Fighting Irish pummel Lions

By Geoff Dodd
Collegian Staff Writer

NEW YORK — The New York Knicks didn't show up to play Penn State last night at Madison Square Garden, but after looking at the final score its hard to believe otherwise.

The Nittany Lions faced off against Notre Dame instead in the semifinals of the National Invitation Tournament. But then again, it's not like they showed up to play anyone, losing miserably 73-52.

"I thought we shot the ball extremely poorly," Penn State coach Jerry Dunn said. "I thought we played extremely poor. Notre Dame played extremely well.

"We picked a bad time to play poorly."

More than 1,000 Penn State students sat in the far stands nearly encompassing an entire section. Braving a five-hour bus ride the students came to the Garden expecting to see Joe Crispin from the outside, Jarrett Stephens in the low post and Jon Crispin nailing the half court jumper.

They didn't expect to see the Lions lose by 21.

And they didn't expect Troy Murphy — not like this at least.

The 6'9" forward opened his day by rolling out to the top of the key and calmly nailing a trey. He finished his day 15 points later to lead all scorers, with 18.

"Murphy is an NBA prospect," Dunn said. "I thought we played pretty good defense on him but he made some shots. Those things are going to happen in the game of basketball."

The Irish's other main threat, freshman guard Matt Carroll remained relatively quiet in the first half but he did manage to drop a 3-bomb immediately after Murphy nailed his first, increasing the Irish lead to 8-2.

That's all they would need.

Notre Dame never trailed in the game and PSU found itself near the lead only once.

It was at the 5:31 mark in the first half as Titus Ivory floated inside for a delicate one-footer to make the score 23-19.

Of course, Murphy followed with a two-footer of his own, and sophomore Harold Swanagan added another lay-up.

The next thing the Lions knew, Notre Dame was up 15, 38-23 at halftime.

It didn't get any better for PSU after that.

No miracle second-half comeback, no Ohio State miracles, and no 58 point-second half for the Lions (like against Siena last week).

Actually, it got worse. Much worse.

Penn State scored exactly five points in the half's first six minutes, while Notre Dame just poured it on.

Murphy continued his shooting onslaught and Penn State continued its turnover onslaught.

Joe Crispin who ended as the Lions leading scorer with 16 points had eight giveaways.

Penn State ended with 20 turnovers, three shy of Notre Dames total. But with Notre Dame shooting 53.2 percent from the field, to the Lions 33.3 percent, those three extra miscues obviously didn't mean much.

"All good things come to an end" Lions forward Jarrett Stephens said. "I think I have had a pretty good career here at Penn State. I'm just going to savor the moment and play my hardest Thursday."

And by the time the debacle was nearing its end, those 1,000 Lions fans had become 700, then 500, then there were enough to count on one hand.

They could have stayed around, but they didn't. But then again, neither did the Lions.