Leading by as many as 22, the Nittany Lions fended off a late Duquense run to finish the non conference schedule at 8-4 with a 84-74 victory Saturday afternoon.
Sophomore guard DJ Newbill posted his first double-double as a Nittany Lion, registering 23 points while pulling down 12 rebounds.
Penn State opened up the game shooting well, with contributions from Nick Colella, who went 5-of-7 from beyond the arc, and Sasa Borovnjak, who scored 14 points in the paint helped the Nittany Lions build a 39-28 halftime lead.
[Sasa is] playing with confidence,’ Head coach Patrick Chambers said to reporters after the game. ‘I think last year he wasn’t 100 percent sure about his knee and this year you’ve seen a kid who is running the floor great and is taking high-quality shots, high-percentage shots. Our guys look for him every possession. As a matter of fact, we now run a ton of plays to get the ball in the post.’
Penn State continued to shoot the ball well in the second half opening up a 66-44 lead with 10:16 to go. Duquesne didn’t stop fighting though and were able to take advantage of a Nittany Lion cold spell to spark a run that got the lead down to 5 with 56 seconds to go.
Clutch free throws down the stretch by freshman Akosa Maduegbunam helped put the game out of reach for the sixth win in eight games since the loss of All-Big Ten guard Tim Frazier.
‘We feel really confident,’ Newbill said.’We feel that this game was a momentum game for us, and we realize that the Big Ten is going to have some of the toughest games that we’re going to face this year. We’re just working hard. Our principles don’t change. Play hard, defend, tough, gritty; that’s our identity.’
