Last meeting of century for Quakers and Tigers

The Penn football team must defeat Princeton in order to keep its hopes for an Ivy League title alive. You can take the losses to Brown and Yale and throw them out the window. You can take Penn's fifth-place spot in the Ivy League standings and throw it out the window. You can even take the Quakers' 1998 Ivy League Championship and give it the old heave-ho as well. Why? Because it's Penn vs. Princeton for the last time this century. One of the Ivy League's most storied rivalries will face off on the Franklin Field gridiron at 12:30 this afternoon in what will be the last Homecoming game of this millennium. And it should be a good game as well. Princeton faced a slew of question marks on offense entering the 1999 campaign but has progressively improved throughout the season. "They've done the things they've had to do to get that offense to be much more efficient than it was against Cornell," Penn coach Al Bagnoli said. "This is probably not the best time to play them." Coming into the season, junior quarterback Jon Blevins was the only experienced quarterback. That's if you can call three passing attempts experience. But it has been sophomore Tommy Crenshaw, who also pitches for the Tigers baseball team, who has emerged as the starter. Crenshaw has completed 54.8 percent of his passes for 1,111 yards. Moreover, he has shown vast improvement since being named the starting quarterback. In the last three weeks, Crenshaw has averaged over 250 yards passing per game while hitting his receivers 61.1 percent of the time. This has caused his passing efficiency to skyrocket from 68.4 to 102.8 in that three-week span, which is pretty remarkable for a guy who had more decisions on the pitching mound his freshman year (two) than snaps on the football field (zero). Crenshaw's favorite target has been senior wide receiver Phil Wendler. In the midst of an All-Ivy caliber season, Wendler is second in the Ivies in receptions with 52 and third in receiving yards with 555. "He's a pretty good receiver," Penn sophomore defensive back D.L. Bouldrick said. "He has a lot of experience, good size, good speed and good hands." With at least six receptions in each game this season, Wendler has been a far more explosive threat than the rest of the Princeton receiving corps. Despite the threat Wendler imposes, the Quakers will make an effort not to over-adjust their game plan to defend him. "We're pretty confident in the systems that we have," Bouldrick said. "Every week there are always little twists that we'll do to our own coverages but I doubt that we'll completely change our defense for one receiver." The source of the Tigers running game was also a question that has been answered in the first seven weeks of the season by two Princeton tailbacks. "They went to a platoon running the ball and got a freshman involved there, who is a pretty good player," Bagnoli said. The freshman is Cameron Atkinson, who has 316 yards rushing on 82 carries, including two 100-plus yard rushing performances. His platoon partner in the backfield is the Tigers' leading rusher both this year and last. Senior running back Derek Theisen led Princeton with only 487 yards last year and is on pace to finish his senior year with about the same yardage. Unlike the Tigers, Penn has been hampered by injuries and has not seen the kind of progress on offense it would like. "We're still not where we want to be offensively," Bagnoli said. "We're plagued by some things we can't control. We seem to have a running battle with who is going to play wide receiver." Bagnoli noted that injuries to wide receivers Jason Battung and John Holohan impeded their development in key receiving roles. "It's hard to get those people to the level you want when you don't have them for consecutive weeks," Bagnoli said. One Penn receiver who has managed to avoid the injury bug is sophomore Rob Milanese. Milanese leads the Red and Blue with 26 receptions for 450 yards. Milanese and the rest of Penn's offense will need to continue their improvement if the Quakers are to succeed against Princeton's sound defense. The Tigers defense is anchored by senior defensive end David Ferrera, who already holds the Princeton record for most career sacks with 27.5, including his 4.5 sacks this fall. Although the Tigers have not dominated any one statistical category, they are second in the Ancient Eight in yardage defense and third in scoring defense, allowing 316.14 yards and 20.3 points per game. The most amazing fact about Princeton's defense is that it has not relinquished a lead all season. In all three of the Tigers' victories, they never trailed, which means the Quakers better get ahead early if they want to keep their hopes for an Ivy League title alive. Although four teams stand ahead of Penn in the Ivy League standings, the Quakers -- just one game behind -- still could pull off a minor miracle and win the Ivy League title. "This week is going to be a big week because you've got Yale, Harvard, Cornell and Brown all with one loss, yet they're all playing each other this week," Bouldrick said. "After this week there will be just two teams with one loss." The best scenario for the Quakers would be if Cornell beat Yale at home and Harvard upset Brown in Providence. That would leave Cornell and Harvard as the only teams with one loss, which would be ideal because Penn plays the Crimson and Big Red in its final two games. Then, all the Quakers would have to do is win out to clinch a share of the Ivy League crown. Even if Yale and Brown emerge victorious today, Penn can be co-champions if both Yale and Brown could lose one of their last two games, and the Quakers end the season at 5-2 in the Ivy League. But in the meantime, Penn is just trying to put Princeton in its place one last time before the calendar rolls ahead to 2000.

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