With 11.1 seconds left, Northwestern’s Boo Buie called a timeout.

The Wildcats had the ball with the game tied at 66 and, against all odds, had a chance they really didn’t deserve to notch a win on Sunday night and snap their seven-game losing streak. And on the road, no less, at Rutgers’ notorious RAC, one of the most difficult places to play in the Big Ten.

Never mind that the Wildcats had blown 18-point first-half and 16-point second-half leads. They led by double digits, 64-54, with 5:32 left but that still wasn’t enough to protect them from another of their now-patented offensive collapses, as they made just one of their next eight shots to get them to this point.

But all that would be forgotten if the Wildcats could hit just one basket here, with the game on the line.

Buie got the inbounds pass and dribbled several times beyond the top of the circle. With Geo Baker guarding him, he waited for a screen from AJ Turner that came with about five seconds left. Buie didn’t penetrate, instead flattening out and dribbling to his right, where Akwasi Yeboah picked him up on the switch.

With the shot clock winding down and no other viable options, Buie tried to dribble past Yeboah and launched a running, one-handed jumper off one foot that missed everything as the buzzer sounded. It was indicative of a hapless Northwestern offense that scored just two points over the last five and a half minutes.

In overtime, Baker, took over, scoring seven points to lead the Scarlet Knights to a 77-73 win and hand Northwestern its 11th loss in 12 Big Ten games.

Baker scored 23 of his 25 points in the second half and overtime to pace Rutgers, which claimed its 16th straight home win without a loss on its home floor. Yeboah added 13.

Buie led Northwestern with 19 points, while Miller Kopp added 16. But the two combined for just 10 points on 3-for-12 shooting in the second half and overtime.

For Northwestern, this loss on Oscar night was like Groundhog Day. For the fifth time this season, they blew a double-digit lead to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. It was the Wildcats’ sixth loss by five points or fewer.

Northwestern started the game on fire, silencing a raucous sellout crowd by hitting their first four shots from the floor, including three three-pointers. They drained six of their first eight attempts to build a 15-5 lead at the 15:14 mark.

The Wildcats’ lead reached a high of 18 after Kopp hit a triple to make it 29-11 with 8:13 left in the half. They then went through a three-minute scoring drought as Rutgers whittled the lead down to 10, but a Buie three-pointer from the corner stopped the bleeding and the Wildcats went into the half with a 38-27 edge.

Northwestern’s offensive bonanza continued into the second half. After Myles Johnson opened the half with a dunk for Rutgers, Buie and Kopp hit back-to-back triples to push the lead back to 15 at 44-29.

The Wildcats’ lead crested at 52-36 with 14:25 left after a Turner free throw. From there, the Knights started chipping away, getting the lead down to single digits for good with 5:28 left.

Rutgers finally tied the game at 66, the first time they drew even since the first minute of the first half, on a three-pointer by Baker with 1:15 left. Both teams missed shots from there to set up Northwestern’s failed last possession.

Here are our takeaways from the loss that dropped Northwestern’s record to 6-16 overall and 1-11 in Big Ten play:

Northwestern played an almost perfect first half: That seven-day layoff did wonders for the Cats, who began the game looking as good as they have all season.

The Wildcats, the worst scoring team in the Big Ten, shot 48.5% from the floor in the first period. They hit six three-pointers, three each from Buie and Kopp. They had 10 assists on 16 baskets, meaning they were sharing the ball effectively. Meanwhile, they turned the ball over just once and got 12 points off the bench.

Defensively, the Cats were active and aggressive, forcing Rutgers into tough shots and contesting every one of them. Rutgers made just 33.3% from the floor and missed all nine of their shots from beyond the arc.

Jared Jones played like a man possessed: The big freshman can usually be counted on for tough defense and a few rebounds, but he looked like a different player against Rutgers.

In the first half, Jones hit three of four shots for six points. He had a tip-in flying in off of a miss near the rim. He made an 18-foot jumper. He even put the ball on the floor and drove to the hole for a layup off the wing. He added five more points in the second half to finish with a career-high 11 points on 5-for-8 shooting, as well as five rebounds.

Jones played nine minutes in the first half, but just six in the second as the NU offense floundered. That was a curious choice, given his production and energy off the bench in the first half.

Free throws killed the Cats: Northwestern hit just 6 of 12 free throws in the game, leaving six points at the line in a game where one more point in regulation could have meant victory.

The Wildcats’ offense couldn’t get much of anything going to the rim, which is why they shot just 12 free throws, while Rutgers, a team focused on driving into the paint, shot 34.

The Knights hit 21 of their 34 free throws – not a great percentage (61.8), either – and their 21-6 edge from the charity stripe turned out to be a difference maker.

The Cats had no answer for Baker: Northwestern lacks a proven go-to guy in crunch time. Rutgers has no such problem.

Baker had an abysmal first half, with just two points on 1-for-5 shooting. He practically couldn’t miss after that, drilling 6 of 8 shots for 16 points in the second half and 3 of 4 for seven in overtime.

He hit the game-tying three-pointer, and then canned consecutive jumpers in the last 1:07 of the extra period to put the game away.

When they needed a basket, the Knights knew they were going to go to No. 0 to take the shot.

Is it just youth or is more at play? It’s one thing to lose seven games in a row and 11 of 12 in the Big Ten. But to lose them the way the Wildcats have so often – blowing leads and failing time and again down the stretch – just adds to the pain.

Head coach Chris Collins chalks all of these agonizing losses up to youth and inexperience and maintains that they are learning how to win through their failures.

But what is the statute of limitations on using youth as a reason? These freshmen Wildcats have 22 games under their belts and have been in situations like the one they faced against Rutgers several times. You have to wonder if more than inexperience is at the root cause.