Penn State Basketball falls to Purdue 80-72 in first game back
By Evan Smith
In what will be a familiar tone this year, Penn State Basketball battled hard against a Purdue team that simply is just the better team as the Nittany Lions fell 80-72 in West Lafayette Sunday, in their first game back since the COVID-related pause of team activities.
Penn State Basketball fell down by seven points in the first half, but after Purdue star center Travion Williams was called for his second foul, Penn State Basketball used the mid-range game from Brockington and Jones to take a two point lead.
Ferocious defense led to a helter-skelter final Boilermaker possession of the first half, and Penn State forced Purdue to a prayer three pointer at the buzzer. Of course, Purdue made it, because #PennStateBasketball and the Lions trailed by one going into the half.
Painter bested Ferry out of the half as Purdue came out hot and grew the lead to double digits pretty quickly. An odd technical on Ferry added to the hill the Lions tried to climb. The technical, very likely deserved due to a magic word, came as the Lions just got to the free throw line.
Penn State never got to within single digits until under three minutes remaining, and never made it a one possession game again.
Myreon Jones (23 points) hit some deep threes late, and a few missed Boilermaker free throws allowed the Lions to cut it to four points with 16.2 seconds to play, but yet somehow the outcome still never seeemed in doubt.