THIS WEEK IN QUAKER HISTORY 1996: Dartmouth ended The Streak

HANOVER, N.H. -- Fran Dunphy, Donald Moxley and Tim Krug sat silently at a table in the press room. Through the closed door, one could still hear the raucous pandemonium out on the court. And Ira Bowman was nowhere to be found. The scoreboard read 54-53. Dartmouth. Moments earlier, Bowman had missed the front end of a one-and-one bonus with eight seconds to play. Within seconds, the game was over. For the first time since March 6, 1992, the Penn men's basketball team lost an Ivy League game. It was the first conference loss for any member of the team. It was the first conference loss in 48 games. It was the end of The Streak. It was close, it was hard fought, and it was, uncharacteristically for the Quakers, a loss. "It doesn't feel too good," Krug said. "I would have liked it to continue?. But all the talk about the streak, the streak, the streak. The talking is done. The streak is done." Penn ran out to a mid-half lead in both halves -- 22-12 in the first, 50-43 in the second -- before Dartmouth fought back to pull within two at the half, and to pull ahead at the end. The 50-43 lead was the high point for the Quakers. From there, Dartmouth charged back to tie the game at 50 on a P.J. Halas three with 3:09 to play. With less than a minute on the clock and the Quakers down 52-51, Krug was blocked down low, but Dartmouth guard Kenny Mitchell walked at the other end of the court. Penn called timeout with 35 seconds to play. After Bowman brought the ball up court, Moxley and Garett Kreitz moved the ball around the perimeter until Moxley drove with it at the :17 mark and hit a leaning runner to put the Quakers in control, 53-52. At the other end, Halas fed the ball down low to Brian Gilpin, who was fouled by Krug on the baseline with 16 seconds to play. Gilpin hit both free throws to take the lead at 54-53. Bowman took the inbounds pass, ran the length of the court, and was fouled by Sea Lonergan with :08 to play. Dartmouth called one timeout, another time out, and the front end of Bowman's one and one rimmed out to the left, where it was tipped out. Both foul calls were questioned by Penn and Dartmouth fans alike. Lonergan claimed to have gotten "all ball" and Faucher said Krug "impeded" Gilpin's progress, not exactly an emphatic statement. "You hate for a game to come down to a call, but the game came down to two calls," Dunphy said. "They could've not called the foul [on Gilpin], but they could've just as easily not called it at the other end for Ira, so it balances out. Calls go both ways. They made their foul shots, we didn't make ours." Bowman was so distraught about the miss that he chose not to attend the post-game press conference. "He's a little bit upset," Dunphy said. "He's disappointed. I feel for him. But if he thinks for one moment that the game came down to those last three seconds, he's missing the point. I think he's such a quality person that that's the kind of kid he is, and he'll probably take it upon himself and he shouldn't." Bowman was a key factor in Penn's play early, shutting down Lonergan on the outside while Krug's shot blocking kept Lonergan out of the paint. Offensively, Bowman finished with 12 points and nine rebounds, while Krug had 11 points and four rebounds. Lonergan, former Ivy Rookie of the Year, was held to six first-half points on 3-of-9 shooting, including an airballed layup. He finished with 11, well below his league-leading average. The big factor was Gilpin, who despite missing easy shots inside was using his seven-foot frame to get opportunities. He capitalized on more in the second half, finishing with 17, but his biggest points were his final two from the line. "I'd like to think that we used our timeouts to the point where we weren't as fatigued as we may have been had we not used them," Dunphy said. "I thought their defense really stepped up in the last couple minutes of both halves." The question now is where do the Quakers go from here? A pensive Krug eloquently described the situation, post-streak. "We have eight more games we have to play," he said. "Thirteen and one still means an Ivy League title. An Ivy League title still gets us to the tournament, and that's what we want."

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