Correspondent photo / Robert Hayes. YSU's Ty Harper and Cris Carroll rush toward a loose ball after forcing a turnover on the defensive end of the court on Saturday against Oakland at the Beeghly Center.

YOUNGSTOWN — For several years, high-scoring offense has been part of Youngstown State’s identity.

This season, however, head coach Ethan Faulkner feels that the defense is the cornerstone of this year’s team.

“I still think we have the potential to be a better defensive team than offensive team, and that’s what we’ve got to hang our hat on,” Faulkner said earlier this week.

Through two Horizon League games, that has rung true for YSU, as the Penguins stymied defending conference champions Oakland 66-50 on Saturday at the Zidian Family Arena at Beeghly Center.

“We’re playing really well defensively. I thought, again tonight, very disruptive,” Faulkner said. “If we hold teams to 50, we’ll have a great chance to win. I’ve been saying we’re getting better, and we’re going to continue to get better on both sides of the ball. I thought we were equally as good offensively in terms of what we were trying to execute against a very unique defense, a defense that unless you play Oakland, you don’t see it, especially the way they play it. So I was really proud of our guys for our execution on both ends of the floor.”

Against the Golden Grizzlies, the Penguins mixed up their defenses, particularly in the second half, which is something they haven’t done much of this year.

YSU spent most of the game in man-to-man, but then the Penguins sprinkled in some press, 2-3 zone and adjusted their coverages in the post.

“We would try to press them a little bit, then go back into a zone. We were trying to see how they would react to it,” EJ Farmer said. “We watched previous teams do the same thing to them, so we saw how they move with the zone and it worked pretty well for us. We didn’t want to do man the whole game — we had a spurt where it was, one possession going man, another possession 2-3, we just kept switching back-and-forth.”

The Penguins took Oakland out of its element offensively, limiting the Golden Grizzlies to 34.6% shooting and just 2-of-16 made shots from beyond the arc.

“I think we have a lot of good offensive players, but the fact that we work hard and together on defense — we got a lot of athletes, so it’s hard for us to get scored on when we’re locked in and dialed in together,” Nico Galette said. “Gabe (Dynes) is definitely a big help. He blocks a lot of shots, then we’re just intense with it. Our coaches do a great job of giving us a philosophy and holding us accountable to follow it.”

On the opposite end of the floor, Oakland presents a unique matchup for the Penguins’ offense with its zone.

“The hard part of coaching against Coach (Greg) Kampe’s team is you can’t necessarily run whatever you want or get the ball wherever you want,” Faulkner said. “You really just have to counter how they play.”

In the first half, it took YSU a few minutes to find its spots against the Golden Grizzlies’ defense. Seven of the Penguins’ first eight shots came from deep as a result.

But Farmer hit three of them, and once those started to fall, things started to open up for YSU offensively. The Penguins ended the first half on a 9-1 run, while holding Oakland to just a single point over the final 4:30, as they took a nine-point lead into halftime.

At the start of the second half, Farmer again picked up where he left off at the start of the game. He scored eight of his game-high 22 points over the first five minutes of the second half to help YSU create some separation.

As part of his 22 points, Farmer finished with a new career-high five made threes.

“Finally — it felt good to see the ball go in,” Farmer said. “Like I said, playing against a zone team, threes were going to happen, and it felt good from the jump today.”

With YSU leading by 15 midway through the second half, Oakland mounted a quick run to cut the Penguins’ lead to single digits. But Galette helped push the lead back out with a three-point play and a steal that led to a fast-break layup for Farmer.

“Kind of been the MO of our team. Just respond,” Faulkner said. “We’ve had several of those situations in multiple games this year where teams make a run at us. Tonight it was Nico, other nights, it’s other guys, where guys just step up and make plays and give us a little boost and build our momentum back.”

Galette finished with 11 points to go along with nine rebounds and six assists. Jason Nelson and Juwan Maxey each also added 11 points for the Penguins.

Meanwhile, Allen David Mukeba led Oakland with 17 points.

YSU now has a week off for finals week before jumping back into non-conference play at home against Toledo on Saturday at 1 p.m.