By lighting up scoreboard, Columbia wakes up a sleeping giant

NEW YORK -- For nearly three full quarters on Saturday afternoon, the Baker Field homecoming crowd watched something it probably hadn't expected to see that day.

A close game.

Penn had only mustered 14 points against a shoddy Columbia defense, and the Lions had just put the ball in the end zone to cut the Quakers lead to 14-7.

But, oddly enough, the Lions' lone scoring play seemed to foreshadow their imminent demise, as it quickly awakened the Red and Blue from its prolonged lull.

On the strength of two touchdowns in a span of 2:23 by reserve running back Jake Perskie, Penn quickly jumped out to an insurmountable 28-7 advantage with just 1:06 remaining in the third period.

"I give our kids a lot of credit," Penn coach Al Bagnoli said. "They hang in there pretty well and there wasn't any sign of panic. I think they did a real good job of executing at that point."

Penn's offense had not particularly struggled prior to its 14-point explosion late in the third, during which Perskie seemed to provide just the spark the Quakers needed.

Penn quarterback Gavin Hoffman completed 25 of his 32 passes for a season-high 244 yards, while Kris Ryan went for 126 yards on 18 carries before resting his sore knee late in the game.

The problem, until those critical two-and-a-half minutes, had been red zone futility.

"We move the ball pretty quickly, but once we get to the 20, we always seem to have a false start or a penalty," Hoffman said. "We'll get that shored up. I think it's just a mindset problem."

The problem seemed to have been solved by Perskie, a third-string sophomore running back who had previously been relegated to fourth quarter mop-up duty in the Quakers' blowout victories.

But Bagnoli called on the Somers Point, N.J., native to serve a far more important role on Saturday. With Ryan and junior Todd Okolovitch on the sidelines with injuries, Perskie filled in with 83 yards on 14 rushes.

Most of those stats were compiled on the two drives that he concluded with scores.

"I'm obviously not a game-breaker kind of back like Kris Ryan," Perskie said. "I was just trying to get the offense to execute well."

He maintained that his strategy out on the field was no different at Columbia than it is under any other circumstance.

"Nothing has changed for me," Perskie said. "Being in the game is being in the game. I was just trying to pick up five yards here, 10 yards there."

Ryan is expected to return to the lineup for Saturday's game against Yale.

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