5 Takeaways from Penn State’s Loss at Nebraska

Penn State men’s basketball made it three straight losses as the Nittany Lions fell to Nebraska 68-49 on the road Saturday afternoon. Penn State shot poorly all game long and trailed by as many as 22 before a late 12-2 run cut the lead to just twelve with 5:51 to go but could get no closer.

Zach Hicks led the way for the Nittany Lions with 13 points and six rebounds while Ace Baldwin chipped in 10 points in the second half to go with his game-high five steals. Penn State returns home to face No. 14 Illinois at Rec Hall on Wednesday night.

Cold As Ice: Penn State shot a whopping 33% from the field on Saturday afternoon, a mark that is the third worst this season behind about 32% at Michigan State and 29% against Morehead State (Nittany Lions shot 38 free throws that day). There are a lot of things that go into winning or losing a basketball game, but none of them are more straightforward than the simple fact that if you can’t shoot well you aren’t going to win most of the time. Penn State has been a hot and cold shooting team all season but has mostly found ways to win in Big Ten play with higher-than-usual outputs on offense. That didn’t happen on Saturday and did little to help the Nittany Lions’ cause when it mattered most. Ace Baldwin ended the afternoon with 10 points, but spent the vast majority of the game struggling to find the bottom of the basket. Meanwhile, Nebraska hit shots at a 44% clip and scored 40 points the second half. Rutgers and Michigan are the only teams to face Penn State this year in Big Ten play and not score 40 points in at least one half against the Nittany Lions.

Steal It: Baldwin recorded five steals against Nebraska, the 14th time this year he has had at least three steals in a game. Penn State entered the day 14th in the nation in turnover ratio with no small part of that coming back to Baldwins’ individual efforts. He leads the Big Ten in steals this season and has been a defensive force in that area all year long. For Penn State, it’s a shame that it can’t shoot the ball better because the Nittany Lions are getting extra possession — Penn State forced 10 steals as a team but had four fast break points by the end of the day.

Kanye Out: Kanye Clary didn’t make the trip with Penn State and was ruled “out” according to the official availability report released two hours before tip. A Penn State spokesperson said there’s nothing more to make of this, but there’s no question that the Nittany Lions have missed their leading scorer and that he has not looked himself since making his return to action a few games ago. Time will tell if this is related to his injury or general discontent in a transfer portal world, but Clary not being even on the bench isn’t a positive for Penn State’s chances any given night. This is especially true if Baldwin is trending back downwards in the scoring department.

Of note

Pass It: Penn State recorded six assists on Saturday, the lowest mark of the year for the Nittany Lions. They have had single-digit assists this year on four occasions but all four came in the first seven games of the season. It’s not a huge surprise that Penn State didn’t registered many assists in a game that it didn’t make many baskets, but even with that in mind, two-thirds of Penn State’s makes were unassisted. Baldwin led the way here with two assists, and even if the Nittany Lions can get away without Clary’s scoring, his passing might be what they miss even more. Whatever the case might be, safe to say a bad shooting afternoon comes with a lot of ugly footnotes. This is one of them.

Wahab: Penn State has had a lot of success in games when Qudus Wahab has been able to get going, but the big man had just three points on Saturday. Add in two second chance points as a team and just 18 points in the paint and you’ve got a Nittany Lion roster that is forced to shoot from midrange and beyond on a day when nothing is falling. Wahab has been one of Penn State’s most reliable scorers when he takes his shot but he only took three and only made one on Saturday. This game doesn’t come back to him, but it was just another area in which the Nittany Lions struggled. Even the usually efficient duo of Zach Hicks and Nick Kern struggled going 8-for-20 from the floor.