M. Lax, Cornell meet in a battle of Ivy stragglers

When the Penn men's lacrosse team steps onto Schoellkopf Field to face Cornell tomorrow, it will be exactly three years since its previous Ivy League win. Come tomorrow at 1 p.m. however, the Quakers think a new streak will have begun -- an Ivy win streak. The streak. It has become a tiresome albatross for the Quakers who have seen the word plastered across headlines in many a paper since March 30, 1994. This weekend, however, there are too many ironies present not to continue to flog the phrase at least one more time. The last Ivy win for Penn came against Cornell in a two-overtime marathon that ended with a 10-9 Quakers win. Since then, the Quakers have reeled off 17 straight Ivy losses, including two heartbreakers to Cornell. Two years ago, Penn faded in the final minute to lose 18-17, and last year the Big Red pulled out a 12-11 triumph in overtime. The Quakers (3-3, 0-1 Ivy League), hope to play a more complete game than they did during their victory over Lafayette on Wednesday, when they used a dominant second quarter to overcome sluggish and sloppy play. In the Big Red (2-4, 1-0), the Quakers find a team that struggled in the early stages of the new season but has won twice in the last week, including an 8-3 victory over Yale. "I think the turnabout is because we are playing much better as a team," said Cornell coach Richie Moran. "We have a lot of new personnel and we just weren't clicking, but over spring break we had some excellent workouts." The two programs are both coming off of unsuccessful seasons from a year ago and need a victory to gain credibility in the league. Neither school has experienced a winning league season in the 1990s after having built strong teams through much of the previous decade, and both schools expect to end their plunge into Ivy obscurity. Both teams enter the game in similar situations, but the men running the show are markedly different. Penn has changed coaches twice in the last four years looking for new guidance, but Cornell has stuck with Moran through the tough times. Quakers coach Marc Van Arsdale will see his first Penn-Cornell clash from the sidelines, while at the same time Moran will be standing a few yards away leading his team against Penn for the 29th time. Having brought three national titles to Cornell in the 1970s, Moran has been a member of the Lacrosse Hall of Fame since 1983. The Penn-Cornell rivalry will begin the Van Arsdale chapter tomorrow, and the Quakers certainly hope that it has a successful opening chapter, but the new coach doesn't see this game as a way to exorcise the demons of the past. Instead it is a chance for his team to show a renewed confidence level and a new expectation for success. "We go in expecting to win; it is the approach we need to take," Van Arsdale said. "We have to expect to win in order for it to happen. It is time for us to realize what we need to do." "It will mark that we are standing up to a solid team and beating them. It is important that this 1997 team will have stepped up to a challenge," he added. Moran, too, agrees that he isn't worrying about streaks when preparing for tomorrow. Nevertheless, he expects the contest to flesh out the same way as the other 28 contests against Penn. "Cornell-Penn is always a tremendous game," Moran said. "No matter what our records are, it has always been a very strongly contested game. They will come ready to play, and we will definitely be ready to play."

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