Fouls hurt M.Hoops

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. -- If it had been an Elks Club free throw shooting contest in Bryce Jordan Center Saturday, Penn would have sulked away from the gym clutching the complimentary t-shirt while aiming a jealous eye at Penn State's shiny first-place medal. Instead, it was a men's college basketball game, and the fourth straight that the Quakers have dropped to a beatable opponent because of problems with fouls and foul shooting. "Every game we've played so far, we should have won," Penn guard Lamar Plummer said after his team's 84-74 loss to Penn State this weekend. "I don't think it's the quality of the [opposing] team, I think it's within ourselves." The Red and Blue went a dismal 14-for-27 from the foul line in State College Saturday, which amounted to a bleak 51.9 shooting percentage. Worse than their cold hand at the line, though, was the Quakers' defense, which sent Penn State to the charity stripe 48 times. The Nittany Lions took advantage of the foul-hungry Quakers by converting an impressive 40 of their free throw attempts. "We're not doing well in the foul shooting area," Penn coach Fran Dunphy said. "Teams are shooting good percentages against us, and we're not shooting very well from the line." A large discrepancy in both free throw attempts and free throw percentages between the Red and Blue and their opponents has been a constant problem for the Quakers in this early part of the season. After its first four games, Penn only has a 46.3 free throw shooting percentage on 114 trips to the line. The Quakers' opponents, on the other hand, have a 77.3 foul shot percentage on 156 attempts. And in the game this weekend, where Penn had a higher shooting percentage from the field and nailed twice as many three-pointers as the Nittany Lions, the 26-point swing at the free throw line in Penn State's favor was definitely what sealed the Quakers' fate. "I think that compliments the lack of shooting on any particular night," Penn State coach Jerry Dunn said about his team's free throw shooting. "Basically what we've done is find another way to win." This winning way for the Nittany Lions was paved mostly through the key and the heart of Penn's defense. Throughout the game, Penn State's guards made consistent drives from the perimeter in hopes of drawing a foul from a Quakers defender collapsing in on the play. With Nittany Lions guards Titus Ivory and Joe Crispin stepping to the line 15 and 12 times, respectively, this plan definitely worked against Penn. "I thought we did a better job of getting the ball inside and taking it strong and getting to the free throw line," Dunn said. "Those are the things I think you have to do to get to the line more than your opponent." More trips to the line by the Nittany Lions also meant more personal fouls being racked up against individual Red and Blue players. Plummer, the team's leading scorer with 20 points and Penn's only player who was perfect from the free throw line, fouled out of the game with 6:55 remaining and with Penn trailing, 66-58. Two more Quakers, Ugonna Onyekwe and David Klatsky, joined Plummer on the bench with five fouls in the final two minutes of the game, while two others finished with four fouls. "We're not disciplined enough with the little things, [like] keeping guys in front of us when we do get beat and no fouling," Plummer said. Along with mistakes by his team on the defensive side of the ball, Dunphy also cited a change in the reaction of referees toward contact between players. "I'm not overly thrilled by it because I think this is a contact sport," said Dunphy. "There was just far too many fouls called, I believe. It stops the flow of the game and, like tonight, it becomes a foul shooting contest. "I hope [the problem] cleans itself up, or else we'll need a bigger bench."

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