Rutgers, purdue, northwestern, wisconsin, msu, mich. penn State is not a good match up for us. Did you catch our two reg season games vs them?
I did and you're right. It didn't go well....at all. Honestly, Northwestern cleaned our clocks for 3 of the 4 halves that we played them. It was a miracle win(which I'll GLADLY take).
My point is that Penn State brings nothing to the table that we shouldn't be able to handle, if we're really thinking that we have a March run in us.
They shoot the ball well and they have one physical guard. What else do they do well? The fact that we struggle with them is more of an issue with us versus the challenge that Penn State provides. They have no size advantage, no depth advantage.....they shoot the ball well. That's it. That simply can't be viewed as them being a bad match up.
The fact is that we haven't been able to guard the three point line all year and our ability to keep ANY guards under control has been a problem. This is not unique to PSU. Perkins went off on us, Buie went off on us, Bufkin went off on us, all of the Purdue guards went off on us, yes Pickett has gone off on us too.
We have guards that have a tendency to go under screens, don't fight through screens, don't switch overly well and rotate poorly which has led to a lot of wide open weak side threes. Penn State has taken advantage. Again, that's on us. There's nothing that they do that's unique.
If we pressure the ball, if we switch properly, if we rotate properly....we win by 10+. If we don't, PSU will make us pay, which they've done twice.
This is basically a home game vs a team that we're far more talented than. That's just the way that I see it.