Both Northwestern and Penn State came out Sunday trying to prove it did not belong in the Big Ten basement.
When NU guard Sara Stutz cut through the lane and put in a right-handed layup, it capped 3:26 of frenetic-paced basketball in which both teams shot more than 50 percent and scored a combined 20 points.
The Lady Lions were able to adjust when the pace of the game slowed down.
The Wildcats were not.
Penn State (8-10, 2-5 Big Ten) used a 29-7 run to build a 22-point halftime lead and cruised the rest of the way, beating NU (4-14, 0-7) 91-48.
“We’ve got to start being more intense,” NU guard Nadia Bibbs said. “The way we came out in the first half was really sluggish, and we’ve got to pick that up.”
When the wheels started coming off for the Cats, almost every aspect of their game began to falter.
After committing only five turnovers in the first 12:11 of the contest, NU turned the ball over eight times in the last 7:49 of the half.
“They were in a zone we aren’t that comfortable with,” freshman Kristin Cartwright said. “When we tried to penetrate and kick, sometimes they got hands on it.”
The Cats gave the ball up 23 times, up from their season average of 19.5.
NU also had problems rebounding.
With 12:45 left in the first half, Penn State forward Courtney Molinaro had eight rebounds to NU’s team total of four. It wasn’t until the 6:44 mark that the Cats were finally able to outrebound Molinaro. The Lady Lions ended with more defensive rebounds than the number of total rebounds for the Cats.
“We flat out just missed a lot of box-outs,” sophomore Melissa Miller said. “We need to work on that, because that’s a tough spot for us every game, it seems like.”
Going into the game, opponents had grabbed an average of 8.8 more rebounds per game.
Cartwright said the team’s poor rebounding and shooting troubles led to easy scores for the Lady Lions.
“When we were shooting outside shots they came off long,” she said. “When we’d go for offensive rebounds, they’d get out quicker and it was hard to get back. That happened a lot, unfortuantely.”
Penn State put up 52 points in the second half, making it the second game in a row the Cats gave up more than 50 points in a half. UW-Milwaukee scored 55 points in the second half of last Wednesday’s game.
“We just didn’t do a good job defensively,” NU coach Beth Combs said. “We didn’t rotate, we weren’t doing a very good job on jumping to the ball and getting into passing lanes. We’re allowing a lot of one-on-one opportunities.”
The Nittany Lions spread the ball around effectively, with five players in double figures. Sophomore Kamela Gissendanner led the team with 21, up from her season average of 15.3.
The only NU player to reach double figures was Bibbs, who finished with 10. She and Miller were also the only NU players to shoot above 40 percent on the game, as the Cats struggled to a 19.6-percent mark from the field.
Despite all the negative aspects of her team’s 43-point loss, Combs said she was proud of the players’ effort.
“We didn’t quit. We didn’t stop playing, we didn’t stop trying to make plays,” she said.
She added, “I see a very, very positive future. These guys have to keep believing in ourselves, believing in our program. We’re going to get there. I just told them I don’t know whether it’s going to be this year, next year, in two years, but it’s going to happen for us.”
Reach David Morrison at [email protected].
