Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1072455
H e had watched his team suffer a close loss at Nebraska minutes earlier, but Patrick Chambers didn't give in to pessimism when he stepped into the postgame media room. His team, which had just fallen to 7-9 on the season and 0-5 against Big Ten competition, wasn't in position to with- stand any piling on. And in fact, in pro- ducing a respectable 70-64 loss in one of the conference's more hostile environs, Chambers felt as if the Nittany Lions had earned some encouraging words. So he provided them. "We worked really hard, and that showed tonight. I was re- ally proud of the way we competed. Guys were di- aled in," Chambers said. "I thought we got better. Even in a loss, we got bet- ter." The same could not be said of Penn State, or of Chambers himself, just days earlier. The Nittany Lions had reopened their Big Ten slate at Michigan on Jan. 3, and after a back-and-forth start to the game, the Wolverines reeled off a 9-0 run midway through the first half. During a timeout, Chambers lit into true freshman guard Myles Dread. The challenge from coach to player on the sideline exceeded the norm, as he extended his right hand and gave Dread a shove to the chest. Chambers' push moved the 6-foot-4, 215-pound guard back a step and earned the coach a one-game suspension from Penn State athletic director Sandy Barbour. Just three days later, in a potentially winnable home game against Wisconsin, the fallout from the shove, the suspen- sion, and Penn State's winless start in conference play were on full display. In one of their worst performances since a blowout loss to Michigan State in the second round of the 2017 Big Ten tourna- ment, the Nittany Lions barely put up a fight against the Badgers. Under the di- rection of assistant coach Keith Urgo, Penn State trailed by as many as 24 points midway through the second half M E N ' S B A S K E T B A L L COLD CASE Shooting diculties, turnovers hamper Nittany Lions as Big Ten losses mount | SHOOTING STAR Stevens has been one of the Big Ten's top scorers this season, but as a team, the Nit- tany Lions are at the bottom of the league in scoring offense. Photo by Ryan Snyder