As its schedule eased up, Rutgers has gotten hot.
The Scarlet Knights obliterated last-place Penn State in an 85-72 win at the Bryce Jordan Center in State College on Wednesday, marking their second consecutive victory following a home win over Maryland over the weekend. Head coach Steve Pikiell’s team led for all but six seconds, going up by as much as 20 points.
It marks their first true road win of the season (0-7 entering the day), the first time they won consecutive games since the final week of December and their first road win over the Nittany Lions since their epic comeback in the 2022-23 season.
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With five games to go, Rutgers (11-15, 4-11) is now two games ahead of last-place Penn State, Oregon and Northwestern in the Big Ten standings, and could surpass Maryland for 14th place — which comes with the final first-round bye in the Big Ten Tournament — if the Terrapins lose in Evanston on Wednesday night.
And considering it has the third-easiest remaining schedule in the Big Ten in front of them, per Bart Torvik, Rutgers has a good chance of finishing higher than 17th place, where it was universally projected to finish in the preseason.
The Scarlet Knights were led by junior guard Tariq Francis, who finished with a game-high 22 points on 7-of-12 shooting (7-of-8 on free throws) and seven assists, sophomore forward Dylan Grant (15 points on 6-of-8 shooting) and freshman guards Lino Mark (career-high 12 points on 5-of-6 shooting) and Harun Zrno (13 points on 4-of-10 shooting).
Rutgers dominated from the start, scoring the first 11 points of the game and holding its hosts at arms lengths from there. The Scarlet Knights entered the break with a 39-20 lead, marking its biggest halftime advantage in a conference road game since joining the Big Ten in the 2014-15 season.
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Rutgers forced Penn State to commit more turnovers (10) than made field goals (9) across 28 first-half possessions, and on the other end, Francis led the way with 15 points, four assists and a steal.
The Scarlet Knights kept control after the break, withstanding a pair of small spurts from the Nittany Lion to maintain a double-digit lead for most of the final 20 minutes. Mark was the star of the second half, scoring 7 of his 12 points in that stretch.
Rutgers returns to action on Saturday, when it faces Minnesota at Williams Arena.