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In 1986, with a 3-9 Ivy League record, the Penn women's basketball team finished in the conference cellar. Ten years later, the Quakers are hoping to avoid that same fate with their last full Ivy weekend of the season. The road trip to New York four weeks ago was rough, to say the least. After losing to a strong Cornell squad, the Red and Blue (1-22, 1-10 Ivy League) suffered a humiliating loss at Columbia -- giving the Lions their first Ivy win in two years. Perhaps even more depressing was the fact that the Columbia starting five consists of four freshmen and a junior. But although the Lions (2-22, 1-11), who Penn faces tonight (7 p.m. at the Palestra), are hardly a conference powerhouse, they are certainly more competitive than they have been in past years, especially at home. After being blown out by Cornell, 74-50, on its last trip to the Empire State -- Penn's most difficult road of the season did not have a light at the Harlem end of the tunnel. Cornell (12-12, 7-5), who Penn hosts tomorrow at 7 p.m., has played extremely well under first-year head coach Kerry Phayre, who brought her competitive ways to Ithaca, N.Y., from a Top-25 Northwestern program, where she was an assistant. Things have definitely changed in the four weeks, since Penn's last meetings against the Lions and Big Red. The most obvious change is the venue. "It would be nice to end the season on a good note," Quakers forward Deana Lewis said. "Maybe end it with a winning streak. We want to be going into next year on some kind of happy thing. "It would be nice to win more than one game. Dartmouth showed us we could do it. We'd like to prove to the league that Dartmouth wasn't a mistake." The Lions have had similar problems to the Quakers. Columbia, like Penn, lost its starting point guard midseason. The Lions have had to rely on freshman Colleen Touey to run the point. The Red and Blue lost its starting floor leader Erica McCauley during the first semester, and has been replaced by sophomore Colleen Kelly, who had been the starting shooting guard. "We don't want to end up in last place," Lewis said. "But we need to concentrate on the games and not worry about what place we'll finish in." · Penn will donate all proceeds from tomorrow night's game against the Big Red to the West Philadelphia Habitat for Humanity.

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