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Star-crossed Penn State is the victim of a bafflingly bad foul call

At the end of a star-crossed season in which it has lost 10 conference games by nine or fewer points, Penn State received another ill-timed dose of misfortune Wednesday night.

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The Nittany Lions were the victim of one of the most baffling foul calls of the season early in their 77-67 loss to Ohio State.

As senior forward Ross Travis was preparing to finish a fast break with an uncontested dunk, teammate D.J. Newbill was trailing the play. Somehow Newbill was whistled for an offensive foul negating the dunk even though, if anything, Ohio State forward Amir Williams shoved him out of the way.

That the call went against Newbill on senior night was especially cruel. The Penn State guard is already one of the nation's most unappreciated stars because he averages 20.4 points per game on a below-the-radar team that's 3-13 in the Big Ten and has no other double-digit scorers.

Penn State coach Patrick Chambers was already unhappy with Big Ten referees after a loss to Maryland last month, earning a $10,000 fine and a public reprimand from the league office for his criticism. Chambers described this call on Jordan Dickerson the worst he'd ever seen in his life, though it's a safe bet he may revise that statement after the foul assessed to Newbill on Wednesday night.

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Remarkably, the Newbill foul wasn't the worst bad luck Penn State experienced against the Buckeyes. Later in the game, Ohio State forward Sam Thompson scored an improbable basket when he leaped to defend a Nittany Lions inbound pass and the ball deflected off his outstretched right hand and into the basket.

The strangest thing about that play is how nonchalant everyone on the floor is about what happened. When it comes to Penn State basketball, perhaps bizarrely bad luck has just become the norm.

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Jeff Eisenberg is the editor of The Dagger on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at daggerblog@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!