Hoosiers close out regular season with win

Senior guard Nikki Smith gave the IU women’s basketball program all four years of her college career, which were full of coaching changes, roster turnover and adversity. Sunday against Penn State, her teammates and Hoosier fans gave her a winning send-off in her final game at Assembly Hall.\nIU (17-13, 10-8) defeated Penn State (13-16, 4-14) 79-67 on Senior Day in front of 8,136 people, the largest crowd ever to watch an IU women’s basketball game at Assembly Hall. Smith and junior guard/forward Kim Roberson led the Hoosiers on the scoreboard with 17 points apiece. Roberson also had eight rebounds and three steals in the game. \nPenn State guard Kamela Gissendanner led all scorers with 24 points on 8-of-17 shooting from the floor. \nSmith, a senior guard from Sylvania, Ohio, hit a 3-pointer on the game’s first bucket to spark a 9-0 game-opening run that gave the Hoosiers a lead they would never relinquish. Smith, one of the Hoosiers’ all-time top shooters from behind the arc, finished the day 5-of-11 from 3-point range. \nSmith said after the game she “didn’t really do much” to get her early open looks at the basket, but she instead credited her teammates’ ability to drive and make the extra pass for the Hoosiers’ success from long range. \n“We had great ball movement today,” she said of her last game at Assembly Hall. “The way that we moved the ball around today allowed a lot of us to get really open shots and knock them down.”\nPenn State coach Coquese Washington said she thought the Hoosiers’ early energy spurred them to the early lead.\n“I felt like they came out with a lot of energy,” Washington said. “The trademark about this team ... is they just play with a lot of energy, and they play hard.”\nIU held an excellent assist-to-turnover ratio of 17-6, while turning the tables on the Nittany Lions – the Hoosiers got 22 of their points directly from 18 Penn State turnovers. \nAfter the game, Washington said the larger-than-normal crowd “made for a better environment,” but she didn’t think it made the game much tougher for her team.\n“They could have had two people and you guys in here, and it still would have been tough,” Washington said, speaking to the press. “Going on the road in the Big Ten, teams play better at home.” \nThe Hoosiers’ 11-3 overall record at Assembly Hall this year seems to support Washington’s claim. \nIU’s win locks in the team as the No. 6 seed heading into next weekend’s Big Ten Tournament in Indianapolis. The Hoosiers, on the NCAA Tournament bubble, will be looking for impressive returns in the Circle City to help make their case to the selection committee. \nThe Hoosiers’ first opponent will be Northwestern on Thursday, winners of just one Big Ten game in the regular season. IU is 2-0 against the Wildcats this year, having defeated them 84-53 on the road and 74-58 at Assembly Hall. \nThe Penn State win wraps up a regular season that saw IU improve three places on its preseason projected finish in the Big Ten, moving from ninth to sixth. \nIU coach Felisha Legette-Jack said at the time that she believed the rankings were fair, and that it was her team’s responsibility to prove the predictions wrong. Now she said it’s time for her players to perform at their highest possible levels to prove they deserve a tournament bid. \n“We’ve got to go to the peak and stay at the peak now, because there’s no more time,” Legette-Jack said. “We have a one-game season now.”