M. Hoops seeks yet another Big 5 win

The Quakers are trying to end a streak of close losses to St. Joseph's. Five years and two days have elapsed since the Penn men's basketball team last defeated St. Joseph's, in what was the second of 25 Quakers wins during their 1993-94 Ivy League championship season. Tonight at the Palestra, Penn has an opportunity to end the drought against its City Line opponents and earn its third consecutive Big 5 win. "You would have to give the guys a saliva test if they cannot get ready for this matchup," Penn coach Fran Dunphy said. There is no shortage of incentives for Penn (8-3, 2-0 Big 5) to be ready for this contest. The Quakers have only beaten the Hawks (9-7, 0-2) twice in the last 20 years. In addition, Penn is riding a five game winning streak. Meanwhile, St. Joseph's has stayed over .500 since putting together a three-game winning streak around New Year's Day. "St. Joe's is playing pretty well lately," Dunphy said. "They are very athletic, and their perimeter shooting has improved. They have always been a pretty aggressive and strong defensive team, as well as a solid offensive rebounding team." St. Joe's is clearly not the same team that made its first visit to the Palestra on December 1. The Hawks' starting lineup of newcomers was erratic in a 61-49 loss to Villanova. St. Joe's took plenty of shot attempts, only to hit the rim on long shots or incur wild misses on drives to the basket. The miscues were indicative of a team with wholesale changes in the starting lineup. With Hawks forward Robert Haskins the only senior among the starting five, no one really knew how much time it would take for them to play well together. In quick time, however, the newcomers have established a rhythm, particularly in scoring. "It seemed that they were a team early on that did not really know what to expect out of their group because they had four new starters," Penn tri-captain Paul Romanczuk said. "Now they are gelling, and we are getting them at a tough time." This gelling began with the Hawks' upset of Tennessee in early December. The winning has continued recently, as four starters scored in double figures to help St. Joe's pull out a two-point win over Fordham on Saturday. Junior forward Andre Howard, a transfer from Pittsburgh, leads the Hawks with 12.1 points and 8.6 rebounds per game. Sophomore guard N'aim Crenshaw is a close second, in large part due to his 39.4 percent mark from three-point range. Rounding out the team's leaders is freshman center Damian Reid, who is contributing 7.7 rebounds per game. St. Joe's also has only one starter who shoots below 60 percent from the free-throw line. On the other side, Penn will need to become consistent in all areas of the team game, as well as avoiding a pattern of inconsistent game-to-game play by both the players and the team. "Inconsistency is always going to happen -- you're not going to have everybody having a good game every night," Romanczuk said. "Still, we would like the majority of us to be consistent in our efforts. If one or two persons have an off-night, the whole team will have to step up." Part of that inconsistency was exemplified Saturday. While the Quakers shot 47 percent from the field, their opponents owned the boards. "We gave up 16 offensive rebounds to Colgate on Saturday," Dunphy said. "If we continue to play that same way tomorrow night, we will be in serious jeopardy." If not, the game may turn out to be as close as last year's 57-55 win by St. Joe's, a game that went down to the wire. As with Penn's November matchup against Temple, there will be no surprises. "We know some of their guys, and what their tendencies are," Penn guard and tri-captain Michael Jordan said. "We'll have to make them do things they don't want to do." "Everyone knows each other," Romanczuk said. "I played the guy I'm guarding [Andre Howard] plenty of times during high school. But it's different playing each other in a college and Big 5 atmosphere." The stakes are higher, and the packed Palestra crowd that has characterized the Big 5 for many years will be more intense. What may remain the same is the close nature of this city rivalry, as in the last five meetings between Penn and St. Joe's, five points is the largest gap that has separated the teams at the end of regulation.