BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- In the midst of its second season in the Big Ten, Penn State is not only still trying to gain the respect of the conference's elite teams, but their fans as well.

"We've never heard of them," said one voice in the crowd referring to Penn State, after Indiana's 80-72 victory in Assembly Hall. "But they're pretty good, aren't they?"

It's a battle that Bruce Parkhill and company may be in for once again this year.

Saturday it was Indiana's turn, but forgive the Hoosiers for feeling just a little high and mighty. After all, No. 14 Indiana (8-2, 1-0 in the Big Ten) was playing Penn State (7-4, 0-2) in the same building where it demolished the Lions by 48 points last year.

Afterwards it was the local media's turn at the 'no respect' theme.

"My name's Bruce," Parkhill said, correcting one questioner who called him Barry, his younger brother.

You'd think that after battling the Hoosiers tooth-and-nail until the final buzzer would merit some regard. The Lions fought valiantly, but in the end, it was Indiana's devastating accuracy that did them in.

Indiana went to the free-throw line 35 times in the second half alone, connecting on 28 of them. They were 32-of-42 from the charity stripe for the game, as the referees whistled Penn State for 30 fouls.

Michael Jennings led Penn State with 18 points, all in the second half. John Amaechi added 11 points and 10 boards as the struggling Lions had their hands full with Bob Knight's Hoosiers.

"I'm pleased that we played better than we did our last couple of games," Parkhill said. "I think the effort was pretty good, finally some shots started going down for us."

The real scoring actually began in the game's final stages, after Indiana opened up its largest lead of the game at 67-53 with just over four minutes to play.

The Lions connected from the three-point arc four times in the game's final two minutes, but were forced to foul after each one. Freshman Dan Earl cut the lead to six, 78-72, with a trey at the 15.6 second mark. But the Lions would get no closer, as senior Pat Graham drained two free throws a second later, giving the Hoosiers their final victory margin.

Indiana's accuracy at the free-throw line ultimately did in Penn State. Graham had a career-high 24 points, and was almost automatic from the free-throw line in the clutch, hitting nine-of-10 in the last 2:16 of the game.

The fact that it was the two seniors contributing the most isn't really surprising of a Knight-coached team. Said Graham, "Coach always puts a lot of the pressure, the burden, on the older guys."

Notes:

-- The Lions set a school record by connecting on 11-of-21 three-point attempts.

-- Referees, Penn State and Indiana always seem to have problems together. Midway through the second half Bailey hit two free throws after a timeout. Parkhill notified the referees that it should have been guard Sherron Wilkerson at the line.

The referees called the mistake a "correctable error" and sent Wilkerson to the line, who promptly sank both without any problem.

"I just kind of walked up there," Bailey said of how he ended up on the line. "To be honest with you, I didn't know who the foul was on."

-- The Lions return to the daily grind of classes, practices and games after a somewhat rough vacation.

After handily disposing of Maryland-Eastern Shore, 81-54, and Bethune-Cookman, 88-69, the Lions lost to College of Charleston, 71-65, at the Lowcountry Classic in Charleston, S.C. They came back to beat Delware St. in the consolation game of the holiday tournament, 64-53.

Penn State then returned home for its Big Ten Opener against Wisconsin in Rec Hall, losing 71-56 to the No. 15 Badgers.