Things started out pretty well for Penn State's Jason McDougald on Senior Day.

With family and friends in attendance at his next-to-last home college basketball game, the seldom-used McDougald scored the game's opening points against the Iowa Hawkeyes Saturday afternoon on a pretty two-handed slam.

He would get the chance for another dunk later in the contest -- but the situation had changed to something he and fellow seniors Kevin Fellows and Jamaal Tate have been all too familiar with during their stay in Happy Valley.

This time, McDougald's dunk cut Iowa's lead to just 22 points.

Can you say déjà vu?

In yet another one of their lackluster efforts this season, the Nittany Lions (7-20, 1-13 Big Ten) were easily defeated by Iowa (17-10, 5-9), 78-56. Penn State coach Ed DeChellis went so far as to apologize to the seniors afterward, embarrassed by his team's performance.

"Obviously, our start was absolutely horrendous; our first half was horrendous," DeChellis said. "I don't have an answer for that; they didn't have an answer for that. I apologize to the seniors because that's not the way they should have senior night. Obviously we didn't do a really good job of preparing them -- I didn't do a very good job of preparing them."

The first half was indeed painful to watch for Penn State fans in attendance. On the way to a 27-point lead at halftime (47-20), the Hawkeyes nearly doubled the Lions' field goal shooting from the floor with a percentage of 64.5 percent to Penn State's 33 percent.

Adding to DeChellis' frustration was that the Lions spent the last few days focusing on their transition defense and taking away easy looks from Iowa guards Adam Haluska and Jeff Horner.

The result? Iowa had 22 fast-break points to Penn State's four. Haluska and Horner combined for 41 points, with the two outscoring the Lions 30-20 at halftime.

"That was the No. 1 thing we talked about as a team that we had to stop, was transition defense," DeChellis said. "We couldn't let them get easy breakouts and obviously they did. So we've identified what we need to do ...We really didn't execute the things that we talked about that we needed to execute, I think that's the most disappointing thing for me."

With the game already over by the half, the second stanza wasn't as poor as the first for the Lions -- then again, it would be pretty tough to be.

Geary Claxton chipped in eight more points for a team-leading 15 on the day, and the Lions shot 50 percent from the floor. But this was in garbage time against many of the Hawkeyes' backups.

For DeChellis, what might have been most disappointing was the lack of effort from the Lions. The coach understands that his team doesn't have the most talent, but can't explain why his team is constantly out-hustled on its home floor.

"You know, you've got to play this game with some energy and some emotion, and we didn't have any energy or emotion in the first half at all," he said. "We were just out there flat. I thought we played harder in practice than we did in the game, which is not a good sign."

And the positive for the Lions? There are only two games remaining in what will likely be the team's third seven-win season in the last four years. Even at a school with such a non-illustrious basketball history like Penn State, the seasons represent three of the worst five records Penn State has had in 55 years.