Roby powers Nebraska to 70-64 win over Penn State

It may only be January, but Thursday night’s home game against Penn State was about as close to a must-win situation that Nebraska had faced yet this season.

There was nothing easy about the 70-64 victory, but the Huskers got the job done to avoid what would have been considered their first “bad loss” of the year, snap a two-game losing streak, and improve to 12-4 overall and 2-3 in Big Ten play.

Junior Isaiah Roby led the charge with one of his most complete efforts as a Husker, dropping a career-high 22 points on 8-of-9 shooting with 11 rebounds, four blocks, two steals, and an assist.

That performance and some tough team defense down the stretch helped NU overcome a lopsided 46-32 disadvantage on glass that included Penn State getting 21 offensive rebounds on its 42 missed shots.

The win not only got the Huskers back on track, it extended their home winning streak to 20 games dating back to last season. That matches the longest run in school history along set by the 1965-66 and 1966-67 squads.

“(Assistant coach) Jim Molinari said something to us just today: ‘When you’ve got a good team and you’ve lost a couple in a row, the hardest thing in the world to do is win a game,’” head coach Tim Miles said. “It’s true. I just thought we were a little uptight, and you could see that. That’s what was hard, was just to win the game.

Nebraska came into the game as heavy favorites, but it was a back-and-forth affair throughout the first half. The lead changed hands nine times and was tied four others before the Huskers finally went into halftime with a 33-31 advantage.

The Huskers shot 48.1 percent from the field and hit 6-of-11 3-pointers in the opening 20 minutes, but five turnovers and six Penn State offensive rebounds directly led to nine points for the Nittany Lions.

“It’s no secret we haven’t been shooting the ball the best in Big Ten play,” Penn State head coach Pat Chambers said. “We have to go to the glass until everybody can see the ball go in the basket a little bit. It was extra effort - not that Nebraska wasn’t trying to box out, I thought they were. It was a hard-fought game.”

Penn State quickly reclaimed the lead early in the second half after guard Josh Reaves, who led PSU with a career-high 20 points, knocked down two straight 3-pointers to make it 39-36.

But Nebraska rallied back and matched its biggest lead of the night on a one-hand slam by Roby that made it 52-48 with 10:38 remaining.

A put-back bucket by Roby gave Nebraska its biggest lead of the night at 56-51 with 8:46 left, but the Nittany Lions continued to dominate the offensive glass and second-chance points. That allowed them to keep it a two-possession game and pull within one with just over two minutes to go

With the shot clock running down, senior guard Glynn Watson made a 3-pointer that hit about every part of the rim and backboard before going in to push NU’s advantage back up to 65-61.

“(The shot) felt good, but I didn’t know it was going to do all that, to be honest,” Watson said.

Two straight empty offensive possessions left the lead at four inside the final minute, but Roby came up with a steal and a blocked shot on consecutive trips to keep PSU at bay.

The Dixon, Ill., native then knocked down four straight free throws in the final 15 seconds to clinch the victory. Penn State only made one field goal in the last 2:51, missing nine of its final 11 shots of the night.

“That was huge,” Roby said. “We talked about defense pretty much 80 percent of our practice the last couple days. Just because we know we can score with anybody, but in order to win, you’ve got to play defense. So to be able to finish the game this time and not blow the lead, that was huge for us.

Nebraska’s five starters ended up playing the entire second half, and all but Thomas Allen (34 minutes) were on the floor for 38 minutes or longer. Watson had 19 points while James Palmer Jr. added 11 points, five rebounds, and four assists.

The Huskers shot 49.1 percent from the field as a team, their highest clip since the win over Dec. 5. On the other end, Penn State was just 36.2 percent despite making a season-high seven 3-pointers.

Nebraska will hit the road again next time out when it travels to take on Indiana on Monday for a 5:30 p.m. tip on FS1.

“You emphasize for the last five days defensive rebounding and getting to threes, and these guys have the season-high night in threes and 21 (offensive) boards there might be a season-high too,” Miles said. “So despite all that coaching, we were able to win. But those are things that we’re going to correct and we’ll get to.

“You just knew, like Coach Mo said, the hardest thing tonight was getting the W.”

1. Roby was as good as ever

The star of the night was undoubtedly Roby, who came up with his best all-around performance as a Husker when his team needed it the most. Not only were his 22 points a career high, but he also set season-bests with 11 rebounds and four blocks and posted his first double-double of the year. Roby was aggressive and active on the offensive end all night, but his play on defense was what changed the game. Miles said he put Roby on Lamar Stevens – PSU’s leading scorer at 18.9 ppg – for about the last five minutes of the game. Stevens, who had 13 points at the time, did not score the rest of the way.

2. Penn State shut down Palmer, Copeland

Nebraska needed Roby and Watson to be every bit as good as they were on Thursday night because its other two senior stars, Palmer and Isaac Copeland, had games to forget. Palmer finished with 11 points but did so on just 3-of-12 shooting, while Copeland was just 4-of-10 from the field and 0-for-4 from 3-point range with only three rebounds in 38 minutes. Palmer’s struggles weren’t a total surprise for the Huskers because they knew Penn State would put Reaves – one of the best on-ball defenders in the Big Ten – on him from start to finish. But he still only got to the free throw line four times and took just six two-point shots.

3. The starters carried the load

Nebraska got back a key piece of its bench rotation when freshman Amir Harris returned to action for the first time since Dec. 5 after missing the past six games due to mononucleosis. But Harris had only recently returned to full practices, so his energy was still too low to play extended minutes (he played four). To make matters worse, sophomore Nana Akenten was also dealing with an illness that forced him to miss the past two days of game prep. Akenten managed to play seven minutes, but he too wore down as the game went on. As a result, and given what was on the line for the Huskers, Miles opted to stick with his starters for the entire second half. He did that a handful of times during his first season back in 2011-12, but not once since. Miles said he briefly debated putting in senior center Tanner Borchardt (two minutes), “but every time I brought it up those assistants talked me out of it.” Said Watson: “I didn’t expect nobody else to get in the whole second half, but we’ve gotta do what we’ve got to do. Coach Miles believes in us to play a lot of minutes, we’ve just got to recover after.”