Penn State (13-7, 3-4 Big Ten) traveled to Indiana after winning a pair of conference home games last week against Wisconsin and Nebraska. The Hoosiers (13-6, 3-3 Big Ten) easily handled the Lady Lions in their first meeting of the season in December and had a more difficult time on Monday, but still managed to pull away from Penn State in the fourth quarter to close out the season sweep 72-66.

How It Happened

Penn State got off to a fast start from the field against the Hoosiers as the Lady Lions hit four of their first seven shots — jumping out to a 10-4 lead. After starting 1-7 shooting, Indiana went on a 13-0 run to close out the quarter with a 19-14 lead on its home floor.

Shooting issues continued into the second quarter for the Lady Lions. Neither offense was clicking, but Penn State’s 33% field goal percentage — including going 2-9 down the stretch in the first half — made it appear that it was going to look like Indiana’s blowout of the Lady Lions in the BJC earlier this season.

Instead, good defense from Penn State helped keep it close at the break. The Lady Lions allowed only 12 points during their second quarter offensive struggles to make it just a 31-27 deficit against the Hoosiers heading into the second half.

Within the first few minutes of the second half, Penn State managed to tie the game 33-33. The Lady Lions wouldn’t take their first lead since the first quarter for another several minutes, but a 12-4 run that featured a number of points off turnovers helped the Lady Lions finish the quarter with a 45-44 lead.

The Hoosiers opened the final quarter of play with an 8-0 run to match its largest lead of the game to that point. Penn State had just two points through the first six minutes of the quarter and fell behind by as many as 11, but the Lady Lions scored a couple buckets in transition capped off by two-straight Teniya Page three-pointers to cut it to 63-59. That’s as close as it would get with the Hoosiers prevailing 72-66.

Player Of The Game

Tyra Buss | Sophomore | Guard

Buss once again gave the Lady Lions trouble. After finishing with 26 points in their first meeting, Buss continued to work the Penn State defense — scoring 21 points and getting to the foul line 10 times where she hit nine.

What’s Next

Next up for the Lady Lions is a sub-.500 Illinois at the Bryce Jordan Center on Sunday. Tipoff is at 2 p.m. and can be seen live on BTN Plus.