No room for error

The Quakers stillThe Quakers stillcontrol their ownThe Quakers stillcontrol their owndestiny, but a lossThe Quakers stillcontrol their owndestiny, but a lossto Darmouth orThe Quakers stillcontrol their owndestiny, but a lossto Darmouth orHarvard wouldThe Quakers stillcontrol their owndestiny, but a lossto Darmouth orHarvard wouldbe devastating For the first time in a long time, there is a late-season logjam at the top of the Ivy League standings. Four of the Ancient Eight's eight teams are still in the hunt for the championship, separated by just two-and-a-half games with less than three weeks remaining on the schedule. But come Saturday night, the muddled picture might be a lot clearer. Third-place Dartmouth and fourth-place Harvard will travel down from New England and spend the weekend taking on Princeton and Penn, who currently occupy first and second, respectively. If either team wins both games, its postseason hopes would be helped tremendously. But two losses may mean the end of any NCAA tournament dreams. In truth, Penn, along with Harvard and Dartmouth, finds itself in a situation where even one loss could be fatal. The Quakers (12-9, 7-2 Ivy) do control their own destiny, but they have almost no margin for error. Penn sits one game behind Princeton (16-5, 8-1), but hosts the Tigers on March 5 in the final game of the season. If the Quakers want that game to mean anything, they have to at least keep pace with Princeton the rest of the way. "I'm thinking this is one of the more important weekends," Penn guard Donald Moxley said. "We can't lose any more games, basically. So every game's going to be important to us." The Quakers' stretch run begins at 7 p.m. tonight when they host Harvard (14-8, 6-4) at the Palestra. The Crimson's main man is 6-foot-6 junior forward Kyle Snowden, who leads the league in rebounding (11.5 per game) and is third in scoring (15.2 ppg). But Harvard is more than a one-man show, which creates problems for opposing teams. Senior forward Mike Gilmore, the most prolific three-point shooter on a roster full of gunners, chips in 10.2 points a game. And though he is just a freshman, point guard Tim Hill runs the show smoothly, racking up 10.3 points and 5.2 assists per contest. "I think they're a real solid basketball team," Penn coach Fran Dunphy said. "They have a good balance of inside scoring with Snowden and outside scoring with a guy like Gilmore, who can make threes, which he did on us the first time we played." Largely on the basis of Gilmore's shooting, Harvard led the Quakers by 10 points early in the first half of their February 10 meeting before Penn rallied to a 77-63 victory. "I've always thought they played us really tough, and we just managed to make plays at the end of the game," Quakers swingman Ira Bowman said. "So they've had all the ingredients," Bowman added. "It's just a matter of them making plays at the right time." Dartmouth did make the right plays at the right time against the Quakers earlier this season. The Big Green (14-8, 7-3) made a comeback late in the second half and beat Penn on February 9. The 54-53 loss was the Quakers' first after 48 consecutive Ivy wins. Dunphy chose to focus only on the fact that Penn needed to beat Dartmouth, saying that avenging the setback was not on his mind and not something he would discuss with his players. Moxley, however, while not calling it revenge, said the team does want to make a point Saturday. "We want to go out there and prove to Dartmouth and everybody else that we are the better team," Moxley said. "It's tough to swallow. I've been here three years and never lost an Ivy League game. And they were the first ones to take us down." If the Quakers are to take down the Big Green this time, they will have to stop another inside-outside combo. Dartmouth swingman Sea Lonergan leads the Ancient Eight in scoring (17.3 ppg), and 7-foot center Brian Gilpin provides solid points, rebounds and blocked shots. But in the first meeting, Penn -- specifically Bowman --held Lonergan to just 11 points. In fact, Dunphy was pretty satisfied with the Quakers' defense in Hanover, N.H. What his team has to do this time, he said, is maintain a lead. Penn led the Big Green by seven points late in the previous game before finally losing. "Our offensive execution was really spotty, and I think that's what we have to improve on," Dunphy said. "Anytime you can get that kind of lead late in the game, you have to improve on it." As for Bowman, who in the first game against Dartmouth missed the front end of a one-and-one bonus in the final seconds that could have tied the game, the senior said he would only look forward to the Big Green after he was finished with Harvard. "There's no great anticipation," Bowman said. "Every game's important. It's winding down now, and we only have a certain amount of games guaranteed to us seniors. So there's no looking past things."