Penn State Basketball defeated Illinois and all but guaranteed a spot in the NCAA Tournament with a 79-76 victory in Chicago.
In a game featuring back and forth runs, typical of this Nittany Lions team, Penn State used a huge 14-3 run late on the game to push a close game to double digits. Despite Jalen Pickett, Kanye Clary and Camren Wynter missing a few FT’s late, the Illini never got closer than 3. Sitting by most accounts on the good side of the bubble, this quad 1 win will only further enhance Penn State’s NCAA Tournament profile, despite a poor non-conference strength of schedule.
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What Penn State Basketball Win Over Illinois Means
Penn State Basketball now has a chance to avoid the ‘First Four’ games in Dayton. Micah Shrewsberry‘s team faces Northwestern Friday night. The Wildcats are the two seed but Penn State won in Evanston just last week after Wynter’s buzzer beating three pointer in overtime. The Nittany Lions took a first half late but a late Illinois run cut the PSU halftime lead to just one. The Illini took control of the game early in the half but were cold late and couldn’t overcome Andrew Funk’s six three pointers. Despite getting both Henn and Njie in foul trouble, for the third time this year Brad Underwood was unable to figure out the answer for this unique Nittany Lion roster. Penn State Basketball saw balanced scoring, Funk leading the way with 20 and both Seth Lundy and Camren Wynter with 17. With the Georgetown and Notre Dame job openings lingering, what a great night for Micah Shrewsberry and the Nittany Lion basketball team.
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NittanyCentral is his second reporting job following the Men's Basketball program. He co-founded and co-hosts the Shots Gotta Fall - The Penn State Basketball Podcast (the premiere, the best, the only) with Steve Travis.
Smith's most proud moment covering the team was seeing the national No. 9 ranking during Pat Chambers' last year. His most embarrassing moment was spending almost a thousand dollars to travel 2,000 miles in 46 hours to watch the Nittany Lions lose to Temple in the 2011 NCAA Tournament (screw you Juan Fernandez).
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