The Northwestern men’s basketball team was taken to school in the paint Wednesday by an overpowering Michigan State team.
Those lessons won’t help Saturday.
When NU (7-8, 0-3 Big Ten) travels to the Bryce Jordan Center to play Penn State (10-3, 1-2) at 7 p.m., it will have to shift its focus to a much more perimeter-oriented offense.
Led by the Crispin brothers — senior Joe leads the Big Ten in scoring with 22.6 points per game and sophomore Jon checks in with 8.9 — the Nittany Lions fire up a barrage of shots from the outside in every game.
The elder Crispin alone averages nine three-point attempts per game, and fellow guard Titus Ivory shoots 5.6 per game from behind the arc.
Aside from senior forward Gyasi Cline-Heard, the Nittany Lions don’t pose too much of a threat inside, a weakness that could help the undersized Cats. Still, the outside threat of the Penn State guards has the Cats wary of their opponent.
“They have three guys who can make long shots,” NU coach Bill Carmody said. “You just hear about the one guy (Joe Crispin) but Ivory was 5-for-9 (Wednesday) from three. So you just have to shadow those guys.”
The adjustment from one extreme in Michigan State to another on Saturday will test the Cats’ ability to adapt on the fly.
“It’s tough enough with both teams being really good,” assistant coach Craig Robinson said. “But with a guy like Crispin spreading everything out, it’s the complete opposite of what we prepared for (against the Spartans). There’s not any overlap. It’s like we have a brand-new thing to look at.”
The change in opponent could potentially alter NU’s offensive opportunities as well. But no matter what Penn State throws at the Cats, NU will still have to execute well to get a win.
“I don’t think who we play should dictate whether we make or miss shots,” Robinson said. “This team, they’re not as big as Michigan State. That always helps, but we’ve got to make shots. You’ve got to play nearly perfect basketball when you’re at a place like Northwestern.”
SHORT-TERM MEMORY: The Cats didn’t seem too upset after losing to the Spartans. Even though they were beaten handily — a 84-53 loss — the coaching staff didn’t express too much displeasure with the effort.
“How do you lose by 30 and still not feel that bad?” Carmody said. “There were certain things that we did last night — I thought we ran our offense. I’m looking at the tape, and you’re down 14 with nine minutes to go and realizing that they’re in total control but still up (only) 14. And we played really good defense.”
Some of the players also noted that the coaches didn’t get too angry, adding that the effort wasn’t a major disappointment.
“We played them tight. We played them hard,” guard Jitim Young said. “After the game, (Carmody) was telling us that he didn’t feel like we were not competing with them.”
NU was able to stay with the defending national champs for a good part of the first half, and the coaches chose to stress that instead of focusing on the difficulties of the rest of the game.
“When you review tapes, you look at it and you say, ‘You know, a little bit here and a little bit there,'” Carmody said. “If you can hang for 10 minutes, can you hang for 20? Can you hang for 30?”
KO’D CATS: Two NU players, freshmen Casey Cortez and Drew Long, didn’t make the trip to Michigan State, although the two had very different reasons.
Long, who has played 19 minutes this year, was declared academically ineligible and will miss the rest of the season, although he can practice with the team. The guard from Houston appealed unsuccessfully, so he will not have another opportunity to play until his sophomore season.
Cortez missed a team meal Saturday before the Cats played Purdue and was suspended by the coaching staff for an indefinite period.
“If I had a chance to talk to him (last) Saturday, I would have had him miss that game,” Carmody said. “I didn’t talk to him about why he didn’t make it until afterward, so he didn’t make the trip (Wednesday).”
