Shooting woes on the road
Coming into Wednesday's game, Indiana had shot 51, 46 and 53 percent from the floor in its last three games, but shots weren't going down for the Hoosiers on the road in State College. At halftime, Indiana had shot 34 percent from the floor.
Trayce Jackson-Davis was the most successful offensive player for Indiana, entering halftime 3-of-5 from the field and 4-of-4 from the free throw line. Two of his field goals came via alley-oops. He had 10 points and six rebounds at the break.
Penn State was not shooting well either, also connecting on just 34 percent of its shots in the first half. Lamar Stevens was 3-of-10 for eight points by halftime, and Curtis Jones was Penn State's most productive offensive player, adding 10 of its 28 points.
The shooting woes never evened out for Indiana. At the four-minute mark, down by 18, Indiana had shot 31 percent from the floor, 20 percent from three and attempted 10 free throws, hitting nine of them.
Penn State didn't excel offensively either. With two minutes remaining, it was shooting 38 percent from the floor, 28 percent from three, is 10-of-20 from the free throw line and is beating Indiana by 16 points.
Turnovers in the backcourt
Since its loss to Rutgers in New Jersey, Indiana's backcourt had seemed to be growing in a lot of ways, its distribution inside to initiate the inside-out passing Archie Miller stressed early in the season. That wasn't there Wednesday.
Many of Indiana's passes in space were deflected by crashing Penn State guards, and a few of them resulted in easy fast break points for Penn State in the first half.
After taking care of the ball and limiting empty possessions against Michigan State an dMaryland, two fo the top teams in the conference, Indiana cleared that mark in State College. With four minutes left in the game and down 59-41, the Hoosiers had turned the ball over 17 times, 11 of them coming in the second half.
Every Hoosier recorded at least one turnover, and seven of them came from the quartet in the backcourt.
Fouls on interior contributors
With Race Thompson still unavailable after his fall against Michigan State, Indiana was down to three post contributors – Trayce Jackson-Davis, Joey Brunk and De'Ron Davis – and Brunk and Davis recorded their third personal fouls by the first media timeout of the second half.
An early foul on Jackson-Davis removed him from the game for a short time, and, in that time, Brunk and Davis recorded their first fouls. Once Brunk added his second foul, Davis was tasked with hilling his role and recorded a six-point, three-rebound half.
But without Thompson and Jerome Hunter (detailed below), Indiana lost much of its length and physicality inside.
When describing Joey Brunk's contributions to the team in January, Archie Miller said Indiana needs a second guy next to Trayce Jackson-Davis inside, but Wednesday, the Hoosiers never really had one.
Jerome Hunter
Redshirt freshman forward Jerome Hunter had been creating some separation between himself and Damezi Anderson in terms of minutes played, but Anderson entered the game after the first media timeout while Hunter remained on the bench.
At one point during the first half, Hunter left the bench to go to the locker room but returned shortly after. When he returned to the bench, he removed his warmup and was wearing his jersey but was not entered into the game.
Hunter would never enter the game.
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