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The first game of the Big Ten tournament is set to tip late Wednesday afternoon, and man is it ugly on paper. The No. 12 Nebraska Cornhuskers and No. 13 Penn State Nittany Lions will cross paths in the first round of the second season for the second time in the last three seasons having last squared off in 2015. That speaks volumes for just how bad these basketball programs have been in recent years.
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It’s been an ugly downward spiral for Tim Miles’s Huskers to close out the regular season. Last we saw Big Red in live action, they got pummeled in front of the hometown faithful on senior night against a Michigan Wolverines outfit that’s had all kinds of issues winning ball games away from Ann Arbor. The 93-57 defeat dropped the club to 0-4 both straight up and against the spread in its last four since beating Ohio State and these same Nittany Lions in back-to-back games. Nebraska’s 1-2 straight up and against the spread on neutral floors.
Not to be outdone, Penn State has actually been even worse than Nebraska recently with it dropping five straight games and managing only a lone cover during that stretch. That triumph coming against Purdue in overtime who they fell to as 7 point underdogs. Since then, they’ve fallen by an average of 7.3 points per game against Minnesota, Ohio State and most recently Iowa. The Nittany Lions went 2-3 on neutral courts this season and posted a 3-2 record versus the linemakers.
Key Stat
55.4% – The Cornhuskers put forth their most impressive effort in conference play against PSU in mid-February. The offense seemingly couldn’t miss in converting over 55 percent of their shots from the field with four players registering double digits in scoring. Keep in mind though that Nebraska entered that game on five days rest while the Lions had 2+ and was coming off an 83-70 outright road upset of Illinois their previous game.
Matchup to Watch
If Penn State is to make a game of this one, it’s going to need to do a much better job on the glass than it did in the first go round. It’s also going to need to find a way to prevent Nebraska’s bigs from manhandling like they did in the first meeting after outscoring them 46-28 in the paint. The Nittany Lions lost the rebounding battle 40-29 and allowed 30 defensive rebounds. PSU is far from being an efficient shooting team, so it better get to those loose caroms so as to prevent getting blown out a second time.
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These teams are more or less mirror images of one another except that Nebraska owns the advantage on the glass and Penn State is the much better free throw shooting team. Still, it’s tough to overlook just how easily the Huskers bigs handled the Lions interior defense in the first matchup. That alone should allow for it to hold the upper hand in how this game plays out.
That said, Big Red has been nothing short of rotten to close the season with it giving up points in bunches defensively and coming up woefully short at the offensive end of the court in posting a pair of games with just 57 point tallies. Penn State has at least been putting points on the board and been a bit competitive falling in overtime to the Boilermakers and by one point at home to Ohio State. It’s been a long season in Lincoln, and the team’s body language versus the Wolverines was terrible. They want the season over, and I expect the Nittany Lions to take full advantage by avenging that ugly loss to move on to play the Spartans.
College Basketball Odds: Penn State 78, Nebraska 72
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