Sprint destroys Cornell

The Quakers handed Cornell a 35-0 drubbing on Friday at home. For the third time this season, and for the second time against Cornell, Penn's sprint football team held its opponent scoreless through four quarters of play. The only difference between Friday night's 35-0 Quakers drubbing of the Big Red at Franklin Field and their season-opening 35-0 victory on September 24 in Ithaca, N.Y., was the color of the jerseys. "We didn't even have our whole team together until Friday night because of midterms and work and stuff," Penn coach Bill Wagner said. "I think it affected us in the first quarter. I told [the team] that it was like a practice, the first time we'd had them all together." Wagner didn't mention whether or not the Quakers (3-1, 1-1 Collegiate Sprint Football League) routinely practice the 94-yard touchdown pass that kicked off the scoring with 10:46 left in the first quarter. With Penn backed up at its own six-yard line after several penalties, junior wideout Robert Reeves hauled in a pass from quarterback John Kernan at the Penn 30. Reeves broke several tackles before motoring another 60 yards to the end zone. "We were just trying to get ourselves some breathing room," Reeves said of the play. "I guess we were kind of stuck down on our side of the field and the offense was getting off to a kind of slow start." Despite their "slow start", the Quakers put up a monstrous 490 yards of total offense and 21 first downs. The large numbers are even more impressive when placed next to Cornell's totals of 141 yards and six first downs. Quakers senior fullback/noseguard Steve Schickram attributed this utter domination to the Quakers' success in the trenches. "Our d-line just beat the shit out of their offensive line," the tri-captain said. "We were coming off of playing Army, and [the Cadets] are a lot more physical. Eventually, I was lining up from the guy across from me and I was just thinking 'this is too easy'." Indeed, the Quakers seemed to have little trouble on either side of the ball, as they were able to score not only on big plays, but on long, sustained drives as well. Senior running back Tim Ortman capped a 76-yard drive with a two-yard touchdown run at the 4:43 mark in the second quarter, which put the Quakers up 14-0. On the night, Ortman rushed for 197 yards -- only 50 of which came in the second half -- on 37 carries. The Quakers all-time career rushing leader also broke the 3,000-yard mark in career rushing yardage. Ortman's 3,081 yards place him 990 yards ahead of the rest of the field on the Quakers all-time rushing list. While Ortman had yet another record-breaking night in a career full of record-breaking nights, Reeves -- the recipient the 94-yard touchdown catch -- had a career night of his own. The junior wideout had four catches for 157 yards and two touchdowns, which were good enough for the fourth-best day by a receiver in Quakers history. Incredibly, Reeves' second touchdown was perhaps a more impressive play than his first. Early in the third quarter, with the Quakers looking to put the Big Red away, Kernan stepped back and threw to freshman Jeff Bagnoli behind the line of scrimmage. As the Cornell defense moved up to stop what looked like a screen pass, Bagnoli reared back and lofted a 45-yard strike to Reeves, who was running free in the secondary. "That one was just a matter of running under the ball," Reeves said. "That play was drawn up to get them after we'd set it up with a wide receiver screen and [Bagnoli] just threw a heck of a pass." "We were going to run that play up at Army but it was too wet," Wagner said. "We knew it would work. The second half was really when we put the wood to them offensively and defensively." The Big Red almost seemed to "put the wood" to themselves in the second half with various late hit and unnecessary roughness penalties. Ultimately, the two teams combined for 22 penalties for 206 yards. "Actually, the penalties for us were early on," Reeves said. "Although we lost a couple of big gains and a score on some of them." The Quakers had 55 yards in first-quarter penalties, but managed, for the most part, to keep themselves in check for the rest of the game, except for an interception returned for a touchdown by defensive back Dan Rowcotsky which was called back because of an illegal block on the return. Wagner, however, wasn't overly concerned with the penalties, which he chalked up to the team's irregular practice schedule of the preceding week. "I was more upset with missed blocks and the times when we lined up wrong and had people out of position because of practice constraints," he said. What happens when this team gets a full week of proper practice? Navy finds out next Saturday.