NEW YORK -- Playing basketball in Madison Square Garden last night was was like playing in a forest.

Every time the Lions (25-9) tried to shoot the ball inside the paint or even from the perimeter, something got in the way.

That something was New Mexico center Luc Longley. At 7'2", the name suits him perfectly.

"We had a couple of ideas about him defensively coming into this game," Coach Bruce Parkhill said. "Obviously the plan we chose in the first half wasn't such a good idea."

During the first half, Longley seemed to have his hands on everything. No matter where Ed Fogell turned, Longley was in his face, trying to swat the ball out of his hands.

On the defensive end, Longley blocked three of the Lions' shots and grabbed eight rebounds in the first half alone. But his efforts on offense hurt the Lions even more. Penn State spent almost the whole half playing catch-up to the inside plays of Longley and the perimeter bombs of teammate Kurt Miller.

Longley hit 8-of-11 shots from inside the paint and finished the half with 17 points.

"We made an adjustment at halftime," Parkhill said. "And the guys really did a nice job of making it tougher for him to do what he wanted to do."

Whatever that new game plan was, it completely shut down Langley on offense. He did not score again, and took only two shots the entire second half. Defensively, Longley wasn't shut down, but his production was definitely impaired. Unwittingly, his presence on defense even heightened the offensive production of Fogell and James Barnes.

"In the first half he blocked a couple of my shots," Barnes said. "So I figured in the second if I saw him in my way I'd try to get it to Eddy. It worked much better."

In this game of avoidance, Longley found himself tied up in his own territory, the paint! He found he couldn't get at the ball quiet as easily.

"He's such a big guy, and during the first half they threw a lot of lobs into him," Fogell said. "We had a lot of trouble with that, but we felt a lot better with him the second half. We just tried to pressure the ball whenever he got it, and I think the whole team just did a good job of digging out on him."

But Longley was not quiet dead. He was merely disoriented. During the latter part of the second half he came back to defensive life.

While the Lobos (20-14) were making their late comeback attempt, they put assorted Penn State players on the line to shoot one-plus-one; several of the first tosses fell away from the rim. Longley was right there to grab some key rebounds.

Once back at the Lobos' end he still didn't score, but during the overtime period he began to look like a railroad conductor. He received passes and deftly fired the re-directs back out to the perimeter. There Miller and Rob Robbins bombed in 3-point shots.

But for Longley and New Mexico it was not enough.

In their two-point loss to the Lions, he finished the night with 17 points, 14 rebounds, 10 assists and three blocked shots.

"I don't think I can really comment on Luc's play right now," New Mexico coach Dave Bliss said. "He had a triple double and the guys he was guarding still combined for 31 points.