Borovnjak still good in Penn State’s 64-59 loss to Illinois

Posted on February 22, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

Yes, everyone loves Penn State’s ATTITUDE and “energy,” but somehow all that grit and hustle has yet to pay dividends in the win column yet. I hope in three or four years the team’s slogan is “We have very talented players on the roster this season.” That would get me revved.

Anyway, I’m familiar with the whole “no moral victories” thing, but there were a couple of theme’s from Thursday’s 64-59 Penn State loss that were positive continuations from what went on in the Michigan game. First, Penn State actually shot the long ball well, with 8-of-19 three-pointers going in (42 percent). Second, Sasa Borovnjak once again scored 17 points and was highly efficient on the offensive end.

I’m not sure if the three-point shooting will hold up. Jermaine Marshall got off to cold start from that range, but finished 4-for-8 (buoyed by some late game shenanigans), while Nick Colella looked legitimately comfortable shooting the ball and finished 2-for-3 from beyond the arc. Borovnjak’s hot play seems more real to me because he’s always been a smooth finisher at the rim, but nowadays he’s finally converting at the tail end of pick-and-rolls. That’s a great sign, especially considering that PSU’s only real point guard has missed almost the entire season with an Achilles injury.

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Penn State Basketball continues quest for Big Ten win in Illinois

Posted on February 21, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

“They want to win.  They care,” Chambers said.  “Nobody likes losing, and that’s why I think we have a good group of guys.  Some guys might mail it in at this point.  Some guys might say, ‘oh we lost, no big deal.’  But I don’t think our kids are making any excuses.  They come out everyday to try to get better and work.  The fact that there are still tears in that locker room after losses is impressive.”

Tears in the locker room! Remember when it was a big deal because the Miami Heat were crying in the locker room? They won a title a year after that. ATTITUDE!

Anyway, that quote is worth posting because the recent efforts of Penn State in close losses to Iowa and Michigan make it apparent that the team does really care and that the players aren’t just mailing in the rest of the season. That makes me confident that the team will win a Big Ten game this season despite the lack of a really easy game on the remaining schedule. Tonight, the Lions will give it their best shot on the road against an Illinois team that has rolled off four consecutive victories.

Illini shooting guard D.J. Richardson has picked up his game lately and is a big reason for Illinois’ February surge. Through the first half of the Big Ten schedule, Richardson scored more than 15 points just twice, but during his team’s four-game winning streak, he’s eclipsed that mark three times. Richardson has even managed to shoot 48 percent form the field during that stretch (very impressive when you consider that 28 of his 50 attempts have come from three-point land), which is worlds better than his season average of 39 percent.

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Payne, Spartans erupt in second half to put away Penn State

Posted on January 17, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

The Nittany Lions probably felt like little kids on punishment shortly after Adreian Payne entered the game for Michigan State along with Branden Dawson early in the second half of Michigan State’s 81-72 victory in University Park on Wednesday night.

Penn State had been hanging with its national ranked opponent for a good portion of the game. In the first half, the Lions predictably struggled to hit shots, but solid defensive play and a lack of turnovers helped keep their halftime deficit at only four points. Michigan State freshman Gary Harris opened up hot from three-point range, but the Spartans struggled with their shooting for most of the half. Meanwhile, D.J. Newbill found room to penetrate, which provided enough offense to keep PSU close.

Michigan State was hurt in the first half by the absence of Payne and Dawson, both of whom were benched by head coach Tom Izzo in response to a scuffle that morning that caused damage to the Nittany Lion Inn. However, there were no criminal charges filed, and both players entered the game just three minutes into a high-scoring second half.

PSU played a surprising amount of man-to-man defense in this game, and it was working until Payne came in. The 6’10”, 240-pound junior was simply too much for Sasa Borovnjak to handle. Payne dominated on the inside with 3 offensive rebounds and 20 points in just over 16 minutes of time on the court. He even stepped back and hit a three-pointer when he apparently grew tired of bullying the Lions on the block. The word “beast” gets thrown around a lot lately, but that term is the only appropriate way to describe how Payne played in the second half of this game.

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Two Michigan State players benched for tonight’s Penn State basketball game

Posted on January 16, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

Two Michigan State basketball players were involved in an incident this morning in the Nittany Lion Inn. Diamond Leung of MLive.com is reporting that the incident was a fight, and that there was punching and shoving involved. The players involved haven’t been revealed yet, and no charges have been filed, but I’ll update this post if more info comes out.

