Citing failing, Micah Shrewsberry shoulders blame for Penn State flop

Micah Shrewsberry’s ire was directed at one man following Penn State’s 93-70 blowout loss to Nebraska on Sunday night.

A disaster by any measure for Penn State, the Nittany Lions losing their final home game of the season, to the Big Ten’s worst team, in dominating fashion, Shrewsberry pointed at himself.

“We were poorly prepared,” Shrewsberry said. “I sucked.”

And that lack of preparation, Shrewsberry continued, showed from the jump at the Bryce Jordan Center.

Against an opponent who entered the game with just one conference win, the Nittany Lions were unable to execute. Knowing who and what Nebraska has been this season, a team with few wins but plenty of scoring potential, Penn State failed to implement its game plan. 

Shrewsberry insisted that responsibility was his in Penn State’s loss. 

“Maybe if we were a little bit more disciplined, maybe if I’d done a better job, maybe if we stepped to our man, we have the first possession. It could change the game. Maybe not. I don’t know,” Shrewsberry said. “We decided to play HORSE tonight. And you don’t play HORSE against a team with better shooters.”

Nebraska’s upper hand over Penn State

From the top to the bottom of Nebraska’s lineup, that theme rang true Sunday night.

Connecting on 32 of 55 shots from the floor, including 13 3-pointers, Nebraska set season records against a Penn State defense that had relied on its defense all season. At 58.2 percent shooting, the Cornhuskers had the highest showing of any Penn State opponent this season with their 13 3-pointers tying the effort of UMass the second game in November. 

Not surprised by anything Nebraska did, the Cornhuskers living up to their billing as the league’s fastest-paced team, Penn State simply couldn’t keep up or reverse the game’s terms to its own.

“I didn’t do a good job of getting our team prepared to play tonight. It was a huge factor in it. You prepare for what’s somebody is capable of doing and if you’re not ready to go, this is what they’re capable of doing,” Shrewsberry said. “Anybody that looks at Nebraska… they haven’t laid down and died and quit at any point in time. They play really hard. We didn’t have it tonight, and that’s on me. I did a terrible job of getting these guys ready to play.”

No answers on offense

Concurrent to that defensive failure, Penn State had no answers offensively to offset it. 

Keeping pace early by connecting on their first five shots from the floor, a drought of eight misses over their next nine attempts left the Nittany Lions in a hole from which they couldn’t dig out.

Still, Shrewsberry directed all attention toward what he considered to be his blunder in Penn State’s loss.

“This didn’t have anything to do with our offense. We’re fighting uphill the whole time. If you don’t get stops, you quit playing hard, and that’s what we did,” Shrewsberry said. “If I do a better job getting our guys ready to go defensively, maybe we feed off of that and we play a little bit better offense. But we didn’t have it. They had more points at almost halftime than we’ve given up in some games this season. 

“I don’t care about anything that happened on the other end of the court. This was about our defense. (It was about) us not being prepared to play, (and) that’s on me. It starts at the top. If I do a better job, maybe we come out and play a little bit better. But hat’s off to them too. They played great. They played the same night we did. There are no excuses about somebody being tired. You get what you deserve, so we gotta sit with this for a little bit. I’ll be better the next time.”