EVANSTON, Ill. – Rutgers men's basketball (10-6, 6-6) never trailed in a 64-56 victory at Northwestern (6-9, 3-8) on Sunday night at Welsh-Ryan Arena. The victory was Rutgers' third straight win.
"Our guys grinded out a Big Ten win on the road. I'm proud of them," head coach
Steve Pikiell said. "Our defense keeps improving. We figured out a way to win in an old fashioned Rutgers win with our defense. We made some timely shots. Everybody contributed. I really liked our bench, we got a lot of contributions. We held them 0-for-8 from three-point in the second half and that was a big reason we were able to get a win on the road."
Jacob Young paced the Scarlet Knights' scoring with 18 points on 6-of-10 shooting and a pair of three-pointers off the bench.
Geo Baker added 12 points, four boards and two assists, while
Ron Harper Jr. scored all 13 of his points in the second half to help secure the road victory.
Rutgers jumped out to a 31-11 lead to open the game, shooting 11-of-17 in that stretch. Northwestern closed the half with a run to bring the deficit down. At the break, RU led 34-29.
In the second half, Rutgers forced a pair of long Wildcat scoreless streaks as the RU lead moved back into double-digits and stayed there until 4:20 left on the clock amid a late Northwestern push. Rutgers survived a 10-0 rally to cut the RU lead to 57-52 as Harper Jr. drilled a midrange jumper to halt the run and provide a cushion with two minutes left on the clock. Young also connected on a long two-pointer with under a minute to play to keep a three-possession lead before his game-icing dunk with 18 seconds left.
"It's so hard to get road wins in this conference," Pikiell said. "We got off to another good start tonight. Everyone chipped in, I like how they're settling in and have been really good. On the defense and rebounding front, we are way further along than where we've been."
The Scarlet Knights return to The RAC for their next contest. Rutgers will host No. 21/20 Minnesota on Thursday at 9 p.m. The game will be broadcast on FS1.
- The victory was Rutgers' third straight win over Northwestern. The Scarlet Knights have won four of the past five meetings with the Wildcats, and two straight at Welsh-Ryan Arena.
- The win was Rutgers' third Big Ten road win of the season (at Maryland, at Indiana, at Northwestern).
- The Scarlet Knights have won three Big Ten Conference road games for the second time since joining the league in 2014-15.
- This marks the third time in the past 16 seasons that RU has won three conference road games in a campaign (2018-19 in the Big Ten, and before that in 2005-06 in the BIG EAST).
- The victory marked the Scarlet Knights' second three-game winning streak in Big Ten conference play (previously defeated Nebraska, Penn State and Indiana from Jan. 21-30, 2019).
- Rutgers forced 20 turnovers, a season-high for the Wildcats. Northwestern entered the game with the fewest turnovers in the Big Ten, averaging 10.1 turnovers per game, which was the 10th-fewest in the nation.
- Rutgers used the same starting lineup as the previous two games: Geo Baker, Paul Mulcahy, Caleb McConnell, Ron Harper Jr. and Myles Johnson. The Scarlet Knights are 3-0 using that starting lineup.
- Geo Baker moved into 25th place all-time in points scored and took sole possession of eighth place all-time at RU in three-pointers.
- Rutgers has used hot starts in the last three games, getting off to combined 67-32 leads in the opening 10 minutes of the last three games. For the second straight game, the Scarlet Knights never trailed.
- Rutgers has allowed 93 total points in the last two conference games combined. That is the fewest RU has given up in consecutive league outings since 1982 when the Scarlet Knights held George Washington and UMass to 85 combined (as an EAA member).
- Rutgers has forced 20+ turnovers in consecutive games (21 versus Michigan State, 20 versus Northwestern). That marks the first time since 2011 that RU has had consecutive games forcing at least 20 turnovers (previously: 11/17/11 vs. Sacred heart and 11/20/11 vs. Hampton).
- Paul Mulcahy added five assists and three steals.
