Defensive line dominates in Football win

PRINCETON, N.J. -- If the old adage that defense wins championships is really true in a conference as bent on wild offensive numbers as the Ivy League, then the Penn football team has put itself in a pretty good position all season. The Quakers entered Saturday's contest at Princeton ranked second in the Ancient Eight in both scoring defense and total defense. That the Red and Blue surrendered 24 points to Princeton is a bit misleading; the Quakers found themselves in an early 18-point hole largely as a result of turnovers that put the defense at a distinct disadvantage. Of Princeton's four first-half scoring drives, only one started in the Tigers' own half of the field. Penn allowed just 318 yards of total offense, and for the first time all season, adhered to another old football adage. "The other team's quarterback must go down, and he must go down hard." The Quakers started Saturday with a pass rush that had laid out opposing quarterbacks 15 times in seven games, more in the Ivy League than only the lambswool-soft defenses of Dartmouth and Columbia. After introducing Princeton quarterbacks to the Princeton Stadium sod eight times on Saturday, the Quakers have the Ivy League lead with 23 sacks. Eight sacks for 56 yards. Columbia has 10 for 68 all season. The Quakers charged through the Princeton offensive line so hard that by the end of the game, the Tigers were down to their third-string center. "Eventually, we were just pushing 'em back and creating piles in the backfield," Penn defensive tackle Ed Galan said. "We were making the quarterback go up in the pocket, and getting him sacked." The battle in the trenches was not only won by Penn on the pass rush on Saturday. The Quakers were land mines to the Princeton ground attack. The Tigers rushed 50 times for 111 yards, working out to a horrific average of 2.2 yards per carry. The Quakers also forced two fumbles, recovering one. After a first half in which the Penn offense seemed content to present the ball to its hosts on a platter, the Red and Blue actually managed to break even in turnovers on the day after their utter domination of the Tigers in the second half. "Eight sacks and any turnovers, that's obviously not going to help your effort," Princeton coach Roger Hughes said. "I have to give Penn's defense a lot of credit." After Penn's lightning-fast three touchdowns in the first eight minutes of the third quarter, the defense made it stand up. Penn blanked the Tigers for the entire second half. In that fateful third quarter, Princeton gained a grand total of three yards. Three yards. Penn's offense averaged over twice that per play on Saturday. There are a few things that might make the Penn defense's performance seem a bit less impressive. The Tigers started Brian Danielewicz at quarterback, their fourth different signal-caller of the year. And Princeton's offense did enter Saturday's game ranked sixth in the Ivy League in scoring, dead last in total yards. Still, what the Penn defensive line did on Saturday was nothing short of incredible. The Quakers front seven dominated a Princeton offensive line whose average weight was a robust 288. By comparison, the average Penn offensive lineman checks in at 276, a figure that would be even lower if not for 305-pound road grader Jeff Hatch. "Having Dennis Norman and [John] Raveche at the two tackles, they tried to push us around," Galan said. "We knew that they might be bigger, but we were quicker, so we started using that to our advantage. By the end of the third quarter, these guys were getting tired out trying to chase us down." The Penn defense held Princeton to 318 yards of total offense, all but unheard of in today's Ivy League. The Quakers had eight sacks, and bottled up the Tigers in the crucial third quarter. Going into next week's game against an explosive Harvard offense and a game in two weeks at supremely offensively-minded Cornell, Saturday's performance on the road has to give the Penn coaching staff confidence that their defense cannot only get the job done, but help lead the Red and Blue to the Ivy title.

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