Basketball isn’t really all that hard to understand.
Even the triangle offense, which people treat like a kind of basketball only taught at Hogwarts isn’t impossible to grasp.
It really just comes down to making shots. And that’s how Ohio State beat Penn State 77-67 on Wednesday night.
Ohio State played like a team that was packed with talent because it is. They played like a team that knew the next shot was probably going in. A team that has the best freshman in the nation and a team that could make a deep run in March. A team that simply made shot after shot. Contested or wide open, they fell.
For 35 minutes Penn State met that challenge. The Nittany Lions left everything they had on the court until the dam finally broke and Ohio State’s scorers blew through the cracks in the defense. It was probably inevitable, but for a good long time Penn State made you pay attention.
Ross Travis and DJ Newbill did their best to carry their teammates on senior night. Travis in particular gave the kind of effort that could have won Penn State a few more games had he played that way a few months earlier. He finished with 14 points and 8 rebounds. Newbill contributed a typical 17 point, 5 assist, 4 rebound performance.
Even then though, effort only gets you so far. You have to make shots. The entire team has to make shots.
To Penn State’s credit the Nittany Lions did just that in the opening half. Penn State’s 44 percent clip in the first half jumps up to 62 percent if you exclude a cold 1-for-9 performance from beyond the arc. The Nittany Lions made baskets, got back on defense and played good enough defense to force Ohio State to work for everything.
The result was a positive one for Penn State — a nine point lead in the first half with the crowd on their side. Ohio State would close the gap to 30-29 at halftime, but it was Penn State that controlled the pace of play.
Beginning the final 20 minutes of play, the Nittany Lions struck first. A 6-0 run forced an Ohio State timeout and sent the Jordan Center crowd to its feet with 17:18 to go.
It was the next six minutes though that showed the real difference between the two teams.
In that span Ohio State went 12-of-16 from the floor in an offensive explosion that Penn State could not stop. The key was D’Angelo Russell and his 19 second half points. Truly though, the entire Buckeye team threatened Penn State with balance and poise, drawing fouls and making free throws.
Penn State trailed by 17 points with 5:30 to play. The Nittany Lions cut the lead to only nine with 1:28 to go, but by then it was a formality of fouls and prayers as the Buckeyes went 7-of-7 from the line in that closing stretch.
There is a lot to be said about how Penn State’s season has gone. The near wins could have been something other than a host of close losses. But Ohio State put on a masterclass Wednesday night.
You win basketball games when you make shots.
“In the Big Ten you need guys who can make shots. We didn’t make shots,” Chambers said. “There were three guys keyed on DJ most of the game. We needed other guys to step up. Ross [Travis] helped in the first half, DJ helped in the beginning of the second half. We needed to put the ball inside and trust it.”
“With 3-17 (From three), we’re not going to win. And you’re putting too much pressure on your defense because they are long shots and long rebounds. Ohio State’s ball is in the net before you can realize what just happened. We did a really good job from the free throw line and that’s a great thing but 3-17 isn’t going to get it done.”
The effort Pat Chambers and his roster have to put forth this season is admirable. It’s not easy to play hard as defeat after defeat piles up. It’s not easy to try again and it’s even harder to get so close against teams that frequently are already ahead of you from the start.
But at some point there is enough data to see the difference between a good team being poorly coached and an almost good team not quite having the firepower to make it over the hump consistently.
That illustrates how important this recruiting cycle continues to be for the program’s future. Penn State basketball will never turn the corner because outclassed players outworked good opponents. It will turn the corner when good players outwork good opponents.
The Nittany Lions are closer. The potential of Geno Thorpe, Shep Garner, Julian Moore and Brandon Taylor should not be underestimated
But Penn State has work left to do, and that work might start to get done this summer.
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