In a game the Penn State men's basketball team needed to win, it was Northwestern that came out of the locker room and played with urgency.

In the end, however, the Nittany Lions (11-3, 2-2 Big Ten) found their rhythm to overcome a 14-point second half deficit and win 72-66 Saturday night in the Bryce Jordan Center.

"Give credit to Penn State for hanging in there," Wildcats coach Bill Carmody said. "I told our guys that Penn State made all the basketball plays they had to make. They turned the heat up on us a little bit and it seemed like our guys couldn't handle it."

The late surge by the Lions came on the heels of senior guard Joe Crispin, who led all scorers with 28. His three-pointer with nearly 13 minutes remaining in the game directed a 28-9 Penn State run that gave his team the lead for good.

"We're a good offensive team and we're good shooters," Crispin said. "So, we continued to shoot and we made a few big ones."

Crispin added that the sluggish start was most likely due to most of the team being overconfident that they would defeat Northwestern. But the Wildcats proved they are not a team to be overlooked.

On defense they confused the Lions in the first half, leading to an anemic 17 percent from the three-point line. Penn State guards Jon Crispin and Titus Ivory were a combined 2-11 from the field and 0-6 from behind the arc in the first 20 minutes of play.

"We didn't make shots," Joe Crispin said. "Defensively, they did a good job. They kind of played a zone-man-not-something-whatever. There's no name for it."

Offensively, Northwestern (7-9, 0-4) looked more like Princeton, connecting on several back-door passes for easy lay-ups. Carmody, who spent 18 years at Princeton and the last four as head coach, has used a similar system with the Wildcats in his first year at the helm.

When the back door wasn't open, Northwestern sophomore Winston Blake was hitting just about everything from the outside. He was 5-6 from the three-point line in the game.

But he made one crucial mistake — he picked up his fourth foul with more than 16 minutes remaining in the game.

"Obviously, when you get one of the guys out who was shooting as well as he was shooting, it takes a little of the pressure off," Penn State coach Jerry Dunn said.

After a few minutes, the Lions finally started to take advantage of Winston's absence. The defense stiffened and Crispin hit the three-pointer that sparked the run.

"We showed how good of a team we are," said Brandon Watkins, who provided solid support off the bench. "We stuck together at the end and we pulled it through."

The win by Penn State was a significant one. It sends the team on the road with momentum, something they will need with four straight away games.

Up next is a trip to Indiana to play the Hoosiers on Wednesday.