Every time the men's basketball team looks like it is about to round the corner and turn a mediocre season into a good one, it stumbles.

After upsetting West Virginia on Thursday night in Morgantown W.Va., the Lions came out cold yesterday afternoon in the nation's capital and could never fully recover -- falling 83-70 to George Washington at the Smith Center.

"I don't think we played very well tonight," Coach Bruce Parkhill said. "It's disappointing. They are a very good team but I think we made them look very good tonight."

The loss dropped the Lions to 13-7 and 6-5 in the Atlantic 10, while GW moved to 13-7 and 7-5.

The Lions' jumped on the Colonials in the game's opening possession. Penn State forward James Barnes was fouled by forward Byron Hopkins on a move to the basket and converted both free throws. But that would be the Lions only lead of the game.

Penn State went over five minutes before hitting its first field goal -- a Monroe Brown's 19-foot jumper -- and were 0-for-8 in that stretch. George Washington led by as many as 14 points late in the first half before heading into the locker room up 41-29. The Lions shot just 29 percent in the first half and turned the ball over 10 times.

Meanwhile, George Washington had tremendous success working the ball down to 6'7" forward Sonni Holland who had 15 of his game high 21 points in the first half.

"We gave up 12 points in the right block in the first half," Parkhill said. "We told the guys before the game we were really going to have to play good interior defense, move our feet and we just didn't do it."

Guard Ellis McKennie -- who harassed Lions' leading scorer DeRon Hayes all night defensively -- added 19 points for the Colonials, which shot 56 percent from the field.

In the second half the Lions were able to cut into big George Washington leads but each time the Colonials rose to the occasion.

With just under 15 minutes left, Brown made a running jumper and was fouled by GW guard Dirk Surles. Brown made the free throw to cut the Colonials' lead to 43-35. After a George Washington miss, backup center C.J. Johnson was fouled by Surles and converted both shots to cut the lead to five.

But McKennie hit a jumper and a layup and forward J.J. Hudock hit a trey to extend the lead to 52-40. George Washington maintained that lead until just under three minutes left.

Johnson followed his own miss and was fouled by Hopkins. Johnson's free throw cut the lead to 67-61. The two teams traded field goals, then McKennie made a driving layup. But James Barnes answered with two free throws to make it 71-65.

On the next possession the Lions played great defense. DeRon Hayes knocked the ball out of bounds with just eight seconds left on the shot clock. Then GW guard Rodney Patterson broke their backs. Patterson hit and off balance 21-foot jump shot with two seconds left on the shot clock to put the Colonials up 74-65 with 1:08 left.

George Washington hit 6-of-8 free throws down the stretch to put the game away. Freshman guard Alvin Pearsall made a half-court 3-point shot at the buzzer to provide the final margin.

Johnson was the Lions' leading scorer with 13 points, while Hayes had 12 and Freddie Barnes 11 in a losing effort. Penn State shot 36 percent from the field for the game. The Lions return home to face St. Bonaventure on Wednesday night at 7:30.