Terran Petteway's 28 Leads Nebraska Past Northwestern
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Terran Petteway scored 28 points and Nebraska had its best shooting game of the season in a 76-60 victory over Northwestern on Tuesday night.
Walter Pitchford added 14 points and Shavon Shields had 11 points and seven assists for the Cornhuskers (13-9, 5-5 Big Ten), who snapped a two-game losing streak.
Northwestern (10-12, 1-8), which lost its eighth straight, got 16 points from Alex Olah, 12 from Scottie Lindsey and 11 from Vic Law.
The Huskers shot a season best 62.8 percent from the floor — the first time they made more than half their shots in a Big Ten game. It was their best shooting performance since they shot 63 percent against Arkansas-Pine Bluff in 2010-11. Nebraska also shot a season best 47.6 percent on 3-pointers against the Wildcats.
Petteway finished his big night with a 3-pointer and breakaway dunk in the final minute.
The Huskers were coming off horrid road losses to Michigan and Minnesota. They shot a combined 33.6 percent in those two games, committed a season-high 20 turnovers against Michigan and scored a season-low 42 points against Minnesota.
The Huskers, down 41-40 early in the second half, scored 17 straight points to go up 57-41. David Rivers had six points during the run and Petteway scored five in a row to end a personal field-goal drought that spanned 19 minutes over the halves.
The Wildcats went scoreless for 6 1/2 minutes and without a field goal for almost eight.
Northwestern came into the game 11th and Nebraska 14th in the Big Ten in scoring in conference games. But the teams scorched the nets early, combining to make 12 of their first 17 shots.
No one was hotter than Petteway, who made his first four 3-pointers. The last of those gave Nebraska a 21-13 lead. But Petteway attempted only two shots the last 11:42 of the half, missing both.
A 15-5 run let Northwestern go ahead briefly, but Nebraska held the Wildcats to one basket the last five minutes of the half to lead 35-33.
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TIP-INS
Northwestern: The loss was only the third of their nine in Big Ten play decided by more than seven points. Wildcats' season scoring leaders Tre Demps and Bryant McIntosh combined for 10 points after totaling 36 in Saturday's loss to Purdue.
Nebraska: Shavon Shields' 11 points put him over 1,000 for his career. The Huskers have won seven of eight games against Northwestern since 1975. Nebraska has held opponents to 37.5 percent shooting in their first six Big Ten home games.
UP NEXT
Northwestern visits Wisconsin on Saturday.
Nebraska visits Penn State on Saturday.
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