What to Expect: IU basketball hosts Penn State

Penn State guard Kayden Mingo drives to the basket.

IU basketball returns to Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall on Tuesday night to host Penn State. The Nittany Lions are 8-1 and have won three straight.

Tuesday’s game will tip at 8:30 p.m. ET on FS1:

Indiana will look to rebound from a tough week that included a pair of nine-point losses. The Hoosiers fell 73-64 to Minnesota on Wednesday to open Big Ten play and followed that up with an 87-78 loss to Louisville on Saturday at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.

A pivotal week begins with their second conference game of the month against Penn State, which is 8-1 but has played one of the ten worst schedules in the country.

In year three of the Mike Rhoades tenure, Penn State is projected by KenPom.com to finish below .500 and near the bottom of the league.

MEET THE NITTANY LIONS

It’s a new-look roster for Rhoades after the graduations of Ace Baldwin, Nick Kern, D’Marco Dunn, Puff Johnson and Zach Hicks. The Nittany Lions also lost their best frontcourt player, Yanic Konan Niederhauser, the No. 30 pick in last June’s NBA draft.

The rebuilt roster features just two players who played regularly last season: sophomore guard Dominick Stewart and junior Freddie Dilione V. There is a noticeable dip in the length and athleticism this season for Penn State compared to the last two seasons under Rhoades.

Penn State is led by freshman point guard Kayden Mingo, the No. 37 player nationally in the final 247Sports Composite rankings for the 2025 class. A 6-foot-3, 195-pound combo guard from New York, Mingo’s 15 points per game lead the team, as do his 4.2 assists and 2.1 steals per game.

Mingo is finishing 59.7 percent of his 2s and has an assist-to-turnover ratio of better than 4-to-1 through nine games. He’s struggled from the perimeter and is just 6-for-30 on 3-pointers.

He’s joined in the starting backcourt by Stewart and freshman guard Melih Tunca from Istanbul, Turkey.

Stewart has started the last two games after Eli Rice started the first seven. He’s scored in double figures just once, but is a capable 3-point shooter. The 6-foot-5 Stewart is 16-for-35 from distance and his 16 made triples lead Penn State.

The 6-foot-5 Tunca has started eight of nine games and has scored in double figures seven times, including a 20-point game against La Salle on Nov. 15. Tunca is shooting 45 percent on 3s – on only 20 attempts – and 56.9 percent on 2s.

Penn State is starting 6-foot-8 Cincinnati transfer Josh Reed up front alongside 7-foot freshman Ivan Juric.

Reed, who IU assistant coach Drew Adams knows well from their time together at Cincinnati, is fourth on the team in scoring at 10.6 points per game to go along with 4.2 rebounds and 1.4 steals in 23.7 minutes per game. He’s shooting 51.6 percent from the field and 86.2 percent from the free-throw line. He’s just 6-for-20 on 3-pointers.

Juric, a native of Zagreb, Croatia, also averages 10.6 points per game and is shooting 71.4 percent, including 31-for-40 from 2-point range (77.5 percent). He can step out and hit the occasional 3-pointer (4-for-9) but isn’t much of a rim protector. Juric has two blocked shots in 220 minutes.

The most dangerous player on the roster might be Dilione V, a starter last season who now comes off the bench to provide a scoring punch. The 6-foot-5 Dilione V began his career at Tennessee with current IU assistant coach Rod Clark. He’s second on the team in scoring at 13.2 points per game and has scored in double figures seven times.

The other names to know off the bench are 6-foot-10 junior Sasa Ciani, 6-foot-9 freshman Tibor Mirtic and Rice, a 6-foot-8 sophomore.

Ciani, a native of Nova Gorica, Slovenia, started the first four games but has been inefficient. A transfer from Illinois Chicago, he’s just 6-for-21 on 2s.

Mirtic, who is also from Slovenia, is a promising young big man. He’s averaging five points and 3.8 rebounds in 15.7 minutes per game while shooting 64.5 percent from the field.

And Rice, who began his career at Nebraska before an injury last season limited him to only one game at Penn State, is 12-for-26 on 3s, good for 46.2 percent. He’s averaging 5.9 points in 16.4 minutes.

TEMPO-FREE PREVIEW

(All stats and national rankings are updated through Sunday’s games.)

Tempo-free stats preview for IU basketball vs. Penn State.

It isn’t easy to draw many conclusions with Penn State given their schedule, which ranks 353rd nationally according to KenPom.com. The Nittany Lions have a solid offense with a defense that struggles to get stops.

Penn State is shooting 37.6 percent on 3s – on very low volume – and 57.2 percent on 2s with a turnover percentage of 12.1, which ranks second nationally. The Nittany Lions are scoring just 26.1 percent of their points on 3s, which ranks 299th nationally and are 314th in 3PA/FGA at 32.8 percent.

Defensively, opponents are shooting 54.6 percent on 2s, which ranks 262nd in the country and Penn State ranks just 348th in block percentage. The Nittany Lions rank 7th in the country in opponent free throw rate (FTA/FGA) and 47th in forcing turnovers (20.8 opponent turnover percentage).

If Indiana can take care of the ball and play inside-out, the Hoosiers should be able to create good looks at the rim, which should help free up the perimeter as the game progresses.

WHAT IT COMES DOWN TO

The KenPom projection is Indiana by 12 with an 85 percent chance of a Hoosier victory. Bart Torvik’s ratings favor IU by 13 with an 88 percent chance for a win.

After back-to-back losses, one of which was unexpected at Minnesota, this is a game Indiana needs to win. The Hoosiers are 6-0 at Assembly Hall and must stack as many home conference wins as possible and find a way to steal road wins along the way.

Penn State is an extremely young team – 334th in experience, per KenPom.com – and is playing its first road game in a challenging environment. The Nittany Lions did win a road game against New Haven in the second game of the season, but it was in front of 1,087 fans.

The Hoosiers will hope to get Lamar Wilkerson back on track after struggles against Minnesota and Louisville. Wilkerson is 4-for-15 on 3s in the last two games. After falling behind 16-0 early against Louisville, Indiana fought back and made Saturday’s loss respectable. Those types of starts, however, can’t happen against high-major competition.

(Photo credit: Penn State Athletics)

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