W. Hoops awaits winter break travels

While most students are enjoying a Winter Break full of rest and relaxation, the Penn women's basketball team (1-5) will have no such luxury. The Quakers will play seven games between December 28 and January 13, only two of which will be held in the friendly confines of the Palestra. Penn will begin its holiday schedule at home against Stonybrook on December 28. This will be the first time Penn has ever faced the Seawolves, as last year marked Stonybrook's inaugural season in Division I. The Seawolves' strong 8-2 record suggests that they will not be a pushover, but Stonybrook's 69-54 loss to Loyola , a team Penn beat 91-78 last year, makes it clear that the Quakers have a fighting chance of pulling this one out. Just two days later, Penn will host Air Force at the Palestra. The Falcons have been off to a rocky start this season, losing all but two of the eight games they've played. Air Force and Stonybrook have two common opponents this season -- Lafayette and Army. The Seawolves won both of those games, while the Falcons lost to both the Leopards and the Cadets. January will be a month of travel for the Quakers, as they head to a different destination for each of the their five road games over Winter break. Penn's first road game of 2001 will be against Lehigh (5-3) on January 3. The Quakers crushed the Engineers 84-64 last year, although Penn lost to Lehigh 62-71 two years ago. This year, Lehigh was destroyed by Temple 89-55 on November 17, while Penn lost to the Owls by just 16 points last Saturday. From Lehigh, the Quakers will venture into New York; Penn will travel to Loudonville on January 6 to play Siena College and then on to the state capital on January 8 to take on Albany. While there are few benchmarks by which to equate Penn and Siena -- considering that they haven't played one another in the last few years and have rarely played the same teams --the Saints are roughly equal in skill level to that of a highly ranked Ivy League team. The same skill determination is true for Albany. Penn will round out its time in New York with the Quakers' first Ivy League games of the season. Penn has been tested by four Big 5 foes so far, teams that have more national prominence than those in the Ancient Eight. But Penn coach Kelly Greenberg is much more worried about the Quakers' Ivy rivals. "Everyone likes to say [Big 5 teams] are a lot better than Ivy League teams," Greenberg said. "But they're not tougher than Ivy League teams." The Quakers will travel to Columbia on January 12 to face the Lions. Penn has defeated Columbia both of the last two years -- they handed the Lions a crushing 79-43 defeat last year. Cornell will prove to be a tougher game for Penn. While the Quakers have defeated the Big Red in five of the last six meeting between the two schools, Cornell has maintained a consistently strong team that has kept the deficit under a dozen points in each of those six games. Penn needs some solid performances, especially in their last two games, to put them on the road towards their first-ever Ivy League crown.

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