M. Lax 'fun bunch' beat Cornell in '84 to stay unbeaten in Ivies

It might have been a routine borrowed from the celebrated "Fun Bunch" of the Washington Redskins. But it was appropriate. It happened with 1:38 remaining in Saturday's Ivy League men's lacrosse showdown between Penn and Cornell. Quaker attacker Michael Braver had just taken a pass from Bill Morrill and deposited it past Big Red goalie Peter Ruchkin for his third goal of the day. The Quakers were now leading 10-5, and it was time for the festivities to begin. Midfielder Leo Paytas, whose speed in bringing the ball upfield helped set up the scoring situation, raised his arm to the approving Quaker fan in the south stands of Franklin Field. Then Paytas joined Braver, Morrill, Ron Smolokoff and Josh Hall in a round of congratulatory high-fives. This was topped off by a climactic group high five -- "Fun Bunch" style. Penn (5-1, 3-0 Ivy League) had just clinched its first win over Cornell (1-4, 1-1) since 1969. "That was all Leo," said Smolokoff (two goals) in reference to Paytas' role in the theatrics, "It wasn't totally spontaneous. We were thinking about doing something like that earlier. But Leo was the engineer of the whole thing." As for the engineer, he was pleased with the outcome. "Right then, I knew we had the game," Paytas said. "The high-fives were very spontaneous. Then I backed everybody up and we pieced it together." All the Quakers had to do for the remainder of the game was allow the clock to run out. And as they passed the ball around the Cornell zone, they showed that they would have no problem accomplishing that task. Then, with about five seconds left, Morrill flipped a pass to Braver. But this time, Braver didn't have to score. Instead, he lifted the ball high into the air as time expired. And there were some happy people in Franklin Field. Cornell defenseman Aaron Jones wasn't one of those happy people though. As the Quaker players and fans were celebrating the win, Jones threw one of his gloves into the turf. He then picked the glove up and did it again. And again. After all, dynasties don't end every day. And although this Ivy League season is still far from over (Penn still has three more league games), Penn certainly looked like the dominant team. "They seem to know their jobs," said second-year Penn coach Tony Seaman about his team. "They know what they have to do and they get it done. We played awfully well all game."