No. 20 Penn State’s once-impressive 2019-20 campaign unraveled in the regular-season finale at unranked Northwestern Saturday, as the Nittany Lions dropped an 80-69 decision to a team that had previously owned all of two Big Ten wins on the year.

Listless and lethargic throughout, Pat Chambers’ squad (21-10, 11-9) will now head to the BIG Tournament having dropped five of six games. Facing a Wildcat team (8-22, 3-17) that played hard despite having virtually nothing to gain Saturday, Penn State’s overall effort was, by comparison, spiritless.

Consider that NU’s two previous conference wins this season were both over Nebraska, which is now locked into last place in the league. PSU cruised past the Wildcats 77-61 at the Jordan Center Feb. 15.

The Lions’ six-week streak of being ranked in the Associated Press Top 25 will end Monday. While they are still a lock to make their first NCAA Tournament appearance in Chambers’ nine seasons thanks to the resume they built earlier in the year, they can now pretty much forget about having a top five seed or better seed.

That could conceivably change with an extended run at Big Tens next week. But nothing PSU has shown in its recent slide suggests that is a possibility, especially given its most likely opening foes (more on that later).

Adding insult to poor play, a terrible tone was set for the Lions’ regular-season finale when it was announced beforehand that veteran big man Mike Watkins had been suspended for an unspecified violation of team rules. Now Penn State is entering postseason play struggling on the floor and with unnecessary drama off of it.

Here is my take on Saturday’s game and where PSU stands overall: