FINAL: IU 74, Penn State 51

After the team’s Big Ten opener on the road where the Hoosiers struggled to breakaway from the Iowa Hawkeyes and walked away from Carver-Hawkeye Arena with a 69-65 win, the IU men’s basketball team utilized a fast first half start to defeat Penn State in State College, Pa. Monday night 74-51 to begin conference play 2-0.

Even though the pace of play slowed the rest of the game after the Hoosiers stormed out to a 31-13 lead midway through the first half, the early hot hands of two seniors gave IU a lead the Nittany Lions simply couldn’t overcome.

Senior forward Christian Watford scored the team's first five points, including a bucket down low in the Hoosiers' first possession. The next time down the court, Watford hit a 3-pointer from the left wing that commenced a 13-0 IU run after the team fell behind early 3-2.??

Watford finished the half with 13 points after scoring just 10 points during the entire game last season when the Hoosiers visited Penn State.??

Senior guard Jordan Hulls broke out of the slump he fell into in Iowa City on New Years Eve, where he failed to score a single point, shooting 0-for-10 from the field. Hulls scored 10 points in the first 20 minutes, including 2-for-3 from beyond the arc.??

The Hoosiers secure an 18-point lead midway through the half, but Penn State showed a brief sign of fight, going on a 6-0 run in less than a minute to cut IU's lead to just 12, but the Hoosiers bumped it right back up to finish the half up 44-27.

But in the second half, neither team looked very sharp as the early turnovers piled up.

IU turned the ball over four times in the first 1:45 and scored only four free throws until a layup from junior guard Victor Oladipo with 13:34 left broke a Hoosier scoring drought from the floor.

The Nittany Lions, though, struggled with four turnovers of their own in the first 1:28 of the second half and scored just four points during IU’s drought. As both teams struggled on offense, the Hoosiers were able to maintain a lead that hovered around 20 points midway throughout the second half.

IU’s lead would stay there the rest of the game, as both teams recovered their touch from the floor, and the Hoosiers finished the game with their largest lead of the contest at 23 points.


-Nathan Brown