Lions get last laugh

So close to Valentine’s Day, its not surprising that coach Jerome Allen and the Penn men’s basketball team are thinking about ‘the one that got away.’

But rather than the love of their lives, it was a 66-62 loss at the Palestra against Columbia Saturday night that the Quakers let slip.

“We had a tremendous opportunity tonight,” Allen said afterwards. “And we let one get away. Definitely can’t get it back.”

In the first half, it seemed as though the Lions (9-13, 3-5 Ivy) couldn’t let the game out of their grasp.

Columbia opened up the contest with two quick Niko Scott three-pointers to take a 6-2 lead just a minute and a half into the first period.

Scott would go on to score 29 points, including a deadly 7-for-9 from behind the arc.

After that, the Quakers (4-16, 3-3) could do little else but play catchup.

“We dug ourselves a hole,” Allen said.

Indeed, Penn looked sluggish and unprepared in the early going, as Columbia mounted an offensive that would have made General Patton proud.

The Lions hit it from deep — going 6-for-10 from three -point land during the first 20 minutes — and were able to build a 15-point lead with 6:24 left in the half.

“Columbia did a terrific job of taking us out of our stuff offensively,” said junior forward Jack Eggleston, who added that the Quakers didn’t match their opponent’s intensity.

But just as the game was beginning to show all the tell-tale signs of a blowout, senior guard Darren Smith showed his maturity and poise, sinking two trifectas in less than 30 seconds.

Suddenly, a game that had seemed out of reach just minutes earlier looked well within the Red and Blue’s frantic grasp.

“Penn played with so much pride and heart,” Columbia coach Joe Jones said. “I saw a team that played as hard as any team in this league.”

The Quakers were able to trim the lead to seven before the half, sending them into the locker room with a spring in their step.

Whatever aggression the players seemed to lack in the first half (and however drained they seemed after Friday’s upset over Cornell), they provided in spades after the break.

Allen instituted a more extensive full-court press, and the results were astounding.

The Red and Blue recorded five steals in the second half, two of which led to breakaway Eggleston dunks that sent the Palestra into deafening frenzies as the sorority sisters attending Panhellenic Night made their presence as conspicuous as possible.

Sophomore Rob Belcore held Columbia’s main scoring threat, sophomore guard Noruwa Agho, to just five points in the second half.

With 7:04 left in the game, sophomore point guard Zack Rosen swished two free throws to give the Quakers their first lead of the game, 50-48.

From there, the fatigue of playing two tough games in two days — only three minutes of which Eggleston and Rosen collectively spent off the court — caught up with the Red and Blue.

“We must understand that it’s an 80-minute, 48-hour weekend,” Allen said. “And from our conditioning, both physically and mentally, we have to do a better job of preparing ourselves.”

The Quakers have a little more time to prepare before hosting Princeton on Tuesday, but if they don’t make good use of it, they will be stuck wondering what could have been.

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