UPDATE: The two Michigan State players involved in the fight were Branden Dawson and Adreian Payne. Both players will be benched tonight. Everything I wrote below is still relevant. Penn State obviously still needs to shoot better, but the emphasis on zone defense could be lightened if Derrick Nix goes to the bench. When Nix is on the floor, PSU does not have a single player to put on him, so they should still resort to zone.

With Payne and Dawson out, Alex Gauna (6.5 minutes per game) and Russell Byrd (9.6 minutes per game) could see more playing time. Penn State now has a legitimate chance to steal this game.

Original Story: Anyway, assuming no key Spartans are forced to sit this game out, Penn State will have its work cut out once again in its fifth Big Ten game of the season. The Lions are fresh off of their worst offensive game of the season (that’s saying something), in which they scored 42 points and shot 26 percent from the field in a loss at Purdue.

Penn State is at home tonight (7:00 ET, BTN), but the team has shown no signs so far of breaking out of its season-long offensive woes. Here’s a great video from the official PSU site showing Brandon Taylor and D.J. Newbill talking about how if the team continues to play hard, good things will happen.

Unfortunately, playing hard will not cure lousy shooting. Penn State may have a game in which someone like Taylor or Jermaine Marshall gets hot from long range, but in general it will continue to be a poor shooting team for the rest of the season.

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Penn State basketball housed by Northwestern 70-54

Posted on January 11, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

Ah, what can I say about this Nittany Lion loss that hasn’t already been said about countless other Nittany Lion losses? Well, for one, it was to Northwestern. Penn State did lose twice to the Wildcats last season, but at least the game was close when the two teams played in State College. That was not the case this time around.

D.J. Newbill had some nice drives to the hoop, but he missed pretty much every shot that wasn’t a layup, and the Lions as a whole shot 32 percent from the field. Newbill scored 20 points and Jermaine Marshall finished with 13, but both players connected on fewer than 40 percent of their shots. At least Newbill got to the free throw line (8-for-9) and only turned the ball over twice.

On defense, Penn State switched between man-to-man and zone, but neither strategy could keep Northwestern point guard Dave Sobolewski in check. The sophomore was effective whether he was slashing to the hoop or shooting from the beyond the arc, and he scored 18 points for the Cats while dishing out a game-high 5 assists.

Northwestern also had three other players in double figures. The team’s leading scorer, Reggie Hearn, made a habit of going to the free throw line (7-for-11) on his way to 14 points. Jared Swopshire scored 9 points in the game’s first 10 minutes on his way to a total of 17, and freshman Kale Abrahamson showed off his three-point shooting skills (3-for-5) to finish with 10 points.

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Penn State Basketball needs to be men, play for 40 versus Northwestern tonight

Posted on January 10, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

Penn State hosts Northwestern tonight at 8:00 ET on ESPNU in a game that will be each team’s best chance so far to get a Big Ten win. I expect Northwestern to be a bit more desperate because it actually has a number of seniors who are major contributors. Penn State is a young team that was more or less playing for the future ever since Tim Frazier got hurt in November.

That said, Pat Chambers is not going to lay down for anyone. In this week’s press conference, he stressed the need for Penn State to play with effort and focus for an entire game. “We have to play Penn State basketball for longer than 20 minutes,” said Chambers, “That’s the bottom line. It’s gotta be for 40.”

Unfortunately for the Lions, so far this season “Penn State basketball” has meant taking and missing way too many jump shots. In a conversation with GoPSUSports.com, D.J. Newbill said that the team has to stop settling for jumpers, but it’s very hard to take him seriously when PSU has all of 12 free throw attempts through two conference games.

No one on Penn State is particularly good at shooting jump shots, but Newbill is worse than his teammates, so he should stick to driving to the basket against Northwestern tonight while Brandon Taylor and Jermaine Marshall handle the shooting.

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PSU Football: Ted Roof leaves for Georgia Tech

Posted on January 10, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

Yesterday, Penn State announced that secondary coach John Butler was being promoted to defensive coordinator. The move was necessary because current defensive coordinator Ted Roof had left the program to take the same job at his alma mater Georgia Tech!

Noooooooooooo!

