Johnson leads No. 20 Purdue past Penn State

NCAA Basketball Betting Lines

02/11/2009 - West Lafayette, IN (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - JuJuan Johnson had 14 points, 13 rebounds and four blocks as the 20th-ranked Purdue Boilermakers defeated the Penn State Nittany Lions, 61-47, behind a strong second-half performance.

Purdue (18-6, 7-4 Big Ten) was riding a two-game losing streak coming into play that coincided with the absence of standout forward Robbie Hummel, who is battling a stress fracture in his lower back.

The Boilermakers got a big boost from the bench, though, with Bobby Riddell's career-high 13 points on 5-of-7 shooting with a trio of three-pointers while Nemanja Calasan checked in with 12 points. E'Twaun Moore had 10 points in the win.

Jamelle Cornley led the way with 16 points for Penn State (17-8, 6-6), which recorded a thrilling 67-64 victory over Purdue on January 6th, but more recently has suffered three consecutive defeats.

Talor Battle, the Big Ten's leading scorer with 18.2 ppg entering Wednesday, was held scoreless over 36-plus minutes with an 0-for-7 showing from the field.

The Nittany Lions kept things close in the first half and a stretch of seven straight points behind a Stanley Pringle three-ball and a pair of jumpers by David Jackson and Cornley gave the visitors a 22-16 lead with just under seven minutes to go.

Consecutive buckets from Moore, though, started a 9-0 spurt for the Boilermakers and Riddell's triple closed it for a three-point advantage. Johnson added three points before the break and Purdue entered the second half up 28-26.

The Boilermakers jumped out to a 46-28 advantage with an 18-2 run over the opening seven minutes of the second half. Riddell hit for a pair of long range shots and scored eight points on the surge.

A three-pointer from Cornley close to midway through the half followed by a jumper moments later cut Purdue's lead to 13, 54-41, but Penn State went the next seven-plus minutes without a field goal and the Boilermakers easily prevailed.

Game Notes

The Boilermakers' lead in the all-time series stands at 21-10...Chris Babb and Andrew Jones each had six points for Penn State, which shot just 36.7 percent from the floor including an 8-of-25 showing in the second half...Purdue shot 48.1 percent from the field and committed just five turnovers.

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Big 12 Conference betting odds

Work left to do: Texas Tech, Oklahoma State, Kansas State

Texas joins Texas A&M and Kansas as locks after getting league win No. 11. Texas Tech greatly helped its own hopes and crippled OK State's with the two-point win Saturday. Is K-State the last reasonable hopeful? Could be an elimination match in Stillwater on Tuesday, at least for the Cowboys.

Work left to do:

Texas Tech [18-11 (7-7), RPI: 44, SOS: 12] A critical two-point win over OK State leaves the Red Raiders with Baylor and at Iowa State left. Get both and the Red Raiders likely are good to go. Get one and there could be some interesting comparisons with a K-State team that could finish two or three games "ahead" of them in the standings but doesn't have any of the quality wins Texas Tech has. Not a lot in nonconference play (against Arkansas in Little Rock being the best win, by far) to lean on.

Oklahoma State [18-9 (5-8), RPI: 50, SOS: 35] Still without a road win, the Cowboys now need to win two on the road just to get to .500 in conference play. It's hard to recall a team (OK, other than Clemson) falling so precipitously from lock status to almost certainly out of the NCAAs at this point. There are wins to be had in the last three, including a very big home game against K-State on Tuesday, but this team is reeling. Can you tell the pressure to win is getting to them with the way the final possession played out at Texas Tech? There are some good nonconference performances to lean on, specifically beating Missouri State and Syracuse on neutral floors and Pitt in OK City, but if the Pokes don't right this very, very soon, that won't be enough.

Kansas State [20-9 (9-5), RPI: 56, SOS: 96] It pays to be in the Big 12 North. The nine league wins are Colorado (twice), Missouri (twice), Iowa State (twice), Baylor, Nebraska and (a good one against) Texas. That helps explain the middling computer profile. The win over USC is nice, but the nonconference leaves a lot to be desired. The game at OK State in Stillwater on Tuesday is huge, as it could KO the Cowboys and leave K-State with a home date against Oklahoma with which to work.