ADVERTISEMENT

Basketball Penn State opens Big Ten Tournament with 66-57 win over Michigan

Was thinking the first two nights were going to be cruise control, and then the Nits would have to pull some tourney magic to get past Nebraska. Now I'm a bit worried tomorrow night could be a struggle.
 
Was thinking the first two nights were going to be cruise control, and then the Nits would have to pull some tourney magic to get past Nebraska. Now I'm a bit worried tomorrow night could be a struggle.
We’ll likely be small underdogs tomorrow…really worry about the matchup without Lilley.
 
We’ll likely be small underdogs tomorrow…really worry about the matchup without Lilley.
Not worried about the line. College hoops betting is like taking candy from a baby. Lilley is back, and we handled Indiana without him once, and the other time he did much of nothing (7 min, 1 assist, 1 foul).

I just wanted to see expected tourney crispness and energy tonight and put Mich to sleep early. Didn't happen.
 
It didn't have to be pretty, just a win was all we needed, and we got that so it is a sweet of a game as you can have. Still really pissed that it was on Peacock and not the BTN.
 
Not worried about the line. College hoops betting is like taking candy from a baby. Lilley is back, and we handled Indiana without him once, and the other time he did much of nothing (7 min, 1 assist, 1 foul).
College hoops lines have never been sharper…that’s completely false.

If Lilley was good, I’m sure we would have seen him over the last 30 minutes…I’ll be very surprised if he goes.
 
We handled Indiana twice already with little to no contribution from Lilley, who is just a bit part, regardless.

If Lilley can’t go, the biggest issue is a sheer lack of bodies with games in quick succession, not a match-up problem.

If Galloway can’t go, that balances out our lackluster performance last night, and I’m predicting PSU by at least 7. Likely double digits.
 
We handled Indiana twice already with little to no contribution from Lilley, who is just a bit part, regardless.

If Lilley can’t go, the biggest issue is a sheer lack of bodies with games in quick succession, not a match-up problem.

If Galloway can’t go, that balances out our lackluster performance last night, and I’m predicting PSU by at least 7. Likely double digits.
Indiana has Xavier Johnson back and Ware is playing better. Ware could have a field day inside unless Wahab really brings it. Plus they are hot, finishing with 4 straight wins. They don't have Galloway so that helps but I doubt we win by 7 or more. This will be a dog fight and could simply come down to which team can execute better the last 5 minutes.
 
  • Like
Reactions: bdgan
Indiana has Xavier Johnson back and Ware is playing better. Ware could have a field day inside unless Wahab really brings it. Plus they are hot, finishing with 4 straight wins. They don't have Galloway so that helps but I doubt we win by 7 or more. This will be a dog fight and could simply come down to which team can execute better the last 5 minutes.

XJohn is a downgrade from Galloway, and Ware tore us up for 25 (on 8 for 12 shooting) and 11 the first time we beat them ... by 14.

Weird stuff happens in conference tourneys, and we could come out completely flat and let them make it a game, but the much more likely result is a pretty convincing victory by the Nits, and then we have to deal with the real problem for this squad - the Huskers.
 
Hoosiers are now 2 point favorites. Huge shift in the line
It doesn't take a whole lot to move to move from -1.5 to +1.5, simply because you've got 3 dead numbers in there, and the 1 is rare in college hoops. But definitely some sharp action on Indiana to be moving it.
 
XJohn is a downgrade from Galloway, and Ware tore us up for 25 (on 8 for 12 shooting) and 11 the first time we beat them ... by 14.

Weird stuff happens in conference tourneys, and we could come out completely flat and let them make it a game, but the much more likely result is a pretty convincing victory by the Nits, and then we have to deal with the real problem for this squad - the Huskers.
Well that didn't go as planned. I knew it would come down to the last few minutes. How were we even close with Ace going 3-15 and Wahab 0-8?
 
  • Like
Reactions: The Spin Meister
Well that didn't go as planned. I knew it would come down to the last few minutes. How were we even close with Ace going 3-15 and Wahab 0-8?
Because Indiana's an extremely beatable team that we matched up quite well with, so they couldn't take advantage of our inability to finish.

Indiana had the strategy to take away the 3 early, so we just fell into their trap and tried to put Wahab against their bigs, and he couldn't convert ... we should have worked to create opportunities on the outside earlier, to set the tone.

If we would have shot our season avg at the line, we would have been -2 points there. If we would have shot our season avg from the field, we would have been +20 there. And we only shot 3-4 more FTs than our season avg, so even adjusting for that, we still would have been +15 all told on an average shooting night.
 
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT