If anyone was ready to feed off of a frenzied crowd, beat his chest and scream at any Michigan State player in sight during pregame introductions, it was Jamelle Cornley.

As the first half ended on Saturday, Cornley had already scored 13 points and scrapped against Michigan State's taller frontcourt for five rebounds. After the first 20 minutes ended, so did the crowd noise, and Cornley might as well have been alone.

The crowd was in a deep freeze, along with the rest of Penn State men's basketball team. The Nittany Lions, minus Cornley, shot under 24 percent and scored 10 points in the first half, which amounted to a 22-point deficit at halftime to the Spartans.

By the time the 91-64 loss to Michigan State was finalized, Cornley had done about all he could -- 21 points and six rebounds in 36 minutes -- to try and get some respect for Penn State in the Big Ten.

In the end, he couldn't do it alone.

"My main focus was really just to come out here and play as hard as I could and hopefully my teammates would follow," Cornley said, "but right now I am just extremely disappointed and really at a loss for words."

He wasn't going to blame his teammates, because they didn't shoot to miss, nor was Cornley going to say that he wasn't at all to blame. But he still felt a disturbing trend is plaguing the Lions.

They weren't as pumped as they should have been for a game of this magnitude. Cornley said that it wasn't just cold shooting that doomed the Lions, but that they were a "little too chill."

"Some of us, I can include myself, sometimes we think we are really playing hard, but there is always another level that we need to take ourselves to," Cornley said. " ... People are coming for our heads and we need to do the same thing. We are just too chill right now and we need to take things to another level."

Cornley knows that Spartans head coach Tom Izzo planned all too well for this game. Izzo had a defender guarding sharpshooter Danny Morrissey out to the three-point line and running in front of every screen.

Michigan State's big men alternated responsibility for guarding Geary Claxton, limiting him to three points in the first half with constant double-teaming. Claxton finished as the Lions second-leading scorer with 11 points but on 4-of-12 shooting.

Knowing what Izzo had said about Claxton prior to the game, that he was a "pro-type player," Cornley wasn't shocked by the effectiveness of the Spartan defense against Claxton.

"Reading his quotes about Geary, he loves Geary, and he knows what Geary can do, so, it was no surprise," Cornley said.

Izzo's main concern was keeping Cornley and "the tough as nails" Claxton, the No. 1 and No. 3 rebounders in the Big Ten respectively, off the boards. Penn State was eventually out-rebounded, 33 to 19.

"We did a decent job on Claxton, though Cornley hurt us," Izzo said. "We were concerned about the rebounding, especially with Claxton, and with Cornley being so effective, and the fact that in the league they have done such a great job."

Penn State head coach Ed DeChellis, also trying to find good reason for why his team played so poorly, agreed a little bit with Cornley's assessments that his team can play a bit too relaxed but wasn't completely sold.

For the most part, DeChellis was disappointed because everyone who participated in Saturday's game, minus graduating forward Travis Parker, played in last year's less embarrassing, nine-point loss to Michigan State.

"I think I know what he means," DeChellis said of Cornley's "chill" comment. " I don't know. If that's what he thinks. That's his deal, in a sense. When you don't play well and you get your ears kicked off your head, there are a lot of things that go wrong."

Cornley, for one, knows that whatever went down around him, things needs to change quickly.

"In the Big Ten, this is not out-of-conference," Cornley said. "You have to play at a certain level night in and night out or you will get demolished like we did."