Penn State recruits were shocked to hear that Roof was leaving, but it doesn’t sounds like any commitments are set to be broken… yet. Josh Moyer has some prospect quotes behind a subscription wall at ESPN.com. The guys he talked to sound surprised, but it sounds like they have good relationship with other Penn State coaches as well.

The fact that a Georgia kid is sticking with PSU is a great sign that the impact of Roof’s departure on recruiting will be minimal. However, with Butler having never been a defensive coordinator before, the effect on the actual field is yet to be seen. Here’s Bill O’Brien’s thoughts on Butler, from the Penn State release.

John did an outstanding job with the secondary this past season and brings tremendous experience, energy and a passion for tenacious defense to the field and in the meeting room. John quickly developed a great relationship with all our players on defense and special teams and his ability to teach and relate to the players on and off the field will greatly assist in making this an easy transition.

Butler didn’t have a whole lot to work with this season considering the lack of depth in the defensive backfield, but he made the secondary work well enough. Plus, Butler has a lot of experience beyond the defensive backfield. In 2011, he was the special teams coordinator for South Carolina, and from 2007-2010, he coached linebackers and special teams for Minnesota. The variety in Butler’s experience probably helped him get the promotion over longtime PSU coaches Larry Johnson, who has been coaching the defensive line for 13 years, and Ron Vanderlinden, who just finished his 12th season as linebackers coach.

There were also reports yesterday that Penn State was going to move Virginia off of its 2013 schedule and replace it with FCS program Rhode Island. However, the URI athletic director has since announced that while talks between the two schools existed, no agreement was reached. As of now, Penn State will still be playing Virginia at home on September 14.

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Pokémon X and Y: New Legendary Pokémon named

Posted on January 9, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

Hey, guys. Remember those legendary Pokémon we saw yesterday that we didn’t have names for? Well, earlier today we got names for them! Nintendo is great.

Pokemon XY Legendary 2

This guy is named Xerneas (remember, the Pokémon X logo resembles him!). Apparently, that is pronounced “ZURR-nee-us.” Thanks to the official Pokémon Facebook site for that.

Pokemon XY Legendary 1

This dude is named Yveltal, which is even harder to pronounce than “Xerneas.” You say this one like “ee-VELL-tall.” It feels like they tried a bit too hard to get its name to start with a “Y.” I would have thrown another vowel in there, but I suppose we’ll get used to it.

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I am stoked for Pokémon X and Pokémon Y

Posted on January 8, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

Earlier today I posted on That VideoGame Blog that two new Pokémon games are going to be released later this year on Nintendo 3DS. Needless to say, I am very excited.

In the trailer above, you can see that the graphics have been revamped since the production of the Nintendo DS Pokémon games. I know what the 3DS is capable of visually thanks to my time playing Super Mario 3D Land (which has much smoother graphics than any N64 title), but to look at a handheld Pokémon game that looks better than any of the franchise’s console iterations is pretty amazing.

Here’s a breakdown of the five new Pokémon that were shown in the trailer.

Pokemon Chespin

Per tradition, there are three starting options in Pokémon X and Y. One is a grass-type, one is a fire-type, and one is a water-type (Note: I haven’t seen this confirmed officially yet, but it’s a pretty safe assumption based on previous generations). Chespin is the grass-type, and it looks pretty cool even though I’m not quite sure what sort of critter it is supposed to represent. In the trailer, you can see what looks like a Solarbeam attack on a hapless Magikarp as well as a cutting strike that may be X-Scissor or maybe some new move that we haven’t seen before.

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Indiana 74, Penn State 51: Basketball Recap

Posted on January 8, 2013 by Aaron Yorke

Yeah, the Indiana versus Penn State basketball game from last night was nothing to write home about, but I’m going to write about it anyway because I’m not the busiest person in the world.

Probably because they had no one to guard Cody Zeller with, the Nittany Lions played zone defense for almost the entire game. While this did keep Zeller slightly below his season average with 15 points, it also allowed a sharp-shooting Indiana team to hit on 8 of 16 three-pointers. Meanwhile, Christian Watford drove to the basket early and often, ending up with game-highs in points (16) and rebounds (8).

It wasn’t too surprising that the Hoosiers were able to roll up the score on Penn State. Indiana is among the most efficient teams in the nation, and it was able to put 44 points on the board before the first half ended. A bizarre run of turnovers from both sides caused scoring to slow in a dreadful second half.

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