Result: Butler's win over Brown's star leads Penn to an upset victory.

The heart-stopping win at the Palestra against the Bears, who came into the meet ranked No. 22 in the nation, rekindles hope for a repeat as Ivy champions and a place in the national rankings. The Quakers' championship hopes, however, still rely on a Cornell loss, which would most realistically be to Brown. A Big Red loss would give the three Ivy wrestling powerhouses -- Penn, Brown and Cornell -- one loss each. The day before Saturday's victory over the Bears, the Quakers (10-4, 5-1 EIWA, 3-1 Ivy League) embarrassed Harvard and Rutgers, two other EIWA squads. They destroyed the Crimson, 34-3, and then pummeled Rutgers, a team that defeated Penn a year ago, 37-3. But the dual meet against Brown (11-2, 5-1, 1-1) was the main event, and the comeback victory came down to the last period of the last match. Down 15-10 to the Bears, the Quakers were left to their last two wrestlers, senior co-captain Brian Butler at 190 pounds and junior Joey Allen in the heavyweight division. Penn would need to sweep both of these meets to edge out the victory. Although Allen was expected to defeat his opponent, Dimitrios Gavriel, Butler was facing the No. 1 wrestler in the EIWA, Paul Fitzpatrick, whose record this year was a cool 17-2. "It was really a dej^-vu situation," Penn coach Roger Reina said. "Last year we were down 10-15 [to Brown] and won 17-15. So I wasn't pessimistic." "Brian Butler. I can't say enough about him. He's a tremendous leader, a tremendous example," Reina continued. "He's got great heart. To me, he's everything this program's all about. I mean everything." In an incredible display of wrestling, Butler, who had set the career-win record for Penn against Harvard on Friday, dominated a lethargic Fitzpatrick throughout the match. In the third period, Butler recorded two takedowns to defeat the Brown superstar, who was ranked 12th in the nation by Amateur Wrestling News, 10-4. The only points Fitzpatrick got from Butler were off four escapes. Allen, on the other hand, had more trouble with his less-regarded opponent Gavriel, who initially enjoyed some success with a slow-down strategy. Deadlocked at two points apiece going into the third period, Allen came through in the clutch, recording a three-point near-fall in front of a cheering crowd of several hundred people. " I felt I had to get some points, so I went after him," Allen said. -- M.H.