Keeping WBIT run alive, Penn State women’s basketball beats Belmont at Bryce Jordan Center

The Lady Lions are moving on to the quarterfinals.

Facing Belmont for the first time in program history, Penn State women’s basketball handled the Bruins at the Bryce Jordan Center on Monday with a 74-66 victory to keep its season — and Women’s Basketball Invitational Tournament run — alive.

Fifth-year guards Makenna Marisa and Ashley Owusu remained steady presences offensively for the squad, finishing with 18 and 16 points, respectively.

“I’ve never played in March. It’s just very exciting,” Marisa said.

The Lady Lions will advance to play one last game at the BJC this season in another WBIT matchup. This time, it’ll be against Mississippi State on Thursday.

The winner of that game will travel to Indianapolis for the WBIT semifinals.

“(It) should be a great atmosphere and an awesome last game for our seniors in the BJC,” coach Carolyn Kieger said.

Penn State, one of the three No. 1 seeds still alive in the WBIT alongside Villanova and Washington State, lacked juice for a significant portion of its contest with the Bruins.

Both sides had a slow offensive start, especially from deep, knotted at 14 after a quarter.

Defensively, the Lady Lions continued to rely on trapping ball handlers before the halfcourt line, forcing nine first-half turnovers for Belmont. Yet, despite shooting 2-for-12 from 3-point range, the Bruins took a 32-29 lead into halftime led by eight points from junior Kilyn McGuff, who finished with 20.

For a Penn State team that hadn’t scored fewer than 60 points in a game all season, its struggles to find the bottom of the net in the first half were unusual. Over the first 20 minutes, Kieger’s team failed to convert its shots from the free-throw line, was outrebounded 20-9 and lacked the kind of free-flowing ball movement its maintained all season.

But, just like its matchup against George Mason in the first round of the tournament, the Lady Lions found all their momentum in the second half.

A 7-0 run out of the break put the blue and white back in it, and its aforementioned full-court press continued to pay off.

With 2:45 remaining in the third, Belmont failed to get the ball past halfcourt in time, which led to Owusu’s 13th and 14th points of the night on a second-chance opportunity.

“They did a good job of pressuring,” Belmont coach Bart Brooks said. “I thought we had people open down the floor and we couldn’t see it.”

The BJC crowd came to life in the third quarter, applauding the squad as it entered a timeout with a 48-41 advantage.

Penn State held onto the lead it built through the fourth, albeit with some more stagnant offense. A 3-pointer from McGuff cut Belmont’s deficit to just three points with 3:21 left, but the Lady Lions matched it with a 5-0 run that was just enough to squeak by with another tournament win.

“(Kieger’s) got them playing well and has a chance to go and win this tournament,” Brooks said.

After finding itself on the outside looking in of the NCAA Tournament, the Lady Lions are making the most of their next-best opportunity, the WBIT.

“When you make a goal and you fall short of that, there’s a little bit of a gut punch. But we also know we have to earn it,” Kieger said. “We have to show and prove we can win in March.”

Heading into its final home matchup of the 2023-24 season against Mississippi State, Penn State will get its last opportunity to show out in front of a home crowd.

For Marisa, who’s been with the program for five years and is out of collegiate eligibility after the current season, it will be bittersweet no matter the result.

“I’m trying not to think about it too much,” she said. “This university means the most to me.”