Talor Battle-led Penn State finally nets NCAA shot

TUCSON  Ed DeChellis didn't come right out and say it. But you get the feeling the Penn State basketball coach wouldn't argue if you made the contention that Talor Battle deserved a chance to play in this NCAA tournament more than anyone at Penn State, maybe more than anyone in the Big Ten Conference, maybe more than anyone in the country.

Who has done more individually to try to get his team in?

As a frisky freshman guard from upstate New York, Battle (his first name is pronounced Taylor) cracked the starting lineup on an unremarkable but promising team that finished 15-16.

As a seasoned sophomore, Battle was the leading scorer and a first-team all-Big Ten pick on a team that, on Selection Sunday, stood 22-11 and gathered to see its name placed in a bracket. The Nittany Lions waited and waited … and ended up in the NIT, which they won.

As a jaded junior, Battle was the only double-figure scorer on a team that lost 12 games in a row and finished 11-20.

As a suddenly running-out-of-time senior, he was again the best player — 20.1 points, 4.5 rebounds and 2.9 assists a game — and driving force on a team that just couldn't seem to get over the hump.

Just two weeks ago, after losing by 21 points at home to No. 1-ranked Ohio State, the Nittany Lions were 15-13.

"We weren't on no bubbles, we weren't on no 'last-four-ins,' " Battle says. "At 15-13, we're not getting nowhere, into any kind of tournament."

And, it appeared, maybe the best college basketball player you've never heard of was going to finish his four-year career without appearing in an NCAA tournament game.

But the Nittany Lions played better in their last regular-season conference game, winning at Minnesota, then climbed onto some bubbles and into some last-four-ins by beating Indiana, then-No. 13 Wisconsin and Michigan State to get to the Big Ten tournament final, which they lost to Ohio State by 11 points.

At 19-14, nothing was guaranteed.

But then it popped up on the screen. Penn State … vs. Temple … in Tucson.

Talor Battle, the leading scorer in Penn State history, the only Nittany Lion to twice be first-team all-Big Ten, the third NCAA Division I player ever to total 2,000 points, 600 rebounds and 500 assists (joining Duke's Danny Ferry and Maryland's Greivis Vasquez) was in the NCAA tournament.

"It's definitely been an uphill climb," says the 6-0, 170-pounder from Albany, N.Y. "We've had some tough breaks over the years. But this year, we did just enough work to get here.

"I just told the guys, 'This is really an exciting moment. We all know that. But we've still got to play the game of basketball and do the things we need to do to win the game.' "

Maybe the thing they need most is for Battle to show the way — again.

In the Big Ten semifinals, a game against Michigan State that Penn State probably had to win to get to the NCAA tournament, Battle hit six of 11 three-point shots and scored 25 points in a 61-48 victory.

In the final against Ohio State, he made four of 11 from the arc and finished with 24 points.

So, win or lose Thursday against Temple, expect Battle to go down battling.

"This is a very, very competitive kid," DeChellis says.

That's not what DeChellis will remember most about Battle, though.

"He's a tremendous kid with a great personality, a great smile and a great spirit," he says. "He's been a great ambassador for the university and for the basketball program."

And, just in time, he took Penn State to the NCAA tournament.