COLUMN: Replacing Jordan and Langel will not be easy

Still, there was no way that Rendell was going to miss the Penn men's basketball team's NCAA Tournament first round game against Illinois this past Friday. The notorious Penn fanatic wasn't just there to lend support to the Red and Blue either -- he was there to say goodbye. "I'm also here to see what might be Matt and Michael's last game in college," Rendell said at his seat during halftime at Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum. "I hope it isn't, but I definitely want to be here if it is." The departure of the Quakers' senior backcourt was reason enough for Rendell to make the trip to Dixie last weekend, and it should also give Penn fans a reason to pause and reflect on what this means for Fran Dunphy's program. Michael Jordan and Matt Langel have been the foundation of the Quakers team almost since the duo first put on their Penn uniforms. Jordan was Ivy League Rookie of the Year in 1996-97, playing in 26 games and starting 19 of them. Langel was somewhat slower out of the gate -- but just barely. He started 11 contests, earning Ivy Rookie of the Week honors twice and averaging 24 minutes. Their careers began with promise, and now, after 107 games together in the lineup, these roommates and close friends are going to have to clean out their Palestra lockers. What does this mean for Penn? Well, although it sounds trite, it means different things for different people. You can't just jettison an outrageously athletic point guard with 1,604 career points and a 6'5" off-guard with the range of an ICBM and hope to hop right back into action. For coach Dunphy, it looks as if Jordan and Langel's exit translates into a good bit of sorrow and, perhaps, lasting friendships. "Part of the peril of this profession is that you borrow these guys for four years, and then they're gone," Dunphy said. "They might say that they're happy to leave the nest as it were, because they don't have to put up with me on a daily basis. That's just what happens in our jobs. They've been great kids to coach. Every day's the same with them; they'd just give you everything they had?. We will become much better friends now that they depart from our program." On the basketball end of things, Jordan and Langel were the unquestionable go-to guys for the Quakers. When the clock wound down, the game was on the line and the team was in the huddle, every fan in the Palestra knew for whom the play was getting diagrammed. Earlier this season, when Penn was floundering with a 3-6 record, the Quakers took on Lafayette. The game went down to the wire, and Jordan sunk a 17-footer with .6 seconds left on the Palestra clock to lift the Red and Blue to victory. As he celebrated on the court, the Penn fans who had made it back from Christmas break early felt a singular satisfaction -- the game had been in the hands of their go-to guy, and he came through. Last February 9, when the Quakers buckled and fell to Princeton, 50-49, it was Langel who took the last shot, a short-range jumper on a feed from Jordan. The attempt hit too much rim to fall, but, nonetheless, there was a sense that one of the guys in whose hands you wanted the ball got a chance. And although this fact made the taste in fans' mouths no less bitter that night, there was still mild solace in Langel's good look. So the Quakers will be without an obvious shooter in the clutch next season. Perhaps Geoff Owens and Ugonna Onyekwe will emerge as aces-in-the-hole of a somewhat different variety in the post next season. Or maybe David Klatsky will emerge as a standby from the perimeter. The possibilities are manifold, and that's the point. Without Langel and Jordan, it's not at all clear how Penn will adjust. This season alone, the duo accounted for 812 points, which was 42 percent of Penn's total offense. That sort of production is dauntingly difficult to replace. In addition, as has been their trademark, Jordan and Langel did the extra things that you often don't expect from a pair of guards. Both averaged over four rebounds per game in 1999-2000. Apart from Klatsky, Penn retains none of the backcourt players that garnered significant playing time this season. That leaves the Quakers with basically two options. The first of which is that Penn should expect to be more of a big-man oriented squad in 2000-01. Owens towers above any other Ivy center except for Princeton's Chris Young, and Rookie of the Year Onyekwe is fast approaching stardom with his un-Ivy feats of airborne fancy. The other option is that new talent emerges at guard. Klatsky is a virtual shoo-in at point, but not much else is certain. Fellow freshmen Duane King and Harold Bailey may make their potential actual early in the year. New recruits might make a splash. Pretty much anything can happen -- anything except replacing Jordan and Langel with ease, that is. Two like those don't come around often.

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