The Wildcats' rebounding edge only began to tell the story of the Quakers' submission. To explain Villanova's 89-62 victory over Penn on Tuesday night, re-examining the starting rosters for both teams might help. The Wildcats started a 7-foot-1 forward from Poland by the name of Rafal Bigus. The Quakers countered with 6-6 George Mboya from Bethesda, Md. At forward for Villanova, the 6-11 Jason Lawson battled Penn's 6-7 Jed Ryan. One thing was crystal clear from the start -- the Villanova starting five stepped on to the Palestra hardwood with the biggest advantage possible, a height advantage over every single Quaker. Villanova's towering presence, coupled with Penn's problem on the boards, led to a long night for the Quakers. When the final buzzer sounded, Penn for the second time in three games had been outrebounded, this time by an embarrassing count of 53 -25. Even when the Quakers were hanging in at the outset of the contest, it seemed like only a matter of time before Penn's woes would return on the glass Two weeks ago in the Quakers' victorious home opener, a relatively undersized Towson State team outrebounded Penn 36-22. But on Tuesday evening, the Wildcats' thrashing of the Quakers on the boards can best be explained by Villanova exploiting a Penn weakness. "I think our guys did a great job defensively, and that is what we are about right now," Villanova coach Steve Lappas said. "I was happy to see that we were able to take advantage of the thing that we had an advantage in with our height." Recognizing Penn's miniature stature compared to Villanova, Quakers junior Garett Kreitz felt that the Red and Blue will have to find a way to overcome its height problems in the future. "I don't think they have a short guy on their roster," Kreitz said. "Short doesn't go along with being on Villanova. But everyone laces up their shoes the same way and there will be other teams that are going to be bigger than us, but we just have to play our game." And for the most part, the Quakers' offense, which lives and dies by the three, stayed with their game It was Wildcats' offensive rebounds which muted any chance of Penn sticking with the No.4 ranked team in America. In the first half alone, Villanova had eight rebounds off the offensive glass, just one shy of Penn's total offensive rebounding mark of nine. For the game, the 'Nova's 18 offensive rebounds provided plenty of second-chance opportunities, much to Penn coach Fran Dunphy's dismay. "We were not able to minimize their offensive rebounding and I thought that hurt us," Dunphy said. "When you look at the statistics, rebounding-wise we got hammered pretty good. Their height advantage was certainly distinct." At times in the first half, Penn was able to temporarily overcome Villanova's dominance on the boards. Four minutes into the contest, Penn held an 11-8 lead and with under six minutes remaining, the Quakers found themselves down by only five points 28-23. The tenacity of Penn's offense and defense had the Palestra rocking. But as Dunphy admitted, the good times did not last long.
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