Mar 10, 2026; Chicago, IL, USA; Penn State Nittany Lions head coach Mike Rhoades gestures to his team against the Northwestern Wildcats during the first half at United Center. Mandatory Credit: David Banks-Imagn Images | David Banks-Imagn ImagesTim AydinWed, March 11, 2026 at 2:03 AM UTC·2 min readUnlike the first meeting with Northwestern, where they gave up over 90 points in a 21-point loss in Evanston, Penn State was more competitive against the Wildcats in their opening round game of the Big Ten Tournament, leading at moments during the first half and keeping the game within five points through most of the second half. Unfortunately, it still wasn’t enough Northwestern ultimately pulled away, thanks to some critical fast break points off turnovers and prevailed by double digits to finally put this god-awful season out of its misery.
Players Of The GameIvan Jurić – 22 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementJosh Reed – 14 points, 4 rebounds
Freddie Dilione – 14 points, 4 assists
Kayden Mingo – 13 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists, 1 steal
Jurić had himself a career night scoring-wise, even though he found himself having to sit out large chunks of the game due to foul trouble, while Reed balled out in his final collegiate basketball game, and Mingo was dropping dimes and grabbing boards to go along with his double-digits in scoring. Freddie was also solid off the bench, despite being replaced in the starting lineup by true freshman Mason Blackwood, who went on to put up zero points and one rebound in 20 minutes of action.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementRandom ObservationsTurnovers, Turnovers, Turnovers – The Nittany Lions did a nice job dropping 18 assists as a team, but unfortunately negated that with 17 turnovers. Northwestern on the other hand, had 21 assists but only eight turnovers. This allowed the Wildcats to ultimately blow open a tight game late in the second half
Will he stay or will he go, now? – After three years as Penn State’s head coach with the Big Ten win total getting worse each year, going from 9 to 6 to 3 this season, as well as the truly abysmal defensive performance and lack of effort and fight in his team throughout the season, Mike Rhoades’ status feels like it’s up in the air. I’ve already made it clear that I think a coaching change should be made, but we’ll find out in the next week whether Pat Kraft feels the same way.
At 12-20 overall and 3-18 in Big Ten play, there is zero chance of any postseason tournament invite, so the season is now officially over. Barring a coaching search, you can quit thinking about this program for the next several months.
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