22nd-ranked Penn State holds on to beat Gophers
Daniel Oturu and Marcus Carr were outstanding for the Gophers, but Minnesota had no answer for Penn State senior forward Lamar Stevens.
Stevens scored 32 points to lead the No. 22 Nittany Lions to a 83-77 win over Minnesota. The loss drops to the Gophers to 12-11 overall and 6-7 in the Big Ten, a precarious position to be in with the conference tournament and the NCAA tournament Selection Sunday a little over a month away.
The Gophers trailed by as many 19 points midway through the second half, then got hot behind Oturu and Carr to trim the lead to 71-68 with just over four minutes to play. But Penn State responded with back-to-back three-point possessions to push the lead to nine with 3:13 to go, and that proved too much to overcome.
Minnesota scored 22 points in the first 20 minutes and 55 points in the final 20 minutes.
Oturu finished with 32 points, 16 rebounds and three blocks. Carr scored 20 and added six rebounds and five assists.
Despite proving capable of hanging with every team they've faced, the Gophers are 12-11 overall and on the NCAA tournament bubble. The latest bracketology from ESPN's Joe Lunardi and CBS Sports' Jerry Palm do not include the Gophers, so it's clear that they have work to do if they hope to get into the big dance.
Up next: Gophers get a week off before hosting 17th-ranked Iowa a week from Sunday.
Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen. His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011. Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play. Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers. Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.