Three takeaways from Penn State basketball's loss to Miami
The storyline was simple from Penn State basketball’s 63-58 defeat to Miami: In a game with tight margins, the Hurricanes got more chances.
The Nittany Lions took five fewer shots than the visitors as they moved to 4-3 on the young season.
Turnovers once again loomed large.
Turnovers doom Nittany Lions
Giveaways are emerging as a common theme in Penn State’s losses this season.
For the sixth time in seven games this season, Penn State turned the ball over more than the opposition, giving it away 14 times to Miami’s eight in Wednesday evening’s loss.
No individual player was particularly culpable. John Harrar and Myles Dread each gave it away three times. Seth Lundy, Sam Sessoms and Jalen Pickett did so twice.
They seemed to come in bunches for the Nittany Lions, including a stretch of eight in six minutes to conclude the first half.
“We’re getting a stop and just giving them the ball back and daring ourselves to get two in a row,” Penn State coach Micah Shrewsberry said. “And you can’t win like that.”
Shrewsberry said postgame that he feels Penn State is getting the kind of shots he wants — open threes and looks at the rim.
The Nittany Lions just aren’t putting enough shots up, total, because they continue to give the ball away.
“That’s us shooting ourselves in the foot,” Shrewsberry said. “We don’t value the basketball enough right now. That’s something that we’re going to get cleaned up.”
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Three-point line unkind to Penn State
Miami entered this game as one of the worst teams in the country from behind the 3-point line at both ends of the court.
The Hurricanes had only made 27 percent of their triples entering this game, which ranked in the bottom 20 nationally. They hit 36 percent of their 3-point shots on Wednesday night.
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Four of them came from 6-foot-10 forward Sam Waardenburg, who was 2-7 from beyond the arc entering the night.
On the opposite end of the floor, the Hurricanes had allowed their opposition to connect on 42 percent of their 3-point opportunities.
Penn State made just six of its 24 attempts from range.
The offensive deficiencies are what haunted Shrewsberry the most following this game, and not just in regard to three-point shooting.
“63’s gotta be enough,” he said. “I don’t know what else I can ask of our defense.”
John Harrar a bright spot for PSU
Penn State big man John Harrar is now averaging a double-double for the season after a big game in Wednesday night’s losing effort.
Harrar collected a game-high 16 points, shooting 6-6 from the field and 4-5 from the free-throw line.
He also grabbed a game-high 12 rebounds, including three offensive boards.
Harrar is now averaging 10.6 points and 10.8 rebounds through seven games of the season.
He’s giving the Nittany Lions significantly more production even compared to his monster effort last season as Penn State tries to grind out early-season wins.
