin, the score ballooned to 24-13 with 3:46 left in the first half.
Penn State’s on-ball defense was really taking it up a notch against the Lakers.
But Mercyhurst was not going away. After a dribble-drive to the hoop for a score and two made threes with 21.0 left until halftime by Jake Lemelman, the Lakers cut their deficit to just four points, 33-29.
Lemelman, exploded, and scored 11 of his 13 points with just four minutes to play until half. He was leading all scorers with 13 points at halftime.
Add Nittany Sports Now as a preferred source in Google! Click here to add us.The score at the half:Â Penn State 33 Mercyhurst 29
To begin the second half, Mercyhurst seem to come out with more fire and intensity, and at the 16:41 mark they tied the game 37-37.
At the first media timeout (14:44) of the second half, Penn State was back on top, but only by a score of 41-39.
Prkacin was now leading the Nittany Lions with 12 points on 4-of-5 shooting.
PSU then went on run and was up by seven, 48-41, with 9:55 left after made threes from Thomas Allard and Byers, and Mercyhurst then had to call a timeout.
After the timeout, Allard drained his second three of the game to put the Nittany Lions up by double-digits, 51-41 (8:41).
Penn State went on a 10-0 run.
With 6:19 left in regulation, the Nittany Lions were up on the Lakers 58-45 after Reed splashed a three from beyond the arc. This was their largest lead of the game. Penn State was now shooting 49% (22-45) from the field and 55% from three (6-11).
At the 3:52 mark of the second half, the Nittany Lions seemed to be wearing down the smaller Laker squad and were up 63-51.
But then Mercyhurst hit back-to-back threes to make things interesting with 2:48 to play. They were only down by six, 63-57.
Penn State, though, put the clamps down on defense and turned their defense into high percentage shots on offense.
The Nittany Lions hung on to win by the score of 72-57.
