M. Hoops survives scare at Harvard

Penn held on to win by one at Harvard after beating Dartmouth Friday night. BOSTON -- The boisterous capacity crowd of 2,125 at Lavietes Pavilion was on its feet with 9.3 seconds remaining in the Penn-Harvard men's basketball game on Saturday night. They smelled an upset in the making. After having trailed 56-46 with 6:06 left, the Crimson found themselves with the ball, down one and primed to pull off a major upset in the closing seconds. But Penn (18-7, 11-0 Ivy League) would not allow the Crimson (10-15, 5-7) to mar its perfect Ivy slate. First Ugonna Onyekwe and then Michael Jordan deflected passes out of bounds on the final possession. And when a three-pointer by Harvard's Dan Clemente bounced off the back rim as the buzzer sounded, Penn breathed a sigh of relief, recording its 13th consecutive victory, 62-61. The Quakers had handled Dartmouth (8-16, 4-7) the previous night in Hanover, N.H., 69-55. "We just wanted to keep everybody in front of us and make them take time to get the ball upcourt," Penn coach Fran Dunphy said. "I thought they would run it down right away, but obviously they were looking at something specific. "And Clemente got a shot off, but it really wasn't a very good one." Clemente, who had a game-high 25 points and a trio of three-pointers, tore off his protective goggles in exasperation after his miss. "To be honest, I love that shot," Clemente said. "I got a great look and it felt good leaving my hands and everything, but it just didn't happen." Crimson freshman Elliott Prasse-Freeman dished out 14 assists to complement Clemente's scoring outburst. But Penn was spurred to victory by a balanced offense, with four starters scoring at least 12 points. Nothing, however, came easy for the Quakers on their road trip. Penn had to battle back from a 33-30 halftime deficit to topple Dartmouth on Friday night. Senior guards Matt Langel and Jordan paced the Quakers at Leede Arena with 23 and 21 points respectively, while Shaun Gee led the Big Green with 22. "We were a feisty bunch," said Dartmouth coach Dave Faucher, whose squad recorded eight steals. "We played with such defensive passion every possession. Penn had to earn everything." Penn's nine first-half turnovers helped Dartmouth along on its way to staking its halftime lead. None of the Quakers were immune from these mental errors, as the normally sure-handed Langel had 11 turnovers on the weekend. As a team, the Red and Blue turned the ball over 30 times. And what could have been the season-altering turnover came with less than 10 seconds left at Harvard. Harvard's Damian Long hit a pair of free throws with 23.9 seconds left, and Penn found itself up only 62-61. The Quakers then attempted to play keep-away to run out the clock for as long as possible before being fouled. But Jordan -- who had 35 points, nine assists and eight turnovers on the weekend -- inexplicably traveled without a Harvard defender within five feet of him with 9.3 seconds left. Jordan received a pass from David Klatsky, then, anticipating contact, turned and jumped --Eonly no Harvard defender was in the area, and no Penn player was free to receive a pass. "We just talked about it, and he just thought he had someone on him," Dunphy said. "It was just one of those freak things that never has happened to him before, and I'm sure it will never happen to him again." Both Dunphy and Harvard coach Frank Sullivan then proceeded to call timeouts to prepare for the final play. "There was no question about it, we were going to Clemente. He wanted the ball," Sullivan said. But with Langel desperately shoving a hand in his face, the junior's wobbly shot bounced off the back iron. "Clemente played a terrific game," Sullivan said. "We are proud of our effort -- we took a couple shots from Penn but never got knocked down for the count." The Quakers, visibly relieved, survived the toughest road trip this year. "We have another tough weekend coming up," said Owens, who had a career-high 17 boards at Harvard. "But we had a serious gut-check tonight." The previous night, Penn needed stellar second-half play to ground the pesky Big Green. Langel personally outscored the hosts 11-2 over a 4:54 second-half span to put the game away. "They were not playing a lot of help defense, so if you can get by your man a little bit, it seemed like you had an open opportunity to get a shot at the basket," Langel said. At Dartmouth, the Quakers were helped immensely by five blocks from Onyekwe and three from Owens -- which moved him into first place on Penn's career list with 142. A night later, the Quakers jumped out to an 18-5 lead at Harvard on the strength of five points apiece by Jordan, Owens and Onyekwe. But capitalizing on Penn mistakes -- including six consecutive first-half missed free throws by Owens -- Harvard clawed to a 35-34 lead shortly into the second frame. Fortunately for Penn, the visitors were able to wrest back the lead for good just seconds later on a scrumptious left-handed layup by Jordan. And despite cutting it much closer than they would have liked, the Quakers escaped with the victory to return to Penn still undefeated in Ivy play. News and Notes: With seven blocks this weekend, Onyekwe has 42 for the season. This breaks Owens' freshman record of 40 set in '96-97? Jordan netted 35 points to give him 1,541 for his career. He moved past Jerome Allen into fourth place on Penn's all-time list and needs just 11 points to tie Ron Haigler, who played from 1972-75.

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