Penn State drops 68-51 decision at Iowa, outworked by Hawkeyes
Penn State basketball head coach Micah Shrewsberry was heated.
His Nittany Lions, dropping a 68-51 decision at Iowa Saturday afternoon, were uncompetitive in the second half. Worse, they were outworked by the Hawkeyes.
“They just outworked us,” Shrewsberry told Penn State’s play-by-play team of Steve Jones and Dick Jerardi. “They flipped it. We were comfortable in terms of what was happening and they just flipped the script.”
The situation wasn’t dire through the game’s first 20 minutes.
Despite just 34.6 percent shooting from the floor, the Nittany Lions 22-10 advantage on the glass was enough to not only stay close to the Hawkeyes. Rather, locking down the hosts after falling behind 14-7 early, Penn State found its first lead with 2:27 to play on a Seth Lundy 3-pointer.
The feeling wouldn’t last.
Quickly countered by back-to-back bombs from Iowa, first, a Jordan Bohanon dagger, followed by a Kris Murray 3-pointer 39 seconds later, Penn State found itself at a 30-25 disadvantage at the half.
“It’s a matter of finishing the game, winning the game. When you come in here and play in the tough environment, a lot of things have to go right,” Shrewsberry said. “We gave ourselves a chance in the first half by rebounding the basketball. We turned it over way too many times, but we rebounded the ball and we kept them from getting second-chance shots and we got some back.
“And then we just relaxed at halftime. Next game we’re just gonna stay out here at halftime. We’ve been terrible at the start of second halves and that’s something that’s got to change. Either I got to do something different and I gotta start different people, but we can’t do this again.”
Penn State’s plus-12 rebounding edge, stunningly, evaporated.
Though a Jalen Pickett free throw and 3-pointer amounted to jabs traded out of the locker room, a quick 9-2 run for the hosts built a 10-point advantage at Carver-Hawkeye. Concurrent to Iowa’s second-half burst, Penn State’s shooting stayed just as cold as the first half.
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The result was a barrage of Iowa offensive rebounds numbering 10 in the second half and, consequently, a 9-point swing in second-chance points.
“We got rebounds in the first half but we didn’t in the second half,” Shrewsberry said. “And it started with their effort from the guys on the bench… once they started getting offensive rebounds, the whole thing snowballed. The tougher team sets the rules and they were the tougher team in the second half.
“We were the tougher team (in the first half). They flip it, they get to the free-throw line, they started dominating us on the glass.”
Unable to get closer than a 6-point deficit in the second half, Iowa scoring 11 of its final 17 points at the free-throw line, Penn State remained without answers. Penn State managed just two Greg Lee free throws in the final five minutes of action.
The result was Penn State’s biggest losing deficit since an 81-56 loss at UMass.
Penn State will return to action Wednesday night when they travel to Indiana (8:30 p.m., BTN).
