UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Three Badgers scored in double-digits but the Wisconsin women's basketball team still dropped a high-scoring game, 98-74, at Penn State on Sunday afternoon.
Junior Imani Lewis notched her Big Ten-leading ninth double-double of the season, putting up 18 points while adding a game-high 10 rebounds. Sophomore Sydney Hilliard also scored 18 points, marking the seventh-straight game for both Lewis and Hilliard in double-figure points. Hilliard shot an impressive 6-9 from the field and was a perfect 6-6 from the free-throw line.Sophomore Sara Stapleton chipped in 11 points on 4-5 shoot from the field, coming off the bench for the first time this season.
Turnovers were the biggest difference in the game as Wisconsin (4-13, 1-13 B1G) had 22 giveaways, compared to just three for the Lady Lions (8-7, 5-6). Penn State scored 37 points off turnovers and also had 15 steals in the game, scoring 33 points on fastbreaks.
Wisconsin shot 47.3% (26-55) from the field and out-rebounded the Nittany Lions 44-24. Penn State shot 52% (39-75) from field-goal range, including 12-29 (41.4%) from 3-point range. The Badgers took and made more free throws, hitting 17-12 (73.9%) from the line while PSU hit 8-12 (66.7%). The Lady Lions had five players scoring in double figures behind a game-high 20 points by Makenna Marisa.
UW outscored Penn State 28-27 off the bench as 13 Badgers saw playing time.
The Badgers trailed by only two points (21-19) at the end of the first quarter and stayed within four points (27-23) with 8:37 to play in the second period before Penn State went on a 10-2 run to take a 37-25 lead with 5:45 on the clock. Wisconsin cut the lead to 39-36 with 1:52 remaining on a Brooke Schramek 3 pointer but a 6-0 run by the Lady Lions made it 45-36 at the half. UW made it a six-point game (58-52) with 3:59 to play in the third quarter but Penn State went on another end-of-the quarter run, this one 16-2, to lead 72-54 after three quarters. The Lady Lions continued to shoot well in the fourth quarter to put the game away.
Straight from the court
Jonathan Tsipis
"We achieved some of our goals in the first half. We had both Johnasia Cash and Anna Camden in foul trouble, each with two apiece. You look directly at the turnovers we committed and what they were able to do. Even when we made a run in the second quarter, forcing them to call a time out, we weren't taking care of the ball. I don't think I've ever been on the side of a game where you shoot 47% and you out-rebound somebody by 20 and you lose by this margin. I thought the end of the third quarter was the most disappointing because they had 26 assists and three turnovers but they got to every 50/50 ball. They dove on the ground and they didn't just get them, they converted.
"I was trying to get our kids to play with a better hunger, a better fire to be able to stop those runs. When you don't force people into turnovers, we just allowed them to get in such a comfort mode that even wehn we got a deflection we didn't come up with the ball or make them play faster than they wanted to play."
Up next
Wisconsin returns home from its east coast road trip to face off against Ohio State for the first time this season. Tip off is scheduled for 6 p.m. Wednesday night at the Kohl Center with a live stream available on Big Ten Network+ and radio stream available on U-100.9 FM.
