Penn State basketball preview: Nittany Lions in search of offensive flow as they host Wagner

Penn State head basketball coach Micah Shrewsberry offered a bit of self-criticism regarding how he’d handled the Nittany Lion offense in Sunday’s loss to Ohio State.

Shrewsberry dipped into his arsenal of set plays early on in the game. Perhaps that paid off in the short term. The Nittany Lions opened the game with 12 points in the first 3:35.

But that kind of structure, especially early in the game, can present consequences down the line, Shrewsberry explained. He hopes to use that as a learning experience, beginning Wednesday night at 7 p.m., when the Nittany Lions take on Wagner at the Bryce Jordan Center.

“I have to be better in terms of allowing us to try and get more ball movement early in games,” he said Monday. “There’s opportunities for us to try and attack certain people on the other team, but if we don’t start with ball movement we never get to ball movement. We need to start that way.

“That was on me for going to some stuff too early, got us out of our flow, got us out of our rhythm. It kind of stagnated us a little bit.”

Offensive flow hasn’t always been easily achieved for Penn State this season. The Nittany Lions are 3-0 when they exceed the 70-point mark, but getting there is proving difficult.

Penn State’s offense is much more efficient from the field than it was last season. The Nittany Lions boast a 45.5 field goal percentage. That’s up from 40.8 percent last season — one of the worst marks in the country.

But turnovers are an issue. The Nittany Lions are turning it over at a 20.4 percent clip, and they’re not getting steals on the other end to compensate. Penn State also isn’t hitting the offensive glass as hard as it did last season. The Nittany Lions have an offensive rebound percentage of 27.5, down from 31.9 a year ago.

Efficiency, when Penn State does get shots up, isn’t the problem. Consistently getting up fewer shots than the opposition is. The Nittany Lions attempted more field goals than Youngstown State and Oregon State — both wins. They’ve come out on the wrong side of that equation six times in eight games.

Shrewsberry wants an offense that moves the ball from side to side effectively. Flow is crucial. When you start games moving the ball well, forward Seth Lundy acknowledged, it can carry on throughout 40 minutes.

“I feel like once you set the tempo and pace at the beginning of the game, you set the tempo and pace for the rest of the game,” he said.

“Once we move the ball around and get a couple of reverses and stuff like that, the offense is going to be so much better. There’s gonna be more open shots. And then that’s when we can attack one-on-one. But if the ball’s stagnant and you try to attack one-on-one, people are heavy in the gaps, so it’s hard to get to the rim.”

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Scouting Wagner

Don’t be fooled by the name, this Wagner team can play.

The Seahawks won the Northeast Conference last season and returned all five of their starters.

They sit at 3-1 for the season so far, their resume headlined by a 14-point win at VCU.

“People are going to just look at the name and automatically assume this should be a 20-point win,” Shrewsberry said. “You’re not following college basketball then.

“I told our guys last night, if you think you’re playing hard, you’re going to see what playing hard looks like on Wednesday, because these dudes play harder than anybody I’ve ever seen. So it’s going to be a major, major test.”

Senior guard Alex Morales leads the Seahawks in points and rebounding. He’s averaging 18 points per game through four contests, grabbing 8.3 boards and dishing out 3.7 assists.

This is not a group that offers very much height. Forward Raekwon Rogers is Wagner’s tallest player at 6-foot-8, 230 bounds.

Penn State vs Wagner betting line

The Nittany Lions opened as nine-point favorites, according to the Vegas Insider Consensus. That line has been bet down to 7.5 as of Wednesday at noon.