How to get skinned by a Wildcat

Penn hung on for 10 minutes before Villanova's height advantage dominated the game. What's the difference between the best of the Ivy League and best of the Big East? If Tuesday night's Villanova-Penn clash at the Palestra was any indication, it's about 27 points. The Wildcats played like the fourth-best team in the nation, as the polls say, and took their hard-working, but overmatched, Big 5 opponents apart, winning 89-62. A pro-Penn crowd of 8,317 had come with hopes that the Quakers could pull off one of the most stunning upsets in City Series history. But the Wildcats showed no signs of looking ahead to Saturday's much-anticipated game against Duke. Instead, they showcased the talents of future NBAers Tim Thomas, Jason Lawson and Alvin Williams on the offensive end and used a huge size advantage to double-up undersized Penn on the boards (53-25, including an 18-9 surplus on the offensive glass). "Anyone can see that they were a lot bigger than us -- they might be the biggest team in the country, as far as height of the starting five," Quakers junior guard Garett Kreitz said. "That was something we knew we would have to deal with tonight, and we dealt with it as best as possible." The Quakers (2-1, 0-1 Big 5) had hoped to stay with Villanova with hot shooting from outside. But unlike Penn's two previous games, the treys would not fall. Only Kreitz, a game-high 18 points on 5-for-9 three-point shooting had the touch. The team as a whole was just 10-for-32 (31 percent) from downtown. "We knew we had to stop them from getting off threes. We knew they wanted to get off as many as they could," Villanova coach Steve Lappas said. "They probably had a number in their mind that they had to make to make it a tough game." Villanova (6-0, 1-0) looked strong from the start, systematically pushing the ball to 6-foot-11 Lawson or 7-1 Rafal Bigus. Penn tried to cover the two towers with combinations of Paul Romanczuk, George Mboya and Jed Ryan, none of whom is taller than 6-7. But the Wildcats' offense was the most menacing when the ball was in the hands of freshman Tim Thomas, the No. 2 recruit out of high school last year, behind now-Los Angeles Laker Kobe Bryant. Thomas totaled 15 points and six rebounds in just 24 minutes, mostly against Penn point guard Jamie Lyren, who gave away seven inches in the matchup. The Quakers stayed with 'Nova for the first 10 minutes. A half-ending 22-7 run, sparked by a pair of transition buckets from guard John Celestand, ended any Penn thoughts of an upset and gave the favorites a 41-26 intermission edge. When the jump shots stopped falling and Lawson & Co. began racking up fouls on Penn's forwards, it was clear that a blowout was in the works. Even homecourt advantage could not save Penn. "The talent level offset that," Penn coach Fran Dunphy said. "We had a couple of good runs where the crowd was into it, and the ghosts of the Palestra were around for a while. They obviously ghost-busted us in the second half." The second half was merely a repetition of the first. The 'Nova starters gave way to the subs midway through the second period, but the lead continued to grow to its final size. Non-stop pressure from the Penn defense could not counter the difference in skill and size. "I'm really happy about the heart our team showed," Kreitz said. "We played hard throughout the whole game." Any category related to height reflected complete Villanova domination. In addition to getting two-thirds of the rebounds, the Wildcats shot twice as many free throws (31-15), drew more fouls (22-15) and got 15 more second-chance points (26-11). They accomplished this without starting power forward Chuck Kornegay, who watched the game in street clothes. His replacement, the Polish-native Bigus stepped up with a game-high 15 rebounds. "They have to be very much meriting their statues [in the top five]," Dunphy said. "It doesn't seem like they have any weaknesses." Penn now has 11 days between games, the next being December 21 against Temple at the Owls' McGonigle Hall. Ordinarily a 27-point loss is demoralizing to a team, but Dunphy feels that given the circumstances, that is unlikely. "I don't think we'll get down about it," he said. "This is why kids come to Penn -- the chance to step out of the league and play these kinds of national opponents." For his part, Lappas was impressed by several Quakers, especially the freshman class of Matt Langel, Michael Jordan and 6-11 center Geoff Owens. "The big kid is going to be a good player," Lappas said. "They've got a lot of good young guys. I think they'll do very well in the Ivy League." Any time these two old rivals renew acquaintances, talk turns to the Big 5 past and whether it has future. For 36 years, Villanova and Penn met each year as part of a round-robin city championship with St. Joseph's, Temple and La Salle. But those days appear to be gone forever, a casualty of basketball's big-money era. Since the 1991-92 season, only half the round-robin is played officially. Lappas gave no indication the old days of streamers and a packed Palestra for Penn-Villanova will be back. "It's a great rivalry," he said of the series Villanova leads 29-15. "Right now that decision's been made by the presidents of the different universities. We've just got to go with it."