Tom Izzo Raves About Penn State's Fight After Near-Upset, Praises Mike Rhoades

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — Penn State Basketball (8-3, 0-2) fought valiantly, including overcoming two larger deficits, before inevitably falling to No. 9 Michigan State (9-3, 2-0) at the Bryce Jordan Center 76-72.

In front of a relatively lively crowd (listed at 7,091), including an almost full first portion of the student section, the Nittany Lions team, coming off a 40-point loss, showed they are much better than the team that lost in Bloomington Tuesday.

What the Close Loss Means for Penn State Basketball

Penn State Freshman Guard Kayden Mingo near-triple-double in loss to Michigan State(Mandatory Credit: Matthew O’Haren-Imagn Images)

Using the normal starters (Mingo, Stewart, Tunca, Reed, and Juric) but with all ten rotation players seeing minutes in the first 5 and a half minutes, Penn State surprised the heavily favored Spartans early, taking a 39-36 lead into the halftime tunnel.

While order was quickly restored and Michigan State built a 9-point lead early in the second half, showing resilience of which they had none of Tuesday night, Penn State fought back and clawed their way to a second-half lead, before a cold stretch doomed the Nittany Lions late. Crucially, down two with just over a minute to go, 91.3% free-throw shooter Freddie Dillione V missed the front end of a one-and-one, which effectively ended the Nittany Lions’ chances.

“They try to take my 3’s away so trying to get down hill more and more,” Eli Rice said, after the game. “We know we just gotta keep getting better. That’s not the outcome we wanted.”

Rice finished with 9 points on 8 field goal attempts, 1-4 from three.

Nittany Lions’ Resilient Response to the Indiana Blowout

Kayden Mingo, the star freshmen for the Nittany Lions playing his first conference home game was on the floor for 34 minutes. He only scored 11 poits but had 8 assists and 7 rebounds, coming far closer to a triple-double than anyone realized.

“Indiana was a reality check for us,” Mingo said after the game. “The main thing we were focusing on was physicality. When we watched over it, for a lot of us it was our first time playing and we saw the (need) for more physicality.” Speaking about the cold stretch to end the game, he went on, stating, “I think we missed a lot of shots at the end, missed some open ones, maybe we were tired, we trust each other to make those shots, we’ll get back in the gym.”

Despite only trailing the rebounding margin by 1 at the half, the Spartans outrebounded the Nittany Lions by 12 in the second half.

Penn State attempted fourteen more shots than MSU (thanks in part to 17 turnovers), but Michigan State’s splits (46% from the field, 56% from three and 86% from the stripe) was too hard to overcome.

Tom Izzo’s Praise: “Good Coach” Rhoades and Penn State’s Battle

Michigan State Coach Tom Izzo praised Penn State Coach Mike Rhoades after hard-fought game(Mandatory Credit: Matthew O’Haren-Imagn Images)

Legendary Spartan coach Tom Izzo raved about the young Nittany Lion program, stating multiple times how ‘good a coach” (Mike) Rhoades is and complimenting what this team will look like if the players stay and fans get in the stands.

“We didn’t play too good,” Izzo said. “We turned the ball over a ton…but their kids played hard. At halftime, I told my guys we shot 53% and we’re down three…they shot 40% percent. Ya’ll want this offensive BS, defense matters. The only thing I’m proud of my guys about…we did find a way in the end. Good teams find a way to win.”

Izzo was in a humorous mood, cracking jokes with the press and complimenting/critiquing certain questions.

When asked by yours truly about the signficant change in rebound margin in the 2nd half, “I got down and prayed for them to rebound more. We are ‘Rebound U’. That was what’s impressive about his bigs. They battled, they were a step quicker.”

Penn State Head Coach Mike Rhoades added, “They had a little more poise down the stretch than we did, made a few more plays and finished the game. I am super proud of our team, the response we had from the Indiana game, guys showed up, we got after it.”

When asked about the fact 9 players played in the games first give minutes, Rhoades stated, “We’re not good enough to save ourselves. Eli came off the bench but this was the best game of his career. Sasa gave us great minutes no doubt. Mason Blackwood probbaly had the best two weeks of practice in program history and he’s only a freshmen. It allows our young guys to be able to get good minutes.”

The Nittany Lions (8-3) finish their December conference slate 0-2, head to Hershey next Saturday to play Pittsburgh before closing out the non-conference slate with North Carolina Central.

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Evan Smith

Evan Smith is an alum of Penn State (Marketing, Economics, 2011) and a basketball season ticket holder since 2006.

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).

Evan Smith

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Evan Smith is an alum of Penn State (Marketing, Economics, 2011) and a basketball season ticket holder since 2006. 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